Every situation has a silver lining – discover a mindset that heals and enlightens.
September 28, 2021 · 7 min read
The worst loneliness is to not be comfortable with yourself. - Mark Twain
We all know the importance of high esteem but often neglect it. Did you know that the higher esteem you have, the more successful you are likely to be? Not only that, but happiness also plays a vital role – people tend to be happier than those who have low self-esteem.
Therefore, if you want to improve your self-look, how to have a positive outlook on the world and how to be happier in general, we are going to help you understand these aspects better.
What is high-esteem?
High-esteem is an elevated state of one’s perception that his or her qualities and characteristics are positive. In other words, a person believes in himself and it makes himself feel better.
High esteem is made not only from your thoughts, but also the general view on how you perceive yourself. That includes your skills, relationships, physical and mental health, past background, life experiences, accomplishment, characteristics.
It’s also worth mentioning that every person has his own accentuations which elevate his whole high esteem. For example, some people are focusing a lot on their looks, which translates that it means a lot for them. Therefore, if they think that they look good, they’ll feel good and their esteem will rise dramatically.
11 Signs of high-esteem
High-esteem is linked with your physical behavior and mindset. Here are 11 signs of high-esteem:
- You don’t have difficulty to speak up
- You don’t criticize yourself in your mind
- You decisively make choices
- You feel like you deserve to have everything that you’ve worked for
- You don’t get influenced by other people
- You feel like you have control over your life
- You rarely ever doubt yourself
- You accept positive feedback
- You are not afraid to fail
- You don’t try to please anyone
- You take initiative
Why is high-esteem important?
High-esteem is important because it lets you to perceive yourself better and be more confident in your actions. In other words, that you like yourself and you have less doubts in yourself.
Moreover, high esteem helps you to evaluate how others see and treat you.
In one study it was found that high-esteem is linked with positive benefits. People with high esteem:
- Are more likely to take initiative and not be afraid of criticizing others.
- Are more likely to be persistent in achieving their goals.
- Are linked to be more popular and having a better opinion about themselves.
- May perform better in doing tasks than those with low esteem.
- Are more likely to contribute and speak up more often.
- May enjoy the benefits of being happier than those with low esteem.
- Operate under a bigger number of positive feelings which lead to less vulnerability.
It’s important to note that since high esteem comes from general outlook of one’s world, it means that it can help you to cope better in situations when you feel hopeless, having relationships problems, feel stress or anxiety.
A healthy high-esteem allows people to be overall more successful, face failures and realize that if something’s not going according to the plan, it’s not the end of the world. People who have high esteem see the world through a different lens with more positivity which results in better outcomes.
10 Tips on how to have high-esteem
1. Don’t compare yourself with others
Comparing yourself with others is a toxic activity to do. It plants a seed of negativity within yourself and eventually you might burn out.
Instead, you should practice comparing yourself with yesterday’s yourself. Ask yourself questions:
- What have I learnt today that I didn’t know yesterday?
- What have I done today to be a better person?
- Have I achieved today’s goals?
- Did I make someone happy?
- What could I have done better?
Wanting to be someone else is a waste of the person you are. - Marilyn Monroe
Practicing asking yourself questions can be a great way to improve yourself. As a result, your self-esteem will boost and you’ll have a more positive reflection about yourself.
2. Act more
It’s a common thing that a lot of people tend to overthink about everything. Starting from what food to prepare, ending with what career path I should take or should I leave my job.
Similarly, you have to validate your thoughts by implementing actions. High esteem is built from achieving accomplishments and not from overthinking.
Therefore, if you feel like you want to start a business, you’d obviously have ask yourself some important questions first:
- Do I have enough financial funds to start it and continue?
- Is there a market for this business?
- How long it will take me to become profitable?
- Am I committed enough to continue it until I see the results?
Of course, there are at least 10 more important questions you’d ask yourself first.
The point is, that you first have to validate if you really need to do an activity. After that you’ll learn and achieve everything on the go. 99% of people prefer to read and think instead of executing a task. When people don’t get a sense of achievement, they start developing low self-esteem.
That’s the main problem that reduces your good self-esteem, because one of the elements that influence your self-esteem are accomplishments. Therefore, act more and think less.
3. Do more of what makes you happy
It was found that people with high esteem are more likely to be happy. Happiness is essentially what we are thriving for through good esteem.
Consequently, you should never forget things that make you happy. If you enjoy to play a guitar, have a hot shower, have a massage or any other activity – go on and do it. It will spark within you a sense of satisfaction and will make you more relaxed.
The most terrifying thing is to accept oneself completely. - C.G. Jung
Performing activities that you enjoy will let you adopt a more positive mindset. Eventually, we all need to have some time with ourselves no matter the circumstances. Prioritizing yourself to a healthy extent will have a positive toll on your emotional well-being.
4. Surround yourself with positive people
If you can, find people that are encouraging and would make you feel better. Perhaps you haven’t seen for a very long time your old good friend? In that case, you should arrange a meeting and have a talk.
Highly esteemed people will be glad to help you to become also an esteemed person.
Spending time with your friends can improve your self-esteem dramatically. This is how they can help you:
- Reduce your stress with empathy
- Prevent loneliness
- They can encourage you to become healthier
- Improve mental health
- Boost self-confidence
You can also meet new people by attending community events, volunteering, joining a new class or by even just taking a walk. The hardest thing is to strike up a conversation.
However, it’s a fear that you have to beat and just do it. In this way, you’ll benefit not only from spending time with positive people, but also by initiating the conversation and boosting your self-confidence.
5. Have positive talks with yourself
It’s not too hard to fall into a negative self-talk cycle. Negative self-talk promotes insecurity, hopelessness and lowers your self-esteem.
To cope with this, you should appraise the positive talk with yourself. Be grateful for what you have today and let yourself know that you are doing everything in your power to become a better person. Valuing yourself can go a very long way for your positive self-perception image.
Whenever you achieve something, celebrate it. Encourage yourself with words like “I’m so proud of myself that I’ve done this. I’ve been postponing it, but now it feels great to complete this task. I should do it more often!”
Be faithful to that which exists within yourself. - Andre Gide
Whenever you do a task, instead of saying: “I’m not sure if I’ll be able to cope with it. What if I don’t?”, say “I’ll give my best to cope with this task. At worst, if I fail, I’ll gain experience and the next time I’ll crush this task!”
You can also try to talk with yourself as if you were talking with your friends. Encourage yourself, stay positive and everything will work out just fine.
6. Help someone
Volunteering can be an amazing way to increase your esteem and experience health benefits. Volunteering, in other words, is an activity in which you give your abilities and time to help others without financial benefits.
This grateful attitude to help others can make a difference in others’ lives and improve your well-being as well as make your esteem higher.
Here are some benefits of volunteering:
- Meeting new people
- Boosts confidence
- Gaining more knowledge in a certain area
- Becoming happier by gaining a sense of purpose
- Helps to relief the stress
- Helps to improve problem-solving skills
You don’t have to spend any money in order to help others. All it requires is your time. Therefore, it turns out that helping someone can benefit in improving your self-esteem.
7. Accept and forgive yourself
It’s common that people always carry a huge burden on their shoulders and always try to make the most out of themselves. This is a highly competitive world where we insist ourselves to always stay at the top. However, we must also to know when to take a break.
Accept yourself if you can’t keep up with the pace. To be exact, it’s not a race to live a life. You have to enjoy the process and ride along.
You must also keep in mind that no one’s perfect. A lot of people on social media look amazingly successful when in reality their life might be miserable in terms of relationships, happiness, self-view and other factors. You might not accept yourself for not being like them, but keep in mind that 99% of it is an illusion.
Self-esteem is made up primarily of two things: feeling lovable and feeling capable. - Jack Canfield
Be grateful for what you have and forgive yourself for your mistakes. If you will never learn to forgive yourself, you’ll never feel satisfied. As a result, your esteem levels will plummet and you’ll feel even worse.
You’ll become a high esteemed person only if you’ll be able to accept yourself first.
NOTE: be careful not to fall into a self-pity cycle. Justifying your failures all the time can actually have a negative impact and make you lazier and non-ambitious person. You have to use common sense and know the boundaries when it’s appropriate to forgive yourself.
8. Stay active
You’ve already probably heard how people become more confident when they start exercising. Not only physical activity has benefits for your physical health, but it also has benefits for your mental health.
Exercising helps with:
If you stay active, you may also improve your self-image. You’re very likely to strengthen your body while exercising. As a result, you may experience loss in weight and increase of muscle and stamina. Seeing these results will help you feel better about yourself and have a higher esteem.
Not only that, but you can also experience in a better brain performance. Supplying your brains with oxygen and other valuable nutrients you’ll feel more alert and efficient. As a result, you will cope with the tasks better and increase your self-esteem.
9. Embrace your fears
Fears are the enemies of confidence. If your fears are holding you back and results in more significant problems, it’s time for you to face it.
First, you should analyze your fear. It could be a case that you are not aware of details about it. For example, you might fear scuba diving. However, it’s totally safe as long as you are aware of your oxygen levels in a tank, the environment that you are in and other precautionary tips.
You might find that it’s actually very fun to do and it might create a lot of joy and memorable experiences.
No one actually knows what the hell they’re doing. Everyone is just working off their current best guess. - Mark Manson
However, always have common sense in mind and evaluate the risks. Some activities that people fear have no risks, but they fear them with their whole heart, for example, public speaking. You can research more about public speaking, read success stories, learn how to prepare for them, etc.
Embracing your fears will definitely skyrocket your esteem and make you feel accomplished.
Nevertheless, you shouldn’t face every fear you have. You must distinguish which ones hold you back for achieving great goals. Therefore, you have to determine by clarifying out a few points:
- What are the pros and cons of your particular fear?
- What would you achieve if you’d overcome your fear?
- How realistic is for your fear to come true?
10. Stay curious
Curiosity makes your mind become active instead of passive. Searching for answers, accomplishing your goals will make you to have a higher esteem. Being passive rarely leads anywhere, except for mediocre life. If you thrive to achieve more than that, consider adopting a curious mind.
Also, being curious allows you to increase your creativity. You will start developing new ideas and perhaps even implementing them into practice. If you can fix a gadget, sharpen a knife, dye your hair alone, etc., it will definitely make a difference in your esteem levels.
Therefore, if you want to become curious, be open-minded for every opportunity and idea. Question those ideas, suggestions and validate them. Try to perceive learning as something fun and where you could implement it.
Final Words From Delightful Mindset
High esteem is a very important element in your life for happiness. For some people approaching high esteem can be easier than for others, but don’t get discouraged. Eventually, you’ll be able to become confident and enjoy the fruits of your hard work.
Don’t forget to only compete with yourself and not others. Becoming a better person than yesterday will gradually build your personality, achievements list and you’ll turn out as your best version sooner or later.
Here you can also watch an informative video on how to have higher self-esteem: