We all probably have an intuitive sense that self-esteem is an important factor affecting our interactions with others, our readiness to deal with problems, and our pursuit of our goals: liking ourselves gives us the self-confidence to meet these challenges and to do so more effectively.  Yet self-esteem is a vague and elusive concept, one which is difficult to apply on a practical basis.  This article addresses what self-esteem is, what its qualities are, and how it develops, and then applies this understanding to the issue of how to work on our self-esteem in our everyday lives. 

What is self-esteem?

Essentially, self-esteem is a measure of how well we like ourselves.  It is the evaluative component of our identity, our value judgment of who we are – the various roles, values and attributes that we identify as our own.  It goes beyond pure description and decides whether these qualities are good to have.  Yet self-esteem is not just a judgment of our individual qualities or traits, but a valuing of the total self – positive or negative.

What if we’re not sure about how we feel about ourselves?  Sometimes we might feel really pleased with ourselves, yet other times we might feel embarrassed or even ashamed of ourselves.

That’s an excellent point.  How we feel about ourselves can change considerably from day to day, or even from hour to hour, depending upon our circumstances. This variability is a second aspect of self-esteem, after the value aspect of high or low self-esteem.  This variability will differ from person to person.  Some individuals’ self-esteem remains rather consistent across different situations, whereas others’ varies widely with changing circumstances.

Why is self-esteem more consistent for some and more variable for others?

The stability of self-esteem is related to the degree of integration and stability of identity.  If our sense of who we are is inconsistent across different situations, then our sense of self-worth is likely to fluctuate, as well.  If, however, we are able to maintain the “big picture” of who we are despite different roles or conditions, then our self-esteem is likely to be rather stable.

Another factor contributing to this variability is the degree our self-esteem depends upon others.  This dependence may take two forms.  The more familiar version involves relying upon the regular affirmation or approval from others to feel good about ourselves.  And on the negative side, it is the degree to which our self-esteem is vulnerable to criticism, disapproval, and rejection by others.  The second and less familiar version of dependence involves achieving self-esteem through our identification with people and organizations that we admire.  For example, we feel better about ourselves if our partner receives an award or our hometown team wins the championship.  Our self-esteem is attained vicariously , through our identification with those whom we admire. Conversely, we suffer a blow to our self-esteem when our heroes let us down – we experience their shortcomings as reflecting poorly on ourselves.  With either type of dependence, our sense of self-worth would tend to fluctuate more if it depends extensively on others fulfilling these roles, since they are not always going to be there for us, whether by approving of our actions or by living up to our expectations.  The independence of our self-esteem, the degree to which we have taken charge of determining our own self-worth in spite of how others feel about us or how they meet our expectations, will therefore affect its stability – something we will address later in the article.

Yet another factor affecting variability of self-esteem is whether it is primarily conditional or intrinsic.  Conditional self-esteem involves liking ourselves according to our being and acting in a preferred or acceptable manner.  Intrinsic self-esteem, however,  is a sense of self-worth for just being ourselves, without having to prove ourselves by meeting any particular goals or expectations.  It makes sense that this sort of self-esteem is more stable, since it would not be influenced so much by the normal ups and downs of our changing functioning.

What if we really don’t stop to ask ourselves how much we like ourselves – does that mean we don’t have much self-esteem?

Not at all.  Our self-esteem doesn’t have to be expressed in words or even put into thoughts to be active.  It is implicit in how well we treat ourselves.  You are no doubt familiar with the saying, “Action speaks louder than words.”  When we give ourselves a reward for a job well done, or when we ask for help on a demanding task, or when we take the last piece of cake, our actions are saying that we are valuable and deserving.  And when we let others manipulate us without saying anything, or when we don’t ask for something that is very important to us, our inaction is expressing our self-esteem, though in a negative way.  Of course, we often do make conscious judgments about ourselves in such circumstances, and the degree to which we do expresses our emphasis on self-esteem – yet another aspect of this concept.

So, is it good or bad to emphasize our self-esteem?

That depends.  Being self-aware is generally good, and that awareness can be either descriptive or judgemental.  Descriptive self-awareness pays attention to what and how we think, feel and behave, but doesn’t pass judgement on it.  The current practice of mindfulness cultivates such an awareness of self.  Judgmental self-awareness, in contrast, evaluates whether our thoughts, feelings and actions are good or bad, and this function thus can be useful for guiding our behavior.  But an excessive emphasis on maintaining positive self-regard can be disruptive.  We lose something when preoccupation with our self-image overshadows the various activities and relationships in which we are involved.  The extreme attitudes of “winning is everything” and “image is everything” generally dampen the intrinsic enjoyment of life.  These outlooks also tend to play havoc with relationships.  If we are preoccupied with our self-image, we usually require others to affirm our self-worth on a regular basis.  We would tend to view others primarily in terms of how they enhance our self-image, and this would cause us to neglect or overlook their feelings, needs, and wants.  Or we might require others close to us to meet exacting standards so that we can feel good about ourselves through our identification with them.  A common example of this is parents who pressure their children to be star athletes.  While they often make extensive sacrifices, this comes at a considerable price to the child.  Thus, constantly judging ourselves, whether directly or vicariously through others, not only can interfere with our intrinsic enjoyment of  activities, but also can disrupt our relationships.

But doesn’t this argument suggest that concern with self-esteem is bad and that it just increases self-absorption?

That’s a common misconception.  People often assume that the more we care about ourselves, the less we care about others.  Here it is important to distinguish between narcissism, with its emphasis on self-image, and healthy self-esteem, which is largely intrinsic and relatively independent of others’ approval.  With narcissism our self-image is largely dependent upon both our own accomplishments and others’ recognition of them, and we would tend to perceive others in terms of our own ego needs, rather than as individuals in their own right.  Healthy self-esteem, however, involves substantial faith in our intrinsic self-worth, so that it is less dependent upon the continuing affirmation of others. Thus, when we have a fundamental sense of self-worth, we are able to maintain positive self-regard even when in conflict with others we value, thus enabling us to respect their feelings, needs,  wants and opinions.  Where this intrinsic self-esteem is lacking, it is possible to work on self-esteem without requiring the submission of others, so that the integrity of others is respected as well.  We’ll address this issue when we explore how to work on self-esteem.

But can’t this self-awareness also be detrimental in focusing too much on our faults?

That’s right.  When used properly, self-awareness is quite enriching and useful.  It can simply enrich our lives by allowing us greater appreciation of our own involvement in our activities, pursuits and relationships.  Or it can function as a time-out in a sports competition, whereby we assess our part in a problematic situation and plan out a strategy to approach it differently to resolve the problem.  Yet quite often the self-reflection actually interferes with the planning and problem-solving that it is supposed to serve.  When that happens, we usually speak of someone being “too self-conscious.”

What is responsible for this misuse of self-reflection?

One important aspect is what we might call the “blame and shame” cycle, in which we get so caught up in blaming ourselves for a problem and feeling such intense shame that it interferes with our examining an issue in a realistic manner to find an effective solution to a problem or to understand the meaning a particular paradox may hold for us.  Self-reflection can be an effective tool for solving problems or recognizing paradoxes, but with such critical self-judgment, it often is counter-productive, even to the point of causing us to avoid problems or conflicts we really need to address.  Another frequent mistake is setting excessively high standards for ourselves.  So instead of shooting for a goal which is within reach, we might strive for an objective that is unrealistic or currently unattainable.

So, there’s a lot more to self-esteem than just being high or low, positive or negative.

That’s right.  In summary, we can speak of five different aspects  of self-esteem – value, variability, emphasis, dependence on others, and conditional vs. intrinsic type.  Value is the most familiar to us, the positive or negative coloring of how we characteristically see ourselves.  The key word here is “characteristically,” since it implies some variability in self-esteem, which is  the second facet – the degree to which self-esteem fluctuates between highs and lows across time and situation.  The third aspect is the degree of conscious emphasis that we give to our self-esteem.  These three dimensions are affected by two other factors: first, the degree that our self-esteem is dependent upon others vs. its independence from influence; and second, the extent to which our self-esteem is conditional, dependent upon meeting certain expectations, vs. intrinsic, valuing ourselves just for being who we are without having to pass certain tests.  And problems in self-esteem can arise in some or all of these areas: our self-esteem can be generally low and variable, highly dependent on living up to standards and gaining the approval of others, while fostering an undue conscious emphasis on our self-image. 

Now that we have established what self-esteem is, how do we go about getting it?

Let’s start with how we attained our self-esteem in the first place.  Initially, we acquired our self-esteem through our parents and caretakers in two different ways, comparable to the two types of  dependence on others for our self-esteem that we examined earlier.  First, we learned to value ourselves according to the approval or disapproval of others, feeling good about ourselves with their praise and admiration and feeling bad about ourselves with their criticism and fault-finding.  The quality of these appraisals, whether they are intrinsic or conditional, is quite important for the development of our identity and self-esteem.  Intrinsic affirmation conveys our sense of worth for just being ourselves, whereas conditional affirmation is contingent upon our acting within a certain range of acceptable behavior.  We’ve all probably heard one or another version of the expression, “I love you, even though I don’t approve of your behavior.”  This is an example of unconditional acceptance of the person that builds intrinsic self-esteem.  With conditional affirmation our self-esteem tends to be less stable and to fluctuate with the perceived acceptability of our behaviour.  And with a fear of losing the approval of others, we tend to develop a “false self” that conforms to others’ expectations yet is untrue to our inner needs and feelings.

Another aspect of acquiring our self-esteem from others involves our identification with others whom we can admire and respect.  These people not only serve as role models to guide our development, but they also enhance our self-worth through our association with them.  In looking up to them, we feel better about ourselves.  Among other places, we witness this in the pride that people display in basking in the glory of their favorite sports team.

As is the case with our identity, we claim possession of our self-esteem when we challenge others’ appraisals of ourselves to determine our own self-worth.  Then our self-esteem becomes our own, gaining independence from the evaluations of others.

But don’t our parents and teachers need to correct us?  How are we going to learn anything if they don’t?

Yes, we do need help to learn from our mistakes, and we certainly need clear direction away from potentially dangerous situations.  Furthermore, the normal socialization process that helps us to develop our conscience and  moral values requires some disapproval of our behavior that violates the rights of others or simply neglects their feelings or needs.   Yet this disapproval often goes too far: frequently, it gets directed at the total self rather than at the problematic behavior, as we noted in the discussion of intrinsic and conditional self-worth.  The message may also be quite severe, such as “You’re stupid,” “You’ll never amount to anything,” or “You’re really disgusting.” We typically carry these messages with us well into adulthood, particularly if we have not also experienced more positive messages about ourselves to counter the negative evaluations.  These messages tend to be consolidated into an internal force with a life of its own, acting on us largely outside of our conscious control. After hearing these messages so many times, we  “internalize” them, or make them our own, to have available to say to ourselves when we let ourselves down.  This internalized condemning voice is sometimes referred to as the harsh inner critic, the punitive superego, or the internal saboteur.  Yet it usually doesn’t make sense to beat ourselves up for mistakes or shortcomings – after all, reality will probably punish us enough for our limitations.  But we aren’t always rational, especially when it comes to dealing with problems and frustration.

That may explain how someone got low self-esteem, but why would anyone continue to beat up on themselves?

There are several possible explanations for this.  For one thing, these self-messages tend to be well-learned and highly ingrained.  They don’t go away by themselves and they frequently return whenever we encounter some mistake or shortcoming on our part.  It may be easier to avoid dealing with the self-criticism than to challenge it.  Of course, as this often involves avoidance of the initial problem, it just makes room for more self-criticism, this time for the avoidance. The self-blame and shameful avoidance tend to feed off of each other in the “blame and shame” vicious cycle, reinforcing the pattern.   And as absurd as it may sound, there may also be some pay-offs that reinforce self-criticism.  Maintaining an extremely high standard for ourselves implies an attitude that we could meet that expectation, even though we may not be doing so at the moment.  Lowering the standards we set for ourselves thus implies a lowering of our sense of our own potential, and this disillusionment may be hard to accept.  Even if it is not a conscious choice, we might choose to berate ourselves for our current shortcomings rather than give up our illusions about our potential and admitting to our human limitations.  There may be a perverse pride that is involved in beating up on ourselves, especially if we don’t hold others to the same high standards.  For these reasons, this self-criticism continues as an major force that disrupts our self-esteem when we encounter our shortcomings.

This gets us to the question of how we can work on low self-esteem.  What can we do about the harsh inner critic?

We can start by paying attention to the kind of messages that we give ourselves, particularly when we encounter some shortcoming or mistake on our part.  We need to follow the dictum of “know your enemy” in trying to learn about the inner critic that gives us such a hard time.  We may be able to identify what critical messages we give ourselves rather easily, or we may have to work at uncovering the implicit message in the oppressive feeling and self-doubt that we experience.  The next step is to put the inner critic in perspective.  One approach is to explore where it came from: can we relate this message to any important figures in our past?  Giving the inner critic a name can create some psychological distance between it and ourselves, which gives us some perspective.  Next we can challenge the inner critic, and here it is important to enlist a helpful attitude, such as that of a supportive coach. With this outlook, we can both refute the berating message of the inner critic and propose a supportive, self-affirming message that expresses an acceptance of our human limitations while encouraging ourselves to move forward.  We can thus challenge the self-punitive side of ourselves, acknowledge our wounds from it, and re-focus ourselves from the “blame and shame” cycle back to the original problem or difficulty that evoked the self-blame.  We can also help give ourselves credit for the smaller steps that are required to complete a project, rather than berating ourselves for not getting it done right sooner.  This outlook can help us to accept our own human limitations and to view our shortcomings or mistakes as opportunities to overcome habitual patterns and to learn more adaptive responses to problems.

But isn’t there a risk that all this attention on self-blame and low self-esteem can increase our self-consciousness and make the problem worse?

That certainly is a valid concern.  Putting too much emphasis on ourselves can detract from the intrinsic enjoyment that we can achieve from participating in an activity or being in a relationship.  And interrupting our involvement in an activity or relationship for self-reflection interferes with the intrinsic enjoyment as well – even if that interruption is reassurance or praise.  The technique of challenging the inner critic is used most effectively when the inner critic has already done its dirty work of disrupting our involvement.  Then, it helps us heal our emotional wounds and get back out on the playing field of life.

Doesn’t this approach emphasize the conditional type of self-esteem?  And didn’t you say that this sort of self-esteem is less stable, since it is contingent on whether our current behavior is successful and appropriate?

That’s an excellent point.  For this reason, it is important to affirm our intrinsic self-worth, not just the value we earn through our accomplishments.  We need to develop an inner comforter and nurturer to complement the guide function of the supportive coach role we addressed earlier.  A popular expression of this is the use of affirmations that declare our intrinsic worth, such as “I’m OK the way I am,” “I deserve to be cared about,” and “I’m doing the best that I can, and that’s good enough.”

Telling ourselves such things is one thing, but the real test lies in how we treat ourselves.  Do we eat properly and get sufficient sleep?  Do we allow ourselves sufficient recreation, exercise and relaxation to relieve stress and revitalize ourselves?  Do we share our feelings with others and ask for their support and understanding, or do we bury them away and suffer in silence?  Do we claim the respect that we deserve from others, or do we tolerate their criticalness, name-calling, neglect, abuse, manipulation or coercion?  Do we usually put others’ needs ahead of our own?  And when we do tend to our needs, do we feel guilty about it?  How we answer these questions through our actions conveys implicit messages to ourselves about our sense of intrinsic self-worth.  What are we telling ourselves when we appease our emotional discomfort through outlets such as excess drinking, overeating or compulsive shopping?  Isn’t this somewhat analogous to offering candy to a malnourished child?  What are we saying about ourselves when we suffer alone in silence, or when we tolerate lack of respect?  All of our verbal affirmations will ring hollow unless we back them up with self-care:  action speaks louder than words.

Self-care sounds pretty simple, but it can also be quite difficult to carry out, especially if caring and support were lacking during our development.  If our parents and caretakers primarily valued us for our accomplishments and virtuous living to foster our conditional sense of self-worth, then they may well have neglected our emotional needs.  Not only does this neglect make it more difficult to access these feelings later on, but it often produces a buried store of hurt and anger which emerges as we start tending to our feelings.  Acknowledging our wants, needs, feelings and insecurities can help us to develop compassion for ourselves, as well as opening the door for others to understand and care about us.  But if we do not demonstrate caring for ourselves, how can we expect others to take our want, needs and feelings seriously?

This is all work that we should be doing ourselves, right?  It was all right to depend on others to help us with our identity and self-esteem when we were young, but we should do it for ourselves now that we are adults, to attain an independent identity. 

On the contrary, trying to do it all ourselves individually may be setting ourselves up for failure.  While pulling ourselves up by our own bootstraps is a noble idea, there may be something rather egotistical about trying to go it alone, without any help.  I probably overstated the ideal of an independent identity and self-esteem.  We continue to rely on others for feedback about ourselves, who we are and whether that’s good or bad, though we examine their input to decide whether to incorporate it into our identity or to dismiss it.  The more appropriate ideal may be one of an interdependent identity and self-esteem, rather than a predominantly dependent or independent one.

But what about your point that it’s not right to exploit others to boost our egos?

There’s a big difference between demanding others’ uncritical affirmation of our self-image and making use of their freely offered support.  The concern pertains to whether we view others exclusively in terms of enhancing our self-image, or whether we can appreciate them as individuals in their own right, with worthwhile needs, feelings, wants, aspirations, and accomplishments of their own, so that we can enjoy the intrinsic rewards of a reciprocal relationship.  Sheldon Bach’s recommendation that we balance our being-for-self with our being-for-others applies here.  We must also be ready to accept the fact that others are not always going to be there to affirm our identity and self-esteem – there will be times that they will not be available or will not be able or willing to fulfill that role in the way we would like.  For that reason, it is important to have a relatively broad support system, rather than depending exclusively on one person for our affirmation, and to be able to work on our self-esteem and identity by ourselves, when others are not available.  These provisions will lessen the likelihood of perceiving others primarily in terms of our own needs, whether those needs be of ego-enhancement or for understanding and support.  Then, we can establish intimacy, in which we share our vulnerabilities as well as our strengths with others on a reciprocal basis.

Now  that we’ve established that it is OK to rely on others to affirm our self-esteem, how can they help us?

The guidelines here parallel those of how we can help ourselves.  Others can affirm our intrinsic self-worth, regardless of our personal shortcomings.  They can show realistic admiration for our accomplishments or serve as healthy role models for qualities that we may wish to emulate.  They can give us honest feedback about how we come across to them, acknowledging our shortcomings as well as our strengths, while still valuing our basic self-worth.  Though this qualified support may be painful at times, it can also help us to give up our grandiose illusions of ourselves and to accept all of our human qualities, even when they represent limitations.  Others can encourage our continued efforts to work on our projects and relationships at the pace we are capable of, so that we can continue to develop our identities.  They can show appreciation for those times that we support their self-esteem and identity, and this gratitude can in turn enhance our self-esteem.

But what if we don’t really have people in our lives who are capable of providing this support?

First of all, don’t be too quick to discount others.  We may be inclined to assume that they should be able to give us what we need without our having to ask, but we need to challenge that assumption.  After all, we’ve listed a number of ways in which others can support our identity and self-esteem, and which ones we need at any given time may not be all that obvious.  It is true that others’ characteristic styles may not be that helpful:  some may condemn us for our faults, some may give advice when we need to figure things out for ourselves, and some may attempt to rescue us when we need to handle the problems ourselves.  Our specifying our own needs not only increases our chances of getting what we need, but it also presents others with the opportunity to develop themselves in ways that they may not have considered.