Rebuilding Self-Esteem
If you want to be happy for an hour, take a nap. If you want to be happy for a day, go fishing. If you want to be happy for a month, get married. If you want to be happy for a year, inherit a fortune. But if you want to be happy for a lifetime, do something good for someone else.
- Anonymous
Without self-esteem, it's impossible to follow your intuition and do the right things that will lead to health and happiness. Self-esteem empowers will. Without self-esteem, will, passion, and determination will drain away. When this occurs, you become more vulnerable to herpes outbreaks caused by negative emotions.
What Causes Self-Esteem to Disappear in the First Place?
Things can happen to you in life that make you doubt yourself, sometimes terrible things, like contracting herpes or being abused in some way (or both). Sometimes it's just how someone you care about says something to you or how they look at you that can make you begin to doubt yourself. That doubt might lead to inaction due to fear of negative consequences or the risk of making mistakes. Inactivity eventually leads to even more uncertainty, low self-esteem, and a lack of confidence.
Besides trauma, another cause of low self-esteem is perfectionism. Setting unattainable standards can lead to a gradual decline in self-esteem. Perhaps you're unaware of how unrealistic your ideals or goals truly are, having been raised in a family where only perfection was considered acceptable. Or, maybe you don't give yourself credit for your accomplishments, even though you may have surpassed what might be regarded as average ability, for the same reason. Constant expectation and striving for perfection lead to stress, overwhelm, and an inability to find self-acceptance. Hence, low self-esteem.
You may fear making changes. Some of us are better at it than others. We lose self-esteem when we fear change. There's nothing worse for self-esteem than denying available choices to avoid change.
Refusing to take direction for your own life and vacillating between difficult choices without ever deciding at all can make you feel as if you can't make any right decisions, no matter how small. When this mindset leads to stagnation, you may end up feeling as though life is passing you by, when, in fact, it is the other way around. Often, this occurs when we tune into our intuition.
In essence, self-esteem is lost when you doubt your ability to handle what life throws at you, when your standards are set so high that no one, not even you, can reach them, when you resist change because you are afraid, and when you stagnate. You lose self-esteem when you stop trusting yourself.
Over the next 14 days…
… decide to focus on carrying out the following activities to rebuild self-esteem. Try not to strive for perfection. Seeking perfection is another way of losing self-esteem. No one is perfect. Just focus on making small changes. After 14 days, you'll feel like a brand-new person.
Get Enough Sleep
We have a natural, built-in body rhythm that suggests we get our best sleep between 11 PM and 2 AM. Begin going to bed a half-hour earlier each week until you can get up at the same time every day and still get 8-10 hours of sleep. Get up at the same time every day. Sooner or later, you'll find yourself going to bed at the same time each night. See Getting a Good Night's Sleep.
Get Dressed When You Get Up
Do you want to feel like a loser? Day after day, hang out in your pajamas and watch the sun go down without ever getting dressed. Mark the start of your day by getting up, eating, brushing your teeth, or taking a shower. Stay away from screens. Finish your breakfast first. Prioritize your to-do list and do them. If you want to fly to Paris but only have $5 to your name, put that on your list too. You'll be delighted every time you see it on your notepad (this aligns with stretching your mind with imagination, mentioned later). Then, and only then, after you are fed with genetically appropriate foods and dressed, go about your day.
Eat Well, or At Least Better
Include a protein or healthy fat at each meal (such as cheese, meat, or eggs). Rather than calories, focus on eating genetically appropriate nutrition, complete with colorful foods, to relieve anxiety, panic, and overwhelm.
Cut Back On or Avoid Sugar, Processed Foods & Stimulants
If you are drinking a large amount of caffeine, switch to Oolong tea (a combination of black and green tea). Once you are accustomed to it, try switching to green or herbal tea.
Avoid foods made from white ingredients, such as white flour, bread, rice, potatoes, and sugar. Use stevia, a natural sugar substitute that can be cooked with, found at health food stores, or a small amount of raw honey for sweetening. Please note that stevia can cause diarrhea in sensitive individuals.
Avoid all prepared and junk foods. They cause acidosis, which in turn triggers inflammation, leading to herpes outbreaks. Cook a meal instead of eating that frozen pizza. Going cold turkey isn't necessary or suggested. Still, it is essential to begin to cut down on (and then avoid) these things, which cause inflammation and trigger herpes breakouts (and autoimmune disorders).
Move That Body of Yours
There may be times when regular exercise programs are out of the question, but find some activities you enjoy, such as walking on the beach or gentle stretches, to incorporate some movement into your life. Begin doing something. If you have overlapping conditions, it's best to consult with your healthcare provider and proceed slowly. Whatever exercise you choose, do it only until you feel the first signs of tiredness. If you can only walk for 5 minutes, that's okay. That is where you begin. Don't push yourself. Just keep going at the speed or effort that causes you no pain. Add 2 minutes of walking or an extra set of stretches each week. Build up slowly.
Get Rid of Junk and Clutter
How could you create healthier spaces for yourself? Take a look around. Remove junk, clutter, and dirt from your house, yard, office, or car. Clutter and garbage can have a negative impact on your energy. It can make you feel stuck.
It can be hard to give things away. We form attachments or tell ourselves we may need our stuff someday. However, if you last used something over a year ago and don't know when you might use it again, it's time to let it go. If you still have the same clothes you wore when you were an itty-bitty teenager and are now a size 12, let them go. If you have cards and letters from childhood, organize them in albums or decorative boxes.
Is there something you could sell? It may help to look at it this way. Objects have a life too. There's nothing wrong with giving them a better one where they will be useful and loved again.
Keep the word "simplify" in your mind as you eliminate junk and clutter. You'll feel so much more energized when you accomplish this task.
Engage in Activities, Outings & Invitations
Remember, emotional feelings always follow taking action. Get to the store for dish soap, good food, and the sake of getting outside and engaging with nature. You'll feel better for doing so. Go to a park, and tune into nature. At the very least, engage in sense-based activities.
If you are invited somewhere and even a part of you wants to go, go! Nothing can defeat your self-esteem more than becoming isolated and telling yourself you have nothing to share with others. You will feel so much better after you do so, even if it is just that you allowed yourself to go. Your perspective and mood will improve, and you will feel happier with yourself.
Find things to do around your house or yard, starting with removing clutter and dirt. Face it. You may even be a perfectionist, but when you are depressed, your home will undoubtedly suffer neglect in some capacity. Clutter and garbage can have a negative impact on your energy. Organizing and cleaning your house helps to clean up your mind and aura.
Be Around Positive People
Not everyone has a network of positive people to surround themselves with. Some of us don't have even one person to lean on. If this is you, rent a comedy show or movie that will make you roll with laughter. Watch television shows that promise laughter as well.
If you have positive people who uplift you, reach out to them. Invite them over, even if you don't feel like it or don't feel you have anything to share. You do. You just don't know it. You'll be glad you did. Better yet, invite yourself out to their place for a bit of instant perspective. Friendship is a gift. Use it.
Given the current state of the world, it may not be possible to visit others in person. Get online and join groups or forums and meet like-minded individuals.
Ground Yourself (In this case, I don't mean spiritually, although that's a great idea too!)
Restrict yourself from watching any drama or news for two weeks and see if you can't feel your energy levels shifting positively. The world won't end when you stop watching drama and the news. If it does, it won't matter anyway. Instead, get outside and engage with nature, which you are a part of, even though you may not realize it.
Listen To Self-Empowering, Energizing Music
Even if you are not a music lover, finding music you love to listen to can help boost your self-esteem in the same way as finding like-minded people. I'm not talking about your favorite head-banging music or music that makes you want to beat someone up or makes you want to cry when you hear the words. No. Listen to music that soothes, dissolves into the background, and feels truly soothing, like a spiritual massage. You might check out your cable television music channel, if you have a paid TV subscription, or on YouTube. Play it while you cook, do dishes, read, type, drive, or pet the cat. Cats and children love soft music, by the way. When I need to tap into my spiritual self, I often listen to music, such as the soundtrack from The Last Kingdom. It might not be your thing, but it takes me to a distant land and far-off dreams. Find your thing. Listen regularly.
