When we are in the middle of a storm, we really can’t see things very clearly. When we are fueled with emotions, it seems endless.
That’s why it’s always a good idea to have someone with a more objective view around us so we don’t act in a way that might hurt ourselves or the people around us.
However, I feel like one of the things that people often overlook is that self-hate goes beyond just the thought. With every fortifying thought, it creates negative habits that display that thought.
Disclaimer - If you are seriously feeling suicidal or mentally illness, please see a therapist or a physician. I am not a medical professional and can’t provide anything that would substitute for medical advice.
This is the very basic first step for people struggling with low self-esteem and has no idea what to do. This article is for you.
Low self-esteem is a mindset. It is a deeply ingrained belief that you have that is changing the way you treat yourself because you listened to it so much.
Whenever you make a mistake, you curse yourself under your breathe.
You are regurgitating what the voice inside your head is telling you.
That voice is the closest thing to you, you listen to it you believe what it says even though you don’t want to. You can’t escape it or avoid it, because it’s partially you.
So what do you do?
Meditation is you literally sitting in silence and focusing on your breath for a period of time.
When you meditate, people look at this and say why are you wasting your time sitting around and doing nothing? Aren’t you wasting your life? Shouldn’t you be doing something to improve yourself?
Actually, that is EXACTLY what we are trying to not do.
While the voice inside you is constantly criticizing your every move and making you feel like crap every step of the way, it is also trying to motivate you to do something. It is trying to drive you to “improve” through fear of punishment.
Meditation is doing the opposite.
The message meditation is saying is “I am going to do nothing, and I’ll be just fine.” When you practice meditation, it breaks the pace of the voice inside, because it can’t motivate you. By doing nothing, you are also silently telling yourself that you are ok just as you are right now.
You don’t have to do anything to change. In a way, we are using the outside practice to reform your inner thoughts. When people think that meditation is not doing anything at all, they are pretty much right, but meditation is far from useless. Especially people struggling with anxiety, this helps reset the pace of the person to slow down that inner need to keep moving.
Meditation is simple, free, and effective, you have nothing to lose.
1) Find a place without distraction.
Distractions are literally everywhere. It's hard to find a quiet place calm your mind down. You can use your car (of course, when you're not driving it.), bedroom, backyard, etc. Pick a time that you won't be interrupted. Don't place an obligation during your meditation like cooking or waiting for a phone call.
2) Sit down.
The key here is to fit a comfortable position. Not one where it's sooo comfortable that you fall asleep, but one that isn't awkward or painful. Just sit cross-legged and relax.
3) Set a timer
A timer is very useful. You just have to set it and then focus on breathing. I recommend starting with 5 minutes.
4) Close your eyes
This is to further help you remain focused on meditation. Sometimes, I use earplugs to cut out the noises.
5) Focus on your breathe until the timer goes off.
If you are just starting out, it is honestly very hard to sit still. You might want to open your eyes every 5 seconds and the time feels like an eternity. Focus on breathing and all the sensations of the breath. When you are truly focused on the breath, you won't be thinking about anything else.
6) Practice daily, weekly, monthly
The effects are long-term. Your mind didn't change in one day. This will take time to build a habit for you to accept yourself.
Well, you can’t be bad at it, because there is no standard. No one gets an A+ for any meditation. This you creating a habit of doing nothing. acceptance of the current self. Forgive your when you wander off then just come right back. Remember the healthier you are emotionally, the better you can support the people around you.
Let me know how the meditations went. =D
- Augustus
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Do you remember going to the grocery store and buying your cooking supplies for the week? You look at the labels and try to make the best decision to save money and eat healthily.
This is since we want to take care of our bodies and whoever we might invite over on Friday night. But what if there was something wrong with the food… you would try to find out what it is right? We don’t want anyone to get any stomach problems.
For me, I am totally for not only having great healthy food, but also good emotional food for our self-esteem. These are damages that having lower self-esteem might produce in our lives that we might not be aware of or grown accustomed to.
I want to go ahead and uncover the silent harms of low self-esteem that we might not see.
I don’t think I have to elaborate on the desire to want to be loved. It’s in movies, novels, and music. We all desire to be loved, but how is it that people having low self-esteem don’t feel that way? It’s because they don’t feel they deserve to be loved.
Have you ever rejected a compliment?
Have you ever downplayed a success you had?
I mean it’s hard to feel good about ourselves when we reject the things that are supposed to make us feel good. Even when we spend time with our friends, we suppress the feeling when we feel loved.
If our innate tendency is to reject love, the most love we’ll feel will be only a fraction of the ones we have actually received. That is what low self-esteem does to us.
If we are critical of ourselves, we will be critical with people close to us. If we are still nice to them, that just means they are not close enough yet. This happens especially when a mistake or a disaster happens. When something goes wrong, all hell breaks loose.
If we already feel bad about ourselves, it’s hard to handle another mistake. It makes us feel even lower as a person, so the first inclination is to deflect or blame others instead. I’m not saying people having low self-esteem are malicious, but they are deeply hurt already and can’t take another blow.
This is hard because it’s impossible to live in a mistake-free relationship. Heck, I can’t even go through a day without making some kind of mistake, not to mention two people trying to work together. Perfection does not exist and trying to obtain it is a losing cause.
This links with the feeling of being unlovable as a person.
“If you feel like you’re unlovable, why would other people like you?”
That’s the thought.
This is a pretty detrimental thought. If we think people won’t like the real us, we’re not going to try our best because it shows who we really are.
We’ll deliberately create situations where we know we’ll fail, so we have an excuse for when we do fail. We'll find ourselves in harmful relationships. Always settling for less than we deserve. This is an ingredient that will make any recipe a disaster.
This is a very distinct trait to people with low self-esteem. We usually like the people who like us. We want to be around people that like us because it’s fun and enjoyable.
However, having low self-esteem means we either reject other people for liking us or we like others less for liking us.
Why? When we feel like we’re are unlovable, so if our friend likes us, who is unlovable, then… something is OBVIOUSLY wrong with our friend right? This just shows how much we’ll actually reject love. I mean when we feel and know that we are unlovable, we will try to reject love at any cost even if someone has convinced us that they love us.
Acceptance and love are things we will desperately seek but never get.
This all leads to the final conclusion that no one stays in our lives. Everyone in our life comes and goes, because low self-esteem hinders our ability to create relationships.
If the other person doesn’t feel like we are trying to befriend them, they’ll eventually move on. This situation breeds the feeling of loneliness in midst of people. Everyone is kept at a distance while we are suffering from loneliness. It makes us feel invisible and disposable. No one wins here.
- Augustus
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