High self-esteem - How to get it!

[eviljedi]

I've been thinking a lot about self-esteem/confidence lately. Why do some people act really confidently and others are extremely shy?

 

 

Over the past few weeks I've tried the majority of confidence building material available today. There is one major problem with all of it. Let's say you are a shy guy with low self-esteem. You buy a hypnosis product and a book about confidence and use them every day for a week. You will notice a change in your confidence and you will feel better. However this change won't last.

 

Why do people have low self-esteem? Because they don't like themselves. Listening to hypnosis or doing confidence building exercises or affirmations or anything like that - isn't going to change the way they are. After the short boost in confidence is gone they will feel bad again because they haven't changed themselves in anyway.

 

Example: If a guy feels bad because he doesn't have enough money to live the lifestyle that he desires then he will still feel bad after any hypnosis effects have worn off. He still won't have more money and he still won't be living the lifestyle he wants.

 

 

So if you're shy right now and you have low self-esteem, how do you become super confident? Glad you asked.

 

 

 

ACTION!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

 

 

If you aren't living the way you want then TAKE ACTION and start growing and developing yourself. Take action, means become more like the person who gets the results you want (i.e. do what they do).

 

Think about it, if you were living your ideal life; you had all the girls you wanted, all the money, all the charisma etc. Would you feel shy? Would you feel like you hated yourself? NO WAY! You would love yourself!!! You couldn't help but smile thinking about how awesome you really are!!

 

 

The problem with this is that a lot of people feel like they need a certain amount of confidence in order to take action. If they don't have that confidence they don't take action and it turns into a vicious spiral of doom!

 

I recently discovered PASSION after listing to Tony Robbins talk about state changing. He talks about different levels of passion (1-10) and how feeling passionate can help you get things done. I've had the feeling before but I never labelled it or consciously noticed it. It's AMAZING!

 

You don't need confidence to take action. You need passion! You need to really want it! Get yourself pumped up like crazy!! Jump around listening to your favourite song!! Sing along!! SMILE!! Do whatever you need to do to get yourself in a passionate state.

 

 

Once you take action it's just a matter of time before you get the results you want. As long as you keep taking action and changing your approach, you WILL get ANYTHING!

 

 

Here it is again:

 

Feel bad and shy --> Become passionate! --> Take ACTION --> Get results --> Feel confident and awesome!!

 

 

 

Stay passionate.

eviljedi

[Scotcha]

I agree with you.. There is no easy way to feeling good about yourself.

 

Self-Esteem is EARNED!!!

[HealingHandsWarmHeart]

i disagree...it is not earned.

 

it is a state of being. It is a mindset.

 

if you think you are no fun, no good, unloving, unattractive, unwanted, all the uns that make up negative self talk..then you will be exactly what you think you are.

 

on the flip side..if you become aware of your thought processes...the little voices that say "i can't do that, i will fail" ..."he/she won't want me ..i'm unattractive..." - change the station..play a new song..and starting saying i am attractive, i am worthy, i am smart, i can do it...you'll be surprised at the results.

 

I speak from experience..through trial and error ..and everyday ..i fight the fight and walk the walk of positive self talk.

[Scotcha]

I speak from experience..through trial and error ..and everyday ..i fight the fight and walk the walk of positive self talk.

 

Then you have earned your self-esteem!

[Luke Skywalker]

eviljedi; or should I call you a sith - probably one in the same.

 

Have you tried what you preached? Are you now a confident person with high-self esteem following your forumula? What has it done for you?

 

Hearing too much forumleas - where is the details in the testimony - say more please.

[Kyoshiro Ogari]

Scenario #1: If you think you're beautiful but people keep telling you you're butt ugly, you'll have one of two reactions:

 

A) "They're jealous!"

B) "They're right!"

 

You can have your up days and your down days, but since your esteem is high to begin with, sticks and stones are your only enemies.

 

Scenario #2: If you think you're butt ugly but people keep telling you you're beautiful, you'll have one of two reactions:

 

A) They're crazy.

B) They're psycho.

 

An up day for you is rare. On a scale from 1-10, 3 is the highest you've felt about yourself and chances are you were drunk when this feeling arose. And since you were tainted with low self esteem to begin with, sticks and stones are the least of your problems.

 

I'm scenario #2, minus the compliment. No girl ever has told me I'm handsome, but they tell my friends all the time, so this is hammered into my head and now I have 20+ years of being looked over to work against. If a girl does manage to tell me I'm cute/handsome, my self esteem will rise high. Some will say that I don't need anyone else's opinion, that my opinion is the only one that matters. That is true if I was trying to pick myself up in a bar.

 

I agree with trial and error. You need, what they call in the role playing world, experience points, which is in the form of opinions from others along with your own opinion about yourself. I have +1* experience point, and that asterisk is because my mommy tells I'm handsome.

[HealingHandsWarmHeart]

luke... i didn't earn it..it was always there...i just had to bring it to the service.

[eviljedi]

i disagree...it is not earned.

 

it is a state of being. It is a mindset.

 

if you think you are no fun, no good, unloving, unattractive, unwanted, all the uns that make up negative self talk..then you will be exactly what you think you are.

 

on the flip side..if you become aware of your thought processes...the little voices that say "i can't do that, i will fail" ..."he/she won't want me ..i'm unattractive..." - change the station..play a new song..and starting saying i am attractive, i am worthy, i am smart, i can do it...you'll be surprised at the results.

 

I speak from experience..through trial and error ..and everyday ..i fight the fight and walk the walk of positive self talk.

 

I agree with you. If you are telling yourself that you suck all the time then of course you won't feel good. Positive thinking can only help you so much though. You can sit and say to yourself, "I'm a cool person, I’m a cool person, people like me...." but then when you go out your internal voice will be saying "You're lying! You're wrong! No one likes you!"

 

If you forget about what other people think and CREATE the life that you want, then it won't matter if anyone likes you or not because you will like yourself!

[AntiLove_SuperStar]

That is very true. I like it.

[FoxLocke]

I am still a work in progress on the self esteem front myself...

 

However, through positive self talk and reinforcement I am learning to change all of my old thought patterns...

 

When I was in highschool I suffered from a condition called "Body Dysmorphic disorder" where you believe that you are too ugly to live even if you are an attractive or decent looking individual...

 

It has taken me years to break down those barriers. Even to this day when people tell me they think I am Handsome or beautiful I second guess them and think, "Oh you are just saying that..."

 

When you deal with years of negative self talk it is hard to overcome...But it can be done.

[eviljedi]

eviljedi; or should I call you a sith - probably one in the same.

 

Have you tried what you preached? Are you now a confident person with high-self esteem following your forumula? What has it done for you?

 

Hearing too much forumleas - where is the details in the testimony - say more please.

 

Hey Luke. Of course I practice what I "preach"! With this simple technique I have managed to turn myself from a social reject into the life of the party.

 

 

Here's how I done it: At first I felt shy around a lot of people. I wasn't good at small talk and I always felt self-conscious in social situations. My social life was completely dead! No one would phone me or call me to go out. I felt like a loser staying in on Friday nights when 'everyone else' was out having fun.

 

I got sick of it!! One day I just snapped!! I couldn't take it anymore. I wasn't being myself; I was being who other people wanted me to be. I decided from that moment on that I would do ANYTHING in order to change!

 

I started by reading loads of books about social interactions. I read and read and read and I found lots of useful information but after about a month I realized that I hadn't changed. I got even more annoyed at myself and even more motivated to change. I decided that I was no longer shy. Now if someone said name your best quality I would always say confidence. I WAS a confident person. It was part of me now.

 

I thought - "Okay, I'm a confident person. What do confident people do?" I started to act the same as confident people around me. I started talking to more people and not caring about what they thought. I started doing what I wanted. I started to be more myself in social interactions. I started making decisions and going after what I wanted. I started to talk to more girls and people started to respect me more.

 

I started to become more and more confident until pretty soon I loved myself. At first I was a little worried I was becoming a narcissist, but I realized that this is what high self-esteem is supposed to feel like! You need to be around yourself 24/7 so why not change yourself into someone you love!

 

 

You can see that if I had sat at home and waited for my confidence to increase before taking action then I would still be sitting in my room feeling sorry for myself. The important part was getting motivated; passionate and really wanting to change. If I didn't really want it then I doubt I would have ever taken action. It can't be something you would quite like or would be kinda nice. You MUST be 100% committed to changing!

[ImThatGirl]

 

 

Here it is again:

 

Feel bad and shy --> Become passionate! --> Take ACTION --> Get results --> Feel confident and awesome!!

 

 

 

Stay passionate.

eviljedi

 

I like this too. It's easy to want more and stay in the slump of thinking it's not possible. When you think it's not possible, it's hard to be passionate about something.

 

Operate with "Opportunities are Endless" If you become passionate and work towards your goals, you will feel good about yourself.

 

I was a grouch - driving 2.5 hr day commute - living in a small town - rushing around all the time. Took me awhile to get out of the stump. Finally, finally set a goal - moved closer to work and the city - finished an associates degree. And taaadaaa - I'm not so bad afterall.

[FoxLocke]

Also, as opposed to looking at everything you hate, fixate on the ONETHING you are good about and magnify it...lol.

 

I look at all of my good qualities and that makes me feel really high on myself.

 

However, you have to, eventually, take the good with the socalled bad and love it all!

[easyguy]

I used to have pretty low self-esteem. Then one day it just hit me that everyone is different. Everyone has different qualities that make them unique. Making comparisons in order to try and see how you stack up is kind of pointless, because everyone looks for something different in a person.

 

It's all about your thoughts. Nothing else. If you believe that you are unique and strong, then that is how it will reflect in your character.

[jimpster2005]

'Why do some people act really confidently and others are extremely shy?'

 

The answer could be in your question! Some people ACT really confidently.

 

Pretend to be confident, and after a while you won't need to pretend any more

[LIFE]

Actually I dissagree. I think that confidence has to come before action, because it is what leads you to perform the action. You think that whatever you are doing will work, thereforeeee you do it regardless what happens. A lot of things that I do I always try to picture me doing it perfectly, and then I will go do it. That's the way I go about it. Because yuou don't need any proof to validate that you have confidence, I think you can have it any time if you just believe in yourself.

[g44]

my 2 cents...for me self -esteem goes hand in hand with confidence...and for me when u are confident there is no need to boast about yourself - especially about material things. if anything, being humble allows u to place superficial things in priority...how does boast about having material things equal self -esteem - self -esteem comes from knowing u don't need these things and don't need then to validate who u are. just my take on that tho. everyone is different

[eviljedi]

'Why do some people act really confidently and others are extremely shy?'

 

The answer could be in your question! Some people ACT really confidently.

 

Pretend to be confident, and after a while you won't need to pretend any more

 

Yeah, "fake it till you make it" good concept but first you really need to want to change.

 

 

Actually I dissagree. I think that confidence has to come before action, because it is what leads you to perform the action. You think that whatever you are doing will work, thereforeeee you do it regardless what happens. A lot of things that I do I always try to picture me doing it perfectly, and then I will go do it. That's the way I go about it. Because yuou don't need any proof to validate that you have confidence, I think you can have it any time if you just believe in yourself.

 

This is true for when you have confidence but when you feel bad and depressed then how do you get the confidence to take action? You don't. It's almost impossible to "just believe in yourself" when you are feeling really down.

 

You get passionate and decided that you really MUST change and then you take action without confidence.

 

The belief that you currently have may be limiting you; you might not try things because you don't feel confident. Think about the first time you were learning to ride a bike or a car. Did you feel confident? No. You were probably really bad the first few times but you kept taking action without the confidence and eventually you succeeded. You gained confidence by taking action.

[LIFE]

 

 

 

This is true for when you have confidence but when you feel bad and depressed then how do you get the confidence to take action? You don't. It's almost impossible to "just believe in yourself" when you are feeling really down.

 

You get passionate and decided that you really MUST change and then you take action without confidence.

 

The belief that you currently have may be limiting you; you might not try things because you don't feel confident. Think about the first time you were learning to ride a bike or a car. Did you feel confident? No. You were probably really bad the first few times but you kept taking action without the confidence and eventually you succeeded. You gained confidence by taking action.

 

Well then maybe that's how you perceive it and how you approach the topic of confidence and it's pretty interesting. I think that everyone has their own different methods and there is no real definite answer.

 

The thing is that everyone feels down once in awhile. But then common sense usually creeps back in and brings you back to the level of consciousness that you were at before. No one can 100% confident all the time, just as no one is 100% unhappy all the time. But I think if you are more confident than you are depressed, then you're set.

 

As for the bike riding thing, I had no doubt in my mind that I was going to learn how to ride a bike. Just like I have no doubt in my mind that I was going to learn how to drive. So eventually, I learned both.

 

If you have doubts, then it's not going to work for you. Because I have a lot of doubts everytime I try to swim. I cannot swim at all. And of course I would get nervous when I get in the water, so even to this day I can't swim because I seriously doubt my ability to learn how to swim. So there is no confidence there at all. See if I had just a little more confidence stepping into the water, then learning how to swim would not have been a problem at all.

[eviljedi]

As for the bike riding thing, I had no doubt in my mind that I was going to learn how to ride a bike. Just like I have no doubt in my mind that I was going to learn how to drive. So eventually, I learned both.

 

If you have doubts, then it's not going to work for you. Because I have a lot of doubts everytime I try to swim. I cannot swim at all. And of course I would get nervous when I get in the water, so even to this day I can't swim because I seriously doubt my ability to learn how to swim. So there is no confidence there at all. See if I had just a little more confidence stepping into the water, then learning how to swim would not have been a problem at all.

 

Perhaps you were passionate about learning to drive/ride a bike but you don't really want to swim. If you really wanted it, you'd get it.

[Celadon]

Great OP! I can see you were PASSIONATE about writing it. lol.

 

I've struggled with confidence, and someone here advised me to identify a role model and act like her. Sometimes acting confidently is a matter of having the example, and the tools. As you said, what do confident people DO? What skills do they act out? Motivation is essential, as are ideas on how to get to where you want to go.

 

Here's a situation I could use advice on: Last night I was at a music rehearsal - I'm part of a community band. And this one guy comes in, and he's an extravert, and he starts talking, making jokes, etc. Basically, being confident and getting in the mix. To be honest, I sort of felt like he was taking over. And being as I struggle with confidence, I didn't really like it. The more he talked, the more I started to shrink. What's with that???? I hate that!! I hate how I reacted. I hate *feeling* overshadowed, and I hate having no clue as to what to do. What would any of you do?

 

So yeah, I want passionately to be in the mix. I need to know how to act confidently in a social situation like that. I am NOT an extravert, but I don't want to feel intimidated by someone who comes in and acts like he's all that, you know? What holds me back is fear of looking like a fool (you know, doing something socially inappropriate). But what I want is people's respect and attention and enthusiasm.

[now_better]

humble/shy vs confidence vs arrogance... i could use a dose of TurboConfidence, but at what point are you no longer just confident, but think you're better than other people? i find that i'm a very humble, reserved, laid back person and i view how other people act around me. some people are so full of themselves, you can't help but laugh (in your head) and pity them. i would hate myself if i ever turned into a person like that. what do you guys think?

[Celadon]

humble/shy vs confidence vs arrogance... i could use a dose of TurboConfidence, but at what point are you no longer just confident, but think you're better than other people? i find that i'm a very humble, reserved, laid back person and i view how other people act around me. some people are so full of themselves, you can't help but laugh (in your head) and pity them. i would hate myself if i ever turned into a person like that. what do you guys think?

There's a definite difference between confidence and arrogance, and confidence and narcissicism. I'd say arrogant and narcissistic people are motivated by a need to be dominant or in the center of attention all the time. Confident people can share the spotlight and even support others being in the spotlight. They're secure.

 

I'd just like to get to the point of security, where I can laugh in my head at someone, rather than feel like ... "Hm, maybe I should be like that since they're getting what they want."

 

OTOH, sometimes I am not quite sure what I want. To be in the spotlight? To control a conversation? Or simply not to be left out? Hm....what do you guys think your goal is?

[sidehop]

Great thread. I used to be THE loudest kid in the class but that all changed, most likely due to the culture I grew up in & moving to the US was completely different place in terms of how people communicate and are more open.

 

There are number of reasons but one of the biggest is my English. I can speak it fine, people say I have no accent whatsoever & surprised that it's my second language. But I also know that it's not the best & I tend to pause because I don't know words to say. The ADHD medication has definitely helped me because I can focus better. I'm working on just talking to people in general and looking at them when I do which is my biggest hurdle.

 

I do feel more confident when I get positive reaction or I know that the person or people I'm talking to is really interested to what I have to say.