Building legitimate self-esteem takes time and effort and this sign is basically a lie. It’s what I call “blowing sunshine”. You’re not important, special, amazing, or extraordinary merely by walking into a room. No more than you are a professional athlete merely by walking into a gym. The good news is that you CAN be important, amazing, and extraordinary if you’re willing to do the work. Start small. Do a little more today than you did yesterday. Go a little further, work a little harder, or learn a little more than you did yesterday. Then do a little more tomorrow and a little more the next day. With continued and consistent effort, you can be damn near anything you set your mind to.

People with legitimate self-esteem put in a lot of work to learn and do things they can feel good about. Many people are reluctant to put in the work to improve themselves because they compare themselves to people who are already experts. For example, someone who wants to learn to do a craft such as woodworking shouldn’t compare themselves to a master craftsman.

The master has spent years learning his or her craft. They’ve put the time in. They made lots of mistakes and failed many times and now are at the point where they can make it look easy. It wouldn’t be fair to the new woodworker to feel inferior because they are not as good as someone who has been doing it for twenty years. It also wouldn’t be fair to the master craftsman if someone could do the same quality of work as them in only a few days. But, if you’re willing to do the work, you should be able to become the master in due time.

If you have improvements you’d like to make to yourself, your life, or your relationship, counseling can help. I provide counseling for teenagers and college students, individuals. I also provide marriage counseling in Grand Rapids, Michigan. If you’d like more information, please contact me.

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My suggestion to my client was to be aware of the filters he tends to use when good things happen. Then instead of dismissing positive things or only seeing the negative side, he could consider other explanations. This is a strategy that will improve self-esteem by training yourself to consider new ways to interpret situations and events.

An example might be that you pass by someone and say hello to them and they don’t acknowledge you, you might at first assume they don’t like you or that you are unlikeable. That’s one possible filter. But other possible filters are that the person was deep in thought and didn’t hear you, or they are very shy in public and have trouble speaking to strangers ever though they would like to. Just considering there are other more positive explanations for events helps self-esteem.

My client summed it up this way. He said, “So you mean I should doubt my doubts!”. When he finds himself dismissing genuine compliments, he can doubt these doubts. He can consider the possibility that he has more positive things going on than he thinks. I liked his way of phrasing it much better than mine.

Gary Watson is a Solution Focused Therapist in Grand Rapids Michigan.  He provides counseling for couples, counseling for teenagers, and for adults.  He provides counseling for anxiety, depression, stress, college and work stress, and relationship problems.  For more information, please visit the website at www.turnaboutcounseling.com or call 616-914-9874.

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As a counselor for teenagers and college students, I often see clients who struggle with personal identity. They need counseling for self-esteem and to develop a personal sense of identify. High school students, college students, and young adults often have trouble figuring out who they are and exactly how they should navigate their world. This involves dating relationships, friendships, developing a sense of personal right and wrong, etc. They often look to me for input on what the “right way” to handle a situation is. However, I can usually only talk about what is right for me, or what has been “right” for other people. That doesn’t mean my ideas will be right for them.

So I find ways to ask questions that will encourage them to think about what is important to them, what they want, or how they want to “see” themselves or have other people see them. Quite often, rather than tell a client what they should do, I will tell them what I’m thinking about as they describe what’s going on for them. I do this so they can compare my ideas with what they are already thinking and gain some clarity about what they want to do.

Sometimes when I’m counseling someone for self-esteem issues they realize they should be doing something different. The idea seems good but they have trouble picturing themselves doing something different because it feels awkward. When one client mentioned this during a counseling session, it reminded me of something I saw on a TV show.

I watched a tv show not long ago and someone asked the main character why he wore a cowboy hat. His response was, “I tried it on and it fit”. The implication was that sometimes you try something new and if it fits, you keep doing it.

This is one of the objectives of therapy. You try a new behavior and it if works then keep doing it until it’s a part of you.

You might feel if you adopt a new attitude or behavior then others will think you’re pretending to be somebody you’re not. But if you try it on and it fits, why not just keep wearing it? After a while, you will be so comfortable with it you won’t feel like you’re playing dress-up anymore.

Gary Watson is a solution focused counselor in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He works with people who want counseling for self-esteem, depression, anxiety, self-confidence, relationships, and more. For more information about Solution Focused Therapy and how it works, visit the Solution Focused Brief Therapy Association website.

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