What is self-esteem?

As a confidence coach I'm often asked what is self-esteem and how is it different from confidence.

Confidence is defined as a feeling of trust in your abilities, qualities and judgement.

Whereas self-esteem relates to your self-worth and how you value yourself in the world.

Someone with low self-esteem would have an overall negative belief about themselves. They'd tend to focus on their weaker points and blame themselves for any difficulties or mistakes.

If your self-esteem is higher, you generally believe you're okay and recognise your strengths. When there are tough times in your life you can cope with them without feeling a victim or taking all the responsibility.

If you're not sure where you are on the self-esteem scale then look at these types of behaviours and decide which describe you the most, or perhaps you demonstrate both types of behaviour?

High self-esteem behaviours:

  • Have a balanced view of your positives and negatives.
  • Take care of yourself physically and emotionally.
  • Willing to trust others.
  • Independent.
  • Optimistic.
  • Willing to take risks.
  • Compassionate to yourself.
  • Learn from your mistakes.
  • Open-minded to others.
  • Trusting yourself and your intuition.
  • Collaborative.
  • Take responsibility for your actions and not always blaming others.

Low self-esteem behaviours:

  • Focused on your perceived negatives.
  • Self-blame and criticism.
  • Pessimistic.
  • Fear of taking risks.
  • Blaming attitude.
  • Avoid taking responsibility for actions.
  • Fear of confrontation.
  • Perfectionist behaviours.
  • Oversensitive to others comments.
  • Comparing yourself to others.
  • Needing to be right.
  • Dependant on others for decisions.

Your self-esteem can fluctuate with your current experiences in life and most of us are somewhere around the middle of the scale. To work on building a healthier self-esteem I suggest starting by getting a clear picture of your positives and strengths as well as your flaws.

Jo

The views expressed in this article are those of the author. All articles published on Life Coach Directory are reviewed by our editorial team.

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