Un oiseau, un jardin, le bonjour d’un ami, un
sourire d’enfant, un chat se prélassant au soleil en
quête de caresse.
Remarquez-les ou ignorez-les. Le choix vous
appartient toujours.
(Annelou DUPUIS)
you, yes you who
are reading this. Your Self-Esteem is very important
Your self-esteem is probably the most important part
of your personality. It
precedes and predicts your performance in almost everything you do. It is the
energy source or the reactor core of your personality, and how much self-esteem
you have determines your levels of vitality, enthusiasm and personal magnetism.
People with high self-esteem are more positive, more likable and more effective
in
every part of their lives.
Everything that you do or say or think will affect your self-esteem. Your job,
therefore, is to keep your self-esteem high and positive on a continuing basis.
Probably the best definition of self-esteem is this: the level to which you
respect
and value yourself as an important, worthwhile person. People with high
self-esteem
feel terrific about themselves and their lives. When you feel really good about
yourself, you tend to be the very best person you can possibly be.
Your level of self-esteem is really your level of “mental fitness.” It’s a
measure of
how healthy, hardy, and resilient you are in dealing with the inevitable ups
and
downs of daily life. Your self-esteem determines how much peace of mind and
inner
contentment you experience. It is also closely linked to your health and levels
of
energy. People with high self-esteem are seldom sick and seem to have an
inexhaustible flow of energy and enthusiasm that progressively moves them
toward
their goals.
How much you like and respect yourself also determines the quality of your
relationships with people. The more you like and enjoy yourself, the more you
will
like and enjoy others, and the more they will like you. In fact, when your
self-esteem
is hurt in any way, the very first thing that is affected is the way you get
along with
people.
To perform at your best and to feel terrific about yourself, you should be in a
perpetual state of self-esteem building and maintenance. Just as you take
responsibility for your level of physical fitness, you need to take complete
responsibility for the content and quality of your mind.
I have developed a simple formula that contains all
the critical elements of self-esteem building, and you can use it on a regular
basis to assure maximum
performance.
This formula is comprised of six basic elements. They are: goals, standards,
success experiences, comparison with others, recognition, and rewards. Let’s
take
them one at a time.
How much you like and respect yourself is directly affected by your goals. The
very act of setting big, challenging goals for yourself and making written
plans of
action to achieve them actually raises your self-esteem, which causes you to
feel
much better about yourself.
Self-esteem is a condition you experience when you are moving step-by-step
toward the accomplishment of something that is important to you. For that reason,
it’s really important to have clear goals for each part of your life and to
continually
work toward achieving those goals. Each progressive step causes your
self-esteem to
go up and makes you feel more positive and effective in everything else you do.
The second element in self-esteem building is having clear standards and values
to which you are committed. Men and women with high self-esteem are very clear
about what they believe in. The higher your values and ideals are, and the more
committed you are to living your life consistent with those values and ideals,
the
more you will like and respect yourself, and the higher your self-esteem will
be.
Lasting self-esteem comes only when your goals and your values are congruent—
that is, when they fit into each other like a hand into a glove. Much of the
stress that
people experience comes from believing one thing and trying to do another. But
when your goals and values are in harmony with each other, you feel a wonderful
surge of energy and well-being, and that’s when you start to make real
progress.
Many people tell me that they are unhappy with their job because they can’t
seem to achieve success no matter how hard they try. I always ask them if they
are
doing what they really care about and believe in. In many cases, people realize
that
they are not happy with their job because it is the wrong kind of work for
them.
Once they change jobs and start doing something that they really enjoy,
something
that is more consistent with their innermost convictions, they start to make
real
progress and get a lot of satisfaction out of their work.
The third element in self-esteem building involves having success experiences.
Once you have set your goals and standards, it is important that you make them
measurable so that you can keep score of your small and large successes along
the
way. The very act of setting up a goal, breaking it down into smaller parts,
and then
completing those parts makes you feel like a winner and causes your self-esteem
to
go up. But remember that you can’t hit a target you can’t see. You can’t feel
like a
winner unless you clearly lay out the standards by which you are going to
measure
your success and then achieve those standards.
Let’s say that you set a goal to sell a certain amount or earn a certain amount
of
income in a given year. If you break that down into monthly and weekly goals,
and
then you achieve the first of those goals, you will feel great about yourself.
Each
time you reach another milestone, your self-esteem and ability to perform will
increase, and you will feel encouraged and enthusiastic about the next
challenge.
The fourth element of self-esteem is comparison with
others. Leon Festinger of
Harvard University concluded that in determining how well we are doing, we do
not
compare ourselves with abstract standards, but, rather, we compare ourselves
with
people we know. To feel like a winner, you must know for sure that you are
doing as
well as or better than someone else. The more you know about how well the
others
in your field are doing, and the more favorably you compare with them, the more
you will feel like a winner, and the higher your self-esteem will be.
Successful people continually compare themselves with other successful people.
They think about them and read about them and study their performances, and
then
they work to surpass them one step at a time. Eventually, successful people
reach
the point where they compete only with themselves and with their past
accomplishments. But this comes after they have moved to the top and left many
of
their competitors behind.
The next element for self-esteem is recognition of your accomplishments by
people whom you respect. To feel really great about yourself, you need the
recognition of people you look up to and admire, such as your boss, your
coworkers,
your spouse and people in your social circle. Whenever you are recognized and
praised for any accomplishment by someone whose opinion you hold in high
regard,
your self-esteem goes up, along with your eagerness and enthusiasm to do even
better on the job.
The final element of self-esteem involves rewards that are consistent with your
accomplishments. You may work in a field where you receive financial bonuses,
status symbols—larger offices, bigger cars—or even plaques and trophies for
superior achievement. All of those symbols can have an incredible impact on
raising
your self-esteem and causing you to feel terrific about yourself.
If, however, your existing situation does not offer the tangible or intangible
rewards that are necessary for you to build and maintain your self-esteem, you
must
create rewards for yourself. One of the smartest things you can do is to design
a
system for giving yourself rewards for both small and large accomplishments as
you
move progressively toward your goals. For example, people who do telephone
prospecting will often treat themselves to a cup of coffee after every 10
calls. After
25 calls, they will reward themselves with a walk around the building or the
block.
After 50 calls, they will go out to lunch. Each of those rewards serves as an
incentive that motivates them to repeat the performance. The end result is
success,
enthusiasm, and high self-esteem.
Whether or not your current environment provides the six elements of
self-esteem building—goals, standards, success experiences, comparison with
others,
recognition, and rewards—you need to establish your own structure and take full
responsibility for building yourself up on a regular basis.
Of course, it is possible to like yourself in the abstract, to think of
yourself as a
valuable and worthwhile person, but this tends to be a very shaky form of
self-esteem that is easily knocked down by a negative experience or a temporary
disappointment. The only real way for you to absolutely know that you are a
valuable
and worthwhile person is for you to make the effort, overcome the obstacles and
pay
the price to bring these elements into your life. When you have that
foundation, you
will experience a form of mental fitness and unshakable optimism that will
sustain
you through failure and propel you to success.
