SELF ESTEEM

[allergic2kryptonit]

Anyone have self-esteem issues along with their social anxiety?? I've had social anxiety forever, and I've realized recently to what extent I'm lacking in self-esteem (completely) and direction in life. I've just recently been dumped by someone I truly loved, and I've been very depressed and obsessively looking into myself for flaws. I have been making myself feel worse with too much introspection, but I feel like if I could fix what's wrong with me, I wouldn't lose love.
Also wondering if anyone here had any kind of childhood abuse, neglect, trauma??

 

[Quickslash]

Most definately...when you say you're obsessing about your flaws I know exactly what you mean. Trust me, there is nothing with wrong the way you are...it just seems like that because you have low self esteem.

I tried to "fix" myself a long time ago, I wanted girls to like me more easily, wanted people to take me more seriously. I lost alot of self esteem when I did that because I wasn't me anymore, I felt like an actor...it sucked.

Childhood abuse well, I grew up around alcoholics, and hypocrites. So nothing I did was right unless it was done a certain way, you don't look good unless you look like "this".

Hang in there and keep being you, no relationships are guaranteed, another love will come into your life...it's only a matter of time.

 

[ozkr]

My low self esteem is what magnifies my social phobia. It gives me that feeling that somehow I'm always doing something wrong and that I don't "fit" in certain places.
When I'm around people of a certain group I feel bad because I feel like I'm not at their level or I shouldn't be there. It's when I'm alone at home when I convince myself that those feelings are irrational.

 

[Jack-B]

No one is asking for advice but i give some below, if you dont want it, dont read it...

Who are you referring to who lacks self esteem?

This person exists in your mind and whenever you think about that person (your self) an image of a faulty person appears to your mind. You then over exaggerate your own bad qualities and this recreates this image of who you think you are. You then identify your self as this image in your mind and unpleasant feelings and loathing result. You grasp this image of your self more strongly in situations when you feel threatened and so this magnifies how you feel about your self. Forever creating a picture of our self.

Many people with social phobia actually then do the opposite by over compensating their good qualities, pride then results, pride in wanting others to see us as strong and capable or better than we are. We become good at some things and praise our self. The image we hold of our self in our mind becomes distorted further. This leads to inferiority and us not being able to learn anything and always acting someone different to who we really are because we feel this will make us confident.

So, how should we view our self?

 

[pjam76]

self

Ever since I was in grade school, I've been the "shy" kid and for one reason or another I always felt like I was never good enough. Maybe it had to do with a demanding former marine father.. So my grades were never good enough nor was my skill level in football, baseball, basketball, soccer, volleyball, wrestling, swimming, track and field, the list goes on.

Then because i was not "assertive" and rarely spoke up in class or asked questions, my grades suffered cause of lack of class participation. I was the kid with 100 averages on tests, on HW, on quizzes, but because I had a difficult time speaking in class, my grades were never as good as they should have been.

As I grew older, there was a time when I did everything to get over being "quiet." I even moved and refused to know anybody i ever met...People who knew me as "shy."

Problem was it didn't take long for new people to joke about, "You talk too much..." Cause i didn't say all that much.

Maybe a couple times here and there I felt like things were getting better, but many of those times I wasn't exactly sober either.

So as I've gotten older, i have a lot more self-doubts now than I ever have.. That's what happens when you lose jobs cause your still not "participating in class." Only as an adult, it's a lot worse.

 

[styrka]

My low self esteem is what magnifies my social phobia

I feel the same way. I feel the biggest problem I have is a total lack of confidence. if I was strong and believed in myself I wouldn't be scared to do things around people and be with people and be myself.
And contrary to what most people write (from what I've seen) I had a beautiful wonderful childhood and have amazing parents. I never had to deal with abuse, neglect, or anything like that. but I still managed to end up with SA and low self esteem. I think I was quite normal up to the moment when I had to deal with people different from my parents. when I started going to daycare and kindergarden and deal with people is when my social problems began. so if there's anyone to blame, I blame all the other people in the world but definetely not my parents.

 

[savage_beagle]

advice on self esteem

--Self Esteem
There really is not that much difference between a spectacularly successful person and a dismal failure. But the little difference there is, is crucial. And the difference is self esteem. People who succeed are people who believe in themselves and value themselves. Successful people value their own time and they don't waste it. They value their health and they don't fill their bodies up with poison.
A well developed self esteem creates a confidence that enables successful people to avoid wasteful conflicts with others. Successful people sincerely respect and value other people, and that trait alone draws success to them like a magnet.

People who believe in themselves are willing to take responsibility for themselves. The losers in life blame their troubles on someone else, and by so doing they give control of their lives to others. I see so much of this, and it is painful to watch. People who refuse to take responsibility for their own lives are always frustrated and depressed. They are professional victims.

Success does not take a long time to achieve. In fact, you can go from failure to success in an instant. All in takes is an attitude adjustment. All it takes is a willingness to believe in yourself and to take responsibility for yourself. As soon as you can do that, then you are a success. You may not have a lot of money or fame or whatever, but that really doesn't matter. Because once you are truly successful, once you sincerely take responsibility for your own life, you can have whatever it is you want.

Nothing make you successful if success is not inside of you. Love the person you are enough to give love and respect to others, and your achievements will be unlimited.

-- Ralph Marston

Fear of criticism
Think for a moment how silly it is to live in fear of criticism. If you're doing what you know to be right, what possible reason could you have to fear the criticism of others?
Are you concerned that the comments and opinions of others will somehow damage your self esteem or self image? Are you afraid of speaking your mind or taking action because you might get your feelings hurt?

If you really want to improve your self esteem, stop allowing other people to be responsible for it. Instead, create something of value. Make a positive difference. Pats on the back are nice, but in the end the thing that will truly make you feel good about yourself is to accomplish something worthwhile.

Find valuable feedback in the criticism of others. Realize that it can't hurt you, that it actually can help. Go forward with the confidence of knowing that you're truly making a difference, and you will indeed.

-- Ralph Marston

Build confidence
The way to find confidence is to look for challenge. Rock solid confidence and lasting self esteem cannot be handed to you, no matter how well intentioned your benefactor may be. Confidence and self esteem come from the direct experience of meeting challenges.
Confidence is well worth the trouble. With confidence in yourself, anything is possible. But confidence cannot be created out of nothing. Try to do that and you'll only get arrogance, a poor substitute which crumbles at the first tough challenge.

Confidence must be built. Just as strong muscles are built by lifting heavier and heavier weights, confidence is built by taking on bigger and bigger challenges.

Don't shy away from challenge. Welcome it. Seek it out. It will teach you. It will discipline you. It will give you valuable experience. And it will build in you something which can help take you wherever you wish to go -- confidence.

-- Ralph Marston

hi! You can read over and over great advice like the stuff above, but if all you do is just read it and dont ever bother to put the plans into action, then you have nobody to blame for your state except yourself. Far too much time is wasted in a day watching some crappy tv show or thinking negative thoughts in general. Your self esteem wont magically improve just by wishful thinking, so look for books, articles online, good people to talk with and feed your mind the right thoughts. ~~~savage beagle.

 

[Tryin]

I tried to "fix" myself a long time ago, I wanted girls to like me more easily, wanted people to take me more seriously. I lost alot of self esteem when I did that because I wasn't me anymore, I felt like an actor...it sucked.

i also did this some time before and still "act" sometimes. :? i was trying hard all my life but it still seemed like i was different in some way. when i was about 12, it came to the point that i was behaving like an extravagant extrovert with quite a high self-esteem this week and like a happy, religious nun another - but inside i was suffering a baad depresion. i was so much confused and had noone to talk to. my body - my life - felt like a prison. noone actually knew me. i was lost and scared and didn't know what to do.

i am 16 now and things went better a bit. i am still trying but this time i try to do what is best for ME (and not what everyone's doing). i think i have quite much self-esteem and am pretty strong so i hope i'll manage to overcome whatever is wrong with me.

 

[Quickslash]

It makes you a stronger person after the pain is gone and you start doing what's best for yourself cause nobodys feelings are more important than your own.
I felt that prison feeling and still do sometimes, like your real self wants to break out. I still act a little too but try & remind myself "NO! NEVER AGAIN!" cause really it's like catering to other peoples egos and opinions and makes your own feel worthless.

Trying hard at doing anything seems to make me do worse, I play alot of video games and when I don't try to be good and just play the game because I want to, that's when I play like a pro.

I believe it works like that with anything, when you try to make a convo go perfect, try to impress people or make them laugh is not when it happens.

One thing I notice is that I was and still am to a point highly agreeable with what other people say for fear of hurting their feelings, conflict, argument, or just wanting to "get the convo over with" cause talking is boring and pressuring when you talk to people in situations where you feel like you have to.

Anybody else like that?

 

[Jack-B]

Quickslash

My friend also deals with social anxiety and she agrees with everything everyone says, except those she is close to coz she cares less about what they think.

Self confidence regarding social phobics is a big thing and what i find most powerful in building this confidence is setting small goals before events, situations etc so that you focus on and not analyze anything else. You judge your self on small things first, keeping it simple so there's not a range of skills you have to posses to be amazing say. Yoiu have one thing you set your self instead of creating whole array of things to attack your self with.

Confidence in our self is hammered when anxiety is in our mind because it distorts how we view our self. Basically our mind is mistaken to what appears to it. We start almost hallucinating others thinking something of us and we become intensely paranoid. We glue this experience to our self and think 'me' when this isnt us at all, it is the mistaken appearance of our anxious mind, so to gain confidence in our self we must enter situations and know that we will lose control and wont be our self. We will then cease to attacj our self or analyze our performance. We can then start to get back to viewing our self in a more realistic way.

Who is it who finally stops freaking out after anxiety arises in the mind? Is it you? Who really experiences anxiety?

Jack