In my previous post I discussed what fear is and discussed one approach to deal with fear. I would however like to clarify and further discuss the seventh fear, i.e. fear created by the negative influence from other people. I mentioned in the previous post that people who don’t value themselves, i.e. poor self-worth and poor self-esteem, find it hard not to open their minds to what everyone thinks of them. This is simply because these people don’t believe they have any value and therefore rely on the opinion of other people, or everyone else, to determine their value. This behaviour, which is a normal human trait, can thus be defined as: opening their minds to the opinions of other people. Let me just state here that we all exhibit this behaviour at one time or another, we all have fluctuating self-esteems. Very few people don't ever pay attention, and inherit, the opinions of other people simply because we were all trained to do so - every day sitting in school we were trained to open our minds to the teachings, opinions, etc. of other people. OK, now let's start by examining this everyone I have mentioned.
We all have this everyone, or what psychologists term the generalized other, but in fact this everyone is composed of just a few key people. Martha Beck says that our social nature makes us long to fit in with a larger group, but it’s difficult to hold the tastes and opinions of more than five or six individuals in our mind. So the resourceful thinking mind creates a kind of shorthand: it picks up a few people’s attitudes, emblazons them on your brain, and extrapolates this image until it covers the entire known universe. This is your personal generalised other and please don’t feel bad about it, I assure you we all have one or more of these groups.
We now know that our generalised other typically consist of the tastes and opinions of a small number of people. The people we choose to put into this small group are the people who had the biggest effect or influence on our lives, good or bad. Unfortunately, herein lies a dilemma for the people who do not value themselves, i.e. people with a poor sense-of-self or self-worth. Let's stop and focus on self-worth for a moment to understand why.
Our self-worth starts to develop from the time our subconscious mind starts recognizing our existence. I guess the exact timing is different for everyone but it happens while we are still in our mothers' womb. We are all born with a forming or partial sense of self-worth based on the experiences in the womb. This is reinforced, during the first year or two of our existence, by our experiences with the people around us - our parents, care givers, etc. The way in which these people fulfill our needs (i.e. care for us) has a major impact on the formation of our self-worth. These people all help us to form an opinion about ourselves and these experiences help us to place a value upon ourselves - a value we will believe to be true for the rest of our lives. Simple little things like how they respond to your demands or needs, or hearing 'you are a good girl' or 'you are a bad girl' vs. 'that is a good thing' or 'that is a bad thing' helps the infant to shape her sense of self. Over time, due to repeated experience, we start to believe that we are a good person who deserves good things (e.g. when our demands are met often and consistent) or we start to believe that we are a bad person who deserves bad things (e.g. when our demands are not met often and on a consistent basis). It is true what they say: words (and actions) have the power to create or destroy.
We all have this everyone, or what psychologists term the generalized other, but in fact this everyone is composed of just a few key people. Martha Beck says that our social nature makes us long to fit in with a larger group, but it’s difficult to hold the tastes and opinions of more than five or six individuals in our mind. So the resourceful thinking mind creates a kind of shorthand: it picks up a few people’s attitudes, emblazons them on your brain, and extrapolates this image until it covers the entire known universe. This is your personal generalised other and please don’t feel bad about it, I assure you we all have one or more of these groups.
We now know that our generalised other typically consist of the tastes and opinions of a small number of people. The people we choose to put into this small group are the people who had the biggest effect or influence on our lives, good or bad. Unfortunately, herein lies a dilemma for the people who do not value themselves, i.e. people with a poor sense-of-self or self-worth. Let's stop and focus on self-worth for a moment to understand why.
Our self-worth starts to develop from the time our subconscious mind starts recognizing our existence. I guess the exact timing is different for everyone but it happens while we are still in our mothers' womb. We are all born with a forming or partial sense of self-worth based on the experiences in the womb. This is reinforced, during the first year or two of our existence, by our experiences with the people around us - our parents, care givers, etc. The way in which these people fulfill our needs (i.e. care for us) has a major impact on the formation of our self-worth. These people all help us to form an opinion about ourselves and these experiences help us to place a value upon ourselves - a value we will believe to be true for the rest of our lives. Simple little things like how they respond to your demands or needs, or hearing 'you are a good girl' or 'you are a bad girl' vs. 'that is a good thing' or 'that is a bad thing' helps the infant to shape her sense of self. Over time, due to repeated experience, we start to believe that we are a good person who deserves good things (e.g. when our demands are met often and consistent) or we start to believe that we are a bad person who deserves bad things (e.g. when our demands are not met often and on a consistent basis). It is true what they say: words (and actions) have the power to create or destroy.
I have included an illustration to help explain how self-worth effects our behaviour. As mentioned above, our world view (lowest level in the pyramid, i.e. the base, or basis, of our behaviour) is created primarily from our experience of the world, but also from our genes inherited, enculturation, etc. As we experience more and more things, as we start to understand more about human interaction, what is good or bad vs. whether I am good or bad (as the example above illustrates) we start forming beliefs and making rules about how the world fits together and how to best function in the world (this is the second lowest level in the pyramid). These beliefs, right or wrong, become ingrained in us and are mostly automatically executed by our subconscious minds without even a rational thought applied to it. Our sense of self-preservation drives us to try and perfect our functioning in the world to the best of our abilities irrespective of how right or wrong the beliefs or rules might be that help us achieve this. I should note here that beliefs are classified into two major groups - beliefs that serve you and limiting beliefs that don't serve you, but which help or helped you to function in the world. Without going into detail here, the third level of the pyramid is our hierarchy of values, which is underpinned and formed by our beliefs, limiting-beliefs, and worldview. Finally we get to the visible part, our behaviour.
All of our behaviour, in this case opening our minds to the opinions of other people, is underpinned by the elements of the pyramid below us. What's more, our own behaviour and that of others, constantly adjust or add to our world view, which alters our beliefs and limiting beliefs, which alters our hierarchy of value, and which is then reflected in our behaviour once again. So the person with a poor sense of self could surely simply change their beliefs about themselves and stop paying as much attention to the opinions of others? The catch is that it's not that simple. Our mind will find ways of holding or maintaining our beliefs, irrespective of how limiting they are, simply because it has been able to preserve us to this point so it is likely to continue doing so.
So the question is: how do start valuing ourselves more? Here are some pointers:
All of our behaviour, in this case opening our minds to the opinions of other people, is underpinned by the elements of the pyramid below us. What's more, our own behaviour and that of others, constantly adjust or add to our world view, which alters our beliefs and limiting beliefs, which alters our hierarchy of value, and which is then reflected in our behaviour once again. So the person with a poor sense of self could surely simply change their beliefs about themselves and stop paying as much attention to the opinions of others? The catch is that it's not that simple. Our mind will find ways of holding or maintaining our beliefs, irrespective of how limiting they are, simply because it has been able to preserve us to this point so it is likely to continue doing so.
So the question is: how do start valuing ourselves more? Here are some pointers:
- You start by simply understanding your opinion and attitude toward yourself by listening to your language when you talk about yourself and paying attention to the thoughts you have about yourself. If it happens that you're putting yourself down, belittling your worth, and making light of your talents in the face of others, then you will come across as low in self-esteem. This isn't humility, it's self-denial and an attempt to lessen your presence.
- Learn to overcome a fear of self-love. Self-love is often equated with narcissism or egotism. However, healthy self love is about being your own best friend. Its about treating yourself with the same care, tolerance, generosity, and compassion as you would treat a special friend.
- Trust your own feelings. Self-worth requires that you learn to listen to and rely upon your own feelings and not automatically respond to the feelings of other people.
- Analyze yourself and challenge your limiting beliefs by applying some common sense to them.
- Stop making your self worth conditional on other peoples opinions and tastes. Remember that people change their minds about everything. Basing your value to the opinion of someone or everyone else disempowers you. It places you in a very volatile position and you should be aware that your value is likely to fluctuate constantly from highly valuable to worthless simply because they changed their minds. Avoid overlaying how you think other people see you.
- Tell and prove to yourself that you matter by accepting the responsibility for your circumstances, focusing your energy on what you need to do to change your situation or your circumstances, don't blame other people and avoid being a martyr, and work on your resilience. Resilient people have the emotional strength to get through life's difficulties without falling apart. This isn't about belittling the hardships and challenges of life – they are still very real – but it is about how you react and work your way through them. You always have a choice between demeaning yourself or always remembering your self-worth and staying firm in that resolve. Also, by taking time for yourself, doing things that matter to you and taking care of yourself, you demonstrate to yourself that you value you.
- Carry on believing in your self-worth even when you think you can't. Break the habit of trying to please everyone all of the time. Trying to keep everyone happy will leave you empty and disappointed and it will displease some people. Live in the present. The past has its lessons from which you've learned but it's long gone, so leave it behind you. Keep a notebook of your achievements. Every time you feel tempted to put yourself down and to bemoan that you're getting nowhere, make a cup of coffee, sit down comfortably and take out this book and read through it. Compete only with yourself, not with others! Express your feelings instead of bottling them up.
The past doesn’t exist except as a memory, a mental story,
and though past events aren’t changeable, your stories
about them are. You can act now to transform the way you
tell the story of your past, ultimately making it a stalwart
protector of your future.
and though past events aren’t changeable, your stories
about them are. You can act now to transform the way you
tell the story of your past, ultimately making it a stalwart
protector of your future.
Be Extraordinary!
Myles
Myles
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