Self Esteem

Self esteem is the value we place on ourselves. It encompasses a way of thinking, feeling, and acting that involves acceptance, respect, trust and belief in oneself.

Acceptance means living with both your strengths and weaknesses without a heap of self-criticism. Respect includes acknowledging your worth as a unique human being. Trust requires that you demonstrate consistency between your feelings and behaviours regardless of changes or challenges in your external circumstances. Belief in yourself includes feeling like you deserve to have good things in life.

Low self esteem can lead to a feeling of emptiness and a tendency to search for relief from something or someone who is external. This might serve the purpose of providing a temporary sense of satisfaction and fulfillment. However, if you are looking for a more permanent sense of relief, you need to search within yourself. That is the true path to self esteem.

Counselling will help you recognize and decide how to satisfy your emotional, social, mental, physical, and spiritual needs, in other words, to take care of yourself. Become aware of self defeating beliefs that may have made themselves at home in your head ("I can't do anything right", "no one understands"), and the feelings that go along with them. Learn how to unseat them. Cultivate assertiveness so that you can articulate what you want, or don't want. When you honour your own needs, others are more likely to respect you and less likely to take advantage of you.

"Whether you believe you can do a thing or not, you are right." - Henry Ford