Tag Archives for " self-worth "

This week, I have written a little bedtime story about comparing yourself to other people’s social media posts. It’s one of many stories I could have chosen. It’s a work of semi-fiction. As they say at the end of a television drama, it is based on events that really happened.

If you know someone who is feeling a bit inadequate right now – because we all have those times, don’t we? – then please share this post with them. Because it might help them to stop comparing their behind the scenes with other people’s highlight reels.

She reads her friend’s shocking social media post. Who would have thought?…

She remembers that friend’s gorgeous posts less than 18-months ago. So many stunning, happy, loved up pictures of her and her new husband? She remembers the picture when they were lying on a sun-soaked golden beach, the crystal-clear sea glinting in the sunshine behind them. He was always giving her expensive presents. She remembers some of the pictures of the designer handbags, the huge bouquets of flowers.

Oh… What a perfect life. What a perfect couple!

She would sigh to herself and imagine what it must be like to be so deeply in those first stages of romantic love. What an amazing man her friend had met, how blessed and blissful her life is.

She thinks about her own husband of 15 years, a bit wrinkled around the edges, a bit squidgy around the middle. How he rarely buys her flowers and when he does, they are more likely to be a bunch of geraniums from the local petrol station when he’s feeling guilty. She can’t remember the last time she frolicked on a tropical beach with him and posed for selfies. Actually, she doesn’t think she’s ever frolicked with him on a tropical beach, although they once had a nice walk along Skegness beach – it was a bit windy, though.

In fact, the last time she was on the beach in the sunshine, she was running after her 3-year old and her 6-year old, trying to make sure they didn’t leg it into the sea whenever her back was turned, and trying to apply sun cream on their wriggling sandy bodies, pleading with them to stay still for just 30 seconds.

A few months after the frolicking beach photos, she sees that her friend is pregnant. She looks with envy at the selfies of her growing bump. And oh, what a neat bump it is. Her bump was never this neat-looking. And how has her friend kept her figure so trim, her hair so glossy, right through to month 9?

Then the baby is born and she sees regular photos of the most gorgeous little boy and his mum in poses of endless bliss. They have so much time to do so many lovely things together. She thinks of the chaos of her life – the military operation every morning to get the kids up, one to nursery and one to school. It’s relentless, exhausting.

And then, when the baby is one year old, she reads a long post that shocks her:

In this post, her “friend with the perfect husband, perfect baby and perfect life” reveals that her new husband had been sleeping with her best friend. Before she became pregnant.

The friend discovered the betrayal when she was just 2 months pregnant. Turns out, that she’d split up with her husband before her baby was born. She has been through labour, childbirth and learning to be a mum by herself. She has suffered heartbreak, humiliation, anger, anguish, loneliness and goodness knows what else. All those beautiful pregnancy and baby pictures – they hid so much pain.

And to think, she wished she were her. She thought her own life was so miserable, in comparison. Suddenly, her husband of 15 years with his sporadic attempts at being romantic didn’t seem so bad.

She had compared herself to her lovely friend and found her own life lacking. But she hadn’t been party to the heart-breaking story that was being played behind the happy pictures.

The “moral” of this story…

Next time you look at a social media post or photo of your friends and find yourself thinking:

• She’s having so much more fun in her life than I am
• She’s so much more successful than I am
• They have so many more holidays than I do
• She’s so much more beautiful than me
• He’s so much more popular than I am
• Their kids are so much more accomplished than mine

Remember that you don’t know WHAT is going on behind the picture-perfect life. The camera DOES lie – it shows just a moment in time. People tend to highlight their success and their joy on social media. Nobody has a perfect life.

The quote “Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about. Be kind” should be your mantra when you find yourself going into comparisonitis.

And let’s add a bit extra to that quote:

“Everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about. Be kind. And be kind to yourself, whilst you’re at it!”

I’ve been tuned in to the enormous power of acknowledgment ever since I left university and started work. Like most people, my general experience of acknowledgement has been from lack of it rather than abundance.

During my career as a Project Manager, I worked within a high pressure company culture where people were generally NOT routinely acknowledged for their work: it seemed that the only time someone noticed the work people did was when something went WRONG on a project. I recall submitting reports and the focus was always on the red and amber flags – very little time was spent acknowledging people’s hard work or positive results.

When I trained as a Coach, I learned about the importance of getting our needs met. In a personal development context, this means the needs above the basic Maslow’s hierarchy of needs.

Here’s a very quick and dirty introduction to why getting your personal needs met is so important: When human beings don’t identify their own personal needs and put processes in place to get them met, these needs tend to drive our behaviour. In turn, this propagates an unhealthy vicious cycle where we sub-consciously try to get our needs met. This ultimately holds us back from achieving our biggest dreams and goals.

A good analogy might be this: Imagine you want to get from A to B in a car. You’re determined to get to your destination and you keep putting your foot down on the accelerator. But you’re not getting anywhere because you’re also pressing the brake pedal at the same time. Getting your needs met is like taking your foot off the brake pedal so that the accelerator pedal can do it’s job and you can drive to your desired destination.

One of the core needs that almost EVERY person I’ve ever coached is the need for acknowledgement.

Back in 2006, I felt so strongly about the power of acknowledgement, that I submitted a proposal to a major high street bank for a workshop on acknowledging skills for managers. I wrote this proposal in response to so many of my clients expressing their unmet need for being acknowledged at work.

Acknowledgement in this context is about recognising something that someone has done; it’s the action of showing that we have noticed someone or something. And the power of acknowledgement in the workplace is the power to help people to flourish, to enhance their performance, to grow their confidence and create a virtuous circle of high performing, happy and fulfilled employees.

Let’s go back to my car journey analogy: If a company or organisation is like the car, then the unmet need for acknowledgement is the brake on the car stopping it from reaching its desired destination. When you build genuine acknowledgement into your company culture, not only are you taking your foot off the brake, you’re filling the car with turbo fuel to enhance the acceleration!

Professional athletes know that ongoing acknowledgement and celebration as well as cheers from their fans and encouragement from their team mates improves their performance. The power of acknowledgement is as useful to high performance in the office and raising confident kids as much as it is on the playing field.

It is an unfortunate fact that most company cultures constantly put the focus on what’s not working, on what needs to be fixed and what still needs to be completed. Whilst it’s important to fix and finish, I believe that taking the time to recognise and acknowledge people for the work they have done would act as a preventive measure and reduce the number of problems that get all of the focus.

Acknowledging is a powerful catalyst for action, but when it is absent, it leads to inaction, resentment and demotivation. Talented women and men who don’t feel valued vote with their feet. I know this because, during my years as a professional Coach, I’ve helped a fair few of them to walk elsewhere.

The power of acknowledgement is one of the most underrated and most important elements of leadership and of unleashing human potential. Whether I am coaching personal clients or corporate clients or whether I’m just going about my day-to-day life, acknowledgment is something that’s always been at the forefront of my mind. My radar is almost always switched on to spot opportunities to acknowledge people, whether it’s one of my boys at home, one of my clients or a waiter in a restaurant. It can be anywhere – close family member, colleague or stranger.

Last weekend I was in my beloved Lake District and I felt moved to talk about the power of acknowledgement at the top of Orrest Head in Windermere! I shot a Facebook Live which I’ve uploaded to my blog.

Click here to watch the video – You’ll hear hear me tell the story of the train conductor who seemed to grow a few inches taller after I acknowledged him, or my own recent story about being on the receiving end of acknowledgement for my own performance at work. And even better, you’ll also get to take in some of the finest views in England whilst you’re watching! 🙂

Click here to watch my Vlog on “The Power of Acknowledgement”

 I’d love to hear from you below in the comments.

• Do you feel acknowledged at work?
• Do you look out for opportunities to acknowledge your team or colleagues?
• Are you better at acknowledging your family than your colleagues? Or vice versa?
• And how about strangers? Do you go out of your way to acknowledge people you notice doing a great job, even if you feel a bit awkward doing so?

via GIPHY

High self-esteem is crucial to our success, equanimity and overall sense of happiness. If we want to feel happy and in control of our own life, it is essential that we nurture our self-esteem.

What the heck has low self-esteem got to do with Ripley’s Alien Mother Creature?

With low self-esteem, we filter our view of the World through our own distorted low opinion of ourselves. Low self-esteem is like the big bad mother of self-belief issues. She spawns lots of other baby limiting beliefs. And they in turn grow into monsters that are extremely difficult to slay – just ask Sigourney Weaver if you don’t believe me.

Do you suffer from low self-esteem?

Do you ever call yourself stupid or put yourself down? Do you frequently compare yourself to others and find yourself lacking? Do you worry that other people might not like you?

These are all indications of low self-esteem. But that’s ok – we’re not labelling you here!
You don’t have low self-esteem ALL the time. You only have it in those moments when you’re having those negative thoughts about yourself.

We generally expect people with low self-esteem to appear quiet, reserved: If you’ve ever met someone who finds it difficult to look you in the eye for example, you might suspect that they have low self-esteem. Not necessarily so.

I sometimes put myself down. Occasionally I compare myself with others and I have been known to fret about what other people might think. I never considered myself to have low self-esteem. I’m the sort of person who people view as confident, gregarious, happy and fairly well balanced.

Outward impression is not necessarily a reflection of what’s going on inside. And more importantly, self-esteem is not a fixed part of anyone.

Does low self-esteem come from a traumatic childhood?

Another thing we think we know about self-esteem: Doesn’t low self-esteem come from growing up in a family in which you are put down or belittled? Isn’t it common in victims of abuse? Well, yes – and no!

Dr. Rob Kelly, author of “Thrive” says that the link between childhood experiences and levels of self-esteem is not always to blame:

“People with a negatively distorted sense of self do not, however, need to have been regularly put down or abused by others during childhood….many people that I have treated with self-esteem issue have come from loving, caring families and it is largely their own self-criticism that has caused them to build such limiting beliefs about themselves.”

What IS self-esteem anyway?

Let’s take a quick look at the various synonyms for the word “esteem”:

Deem, judge, rate, respect, admire, value, regard, approve of, appreciate, like

When we add “self” to the word esteem, then we can start to get a feel for what self-esteem is:

Your level of self-esteem is a measure of:

• How you rate yourself
• How much you value yourself
• How much you like yourself
• How much you appreciate yourself
• How you judge yourself

In short, self-esteem is simply how you see yourself. If I asked you to tell me what sort of person you are, you might tell me that you are outgoing or shy; that you are hard-working or laid back; that you are a good friend or a conscientious person.

Essentially, you’d be responding with your beliefs about yourself. We all form beliefs about ourselves – who we are, what we like, what we dislike. They are not facts, they are simply beliefs that we have formed over years.

Your fluctuating self-esteem battery

Self-esteem is not real; it is simply your present evaluation of yourself – a set of beliefs. Sometimes you might evaluate yourself highly, sometimes less so.

Kelly tells his patients to imagine that they are keeping a mental score card of negative and positive thoughts. Each time they have a negative or critical thought it is recorded and each time they have a pleasant, validating thought, this is also recorded.

These positive and negative thoughts reflect the charge of your metaphorical “self-esteem battery”. So if, you have 70% negative thoughts in a day and only 30% positive thoughts, then your self-esteem battery is only 30% charged.

The effect of sh1t tinted spectacles

Kelly uses the evocative analogy of seeing yourself through “sh1t-tinted spectacles”. Here are a few examples of how those sh1t-tinted spectacles can distort your view:

• You look in the mirror and say “God, I look haggard”
• You have a day when you get 5 pieces of good feedback from people and 1 piece of criticism. You focus on the criticism
• A business connection you ‘phoned yesterday does not return your call and you create a reason in your mind that is all about you

Our human brain is a crafty thing. We create a belief and our brain immediately starts seeking evidence to back up that belief. We dismiss any evidence that proves this belief to be untrue – we want to prove ourselves right.

We see what we want to see – even though it doesn’t serve us, support us or make us feel good.

The secret sauce is in the PROCESSING

The trick in increasing your self-esteem is simply to increase the positive charge in that self-esteem battery I mentioned above: Change the positive/negative ratio of thoughts. Generate more positive thoughts and create higher self-esteem! And you can do that by processing your thoughts in a different way.

Kelly says that:

“processing is what takes place when your experience becomes a memory.”

Your memory is not reality – it is a construct made up of your belief systems, your unhelpful thinking patterns and your metaphorical spectacles – and how you decide to tint those spectacles.

In order to increase your self-esteem, all you need to do is switch your specs to a pair that are rose-tinted, rather than sh1t-tinted!

Here’s how:

Coach Yourself: The simple habit that will increase your self-esteem

Time to coach yourself: This is what I’d like you to do:

1. Give yourself the gift of 15-20 minutes of journaling time within the next 24 hours. Set a timer and create a positive hit list and write down as many positive things from your day. Be as creative and as flexible as you want with your list. The only “rule” is that you reflect on the positive things from your day, even if it wasn’t a stellar day! For this exercise, please also reflect on why each item is in your hit list. Why did it make you feel good? What positive thing did it reflect about YOU?

2. Set yourself a reminder at the end of each day to do a mental positive hit list at the end of each day. It’s a great habit to get into both for your self-esteem AND for a good night’s sleep: In a mindfulness sleep meditation, one of the first parts of the meditation is mentally running through your day from waking to getting into bed.

These “positive hits” can be:

• Moments of pleasure
• Things that made you smile
• Moments of pride in yourself or those you love
• Achievements – large or small
• Challenges you overcame
• Things that made you feel grateful
• Acts of kindness that you received
• Acts of kindness that you gave

To help you get the idea of what to write – and to demonstrate that I walk my talk! – here’s one I did earlier! This is my positive hit list exercise from Wednesday this week.

It wasn’t an easy day: I spent most of the day responding to my own mini business crisis – my broadband network failed and I was left with no connection to the Internet whatsoever. This meant I lost a lot of working time and had a couple of sticky situations to get round. Despite this, when you read my positive hit list, you’ll see that, even on a day that could be described as a “nightmare”, there were many positives:

1. Meditated first thing in the morning. Felt proud of myself as it’s an important habit, but it’s one that I have to push myself to do still.
2. Watched the mists rolling off the top of the hill and knew it would be a hot day. The sunshine always makes me feel happy.
3. Took Ernie for a walk in the forest and enjoyed the sunshine, peace and stunning views
4. Met a man in the forest who gave me a wonderful smile, engaged with me and wished me a wonderful day. It made me think how great it is when people connect and how lucky I am for such simple pleasures
5. Emailed parents of Duke of Edinburgh award participants to organise gifts for the D of E leaders. It would have been much easier not to as it will take time and thought, but it is important for me to acknowledge people.
6. Did some writing sitting on the balcony in the sun. Felt grateful for the autonomy and flexibility of my business
7. Responded creatively and calmly to challenge of running important client webinar after broadband developed a fault and I was left with no Internet signal. This shows that every day in every way I’m getting more and more resilient – rolling with the everyday blips of life and taking it (more or less) in my stride
8. Spoke to my friend Penny Pullan who logged into my business email system and sent an email to my clients about alternative conference line. Always love speaking to Penny and feel grateful to have a friend who I know will help me out in this kind of situation and who knows what to do!
9. Had a great conversation with Amanda Davie about coaching and EQ. Love talking to Amanda as she’s so bright, on my wavelength and she gets it!
10. No. 1 son helped me to clear away dinner dishes without me even asking. Wow! All those years of me feeling like a broken record are finally paying off!
11. No. 1 son ALSO mowed the lawn without moaning when asked. As above!
12. Bedtime story reading to Fred and friend’s daughter who stayed over. Really cherish reading a book to Fred and thankful for it as it won’t be long until he won’t want me to read to him.
13. Negotiated better deal on mobile phone contract and felt pleased with myself. I’ve also got extra contingency data
14. Upgraded mobile data contract to ensure better contingency next time there is a problem with broadband at home. I’ve really thought about mitigating a major risk in my business.
15. Spoke to John and Mum on the phone when I felt exhausted and fed up. Feel immensely grateful for these 2 big “rocks” in my life who always listen and always have wise words.
16. Was able to say “yes” to a friend dropping her daughter round and was also able to offer for her to sleepover. How great to be able to do this for a friend who helps me out so often.

If you do these 2 exercises – the written one to start and then follow up simply by creating a habit of ending your day with a positive mental hit list, you’ll quickly reap the benefits in more consistently high self-esteem.

And as you embed this new positive habit, you’ll find you naturally notice more of your own achievements, making it easier the more you do it!

You’ll have that Alien self-esteem mother monster slayed in no time!

Whether you are bringing in loads of dough, an employee, self-employed, a business owner or a stay at home parent having to manage what’s available… you just have to watch this video.

When I was a child, I learnt that, to be successful, I should go to university, graduate and build a “good” career. That was the way to be secure and wealthy, wasn’t it?

Or that’s what I thought..

So I went to university – and stayed far too long! Not only did I do a BA, I did a double honours BA. Then I went on to do a conversion M.Sc. in Computation. I took out a Student Loan to fund my M.Sc.

I applied for the graduate trainee scheme of a global IT company. Tick! I got in and started a good career. I soon became an accredited Project Manager on a decent salary, company car, pension scheme etc.

I met my future husband and we became DINKYs (Double Income No Kids Yet). We had some great times and we spent with profligacy. But we also had plenty of financial pressure building – for example, my husband to be had 2 children to support from his previous marriage.

We got married, spent a fortune on our wedding, an even bigger fortune on our honeymoon, decided to move house and took out a bigger mortgage for the bigger house! Just as we were about to move into our bigger house with our bigger mortgage, straight after our indulgent pre-baby holiday, my husband was made redundant. I was 6 months pregnant when that happened.

A week or so later I was threatened with redundancy. My husband didn’t get a new job until my son was 6 months old. And when he was 6 months old, I was made redundant. By that time I had decided that I would re-train as a Coach – a decision which incurred a significant investment in my own training and coaching. Boy, it’s been a long time since I had the so-called “security” of a career as an employee!

Like many people, we lived beyond our means. We let the good times roll. When the unexpected happened (as the unexpected always will), we had no buffer. We seemed trapped with no way out.

Fast forward 12 years and sadly, our marriage broke down. This meant were faced with funding TWO households instead of one. I know that there are many people who stay in their marriage because it is not financially viable to do otherwise. I understand that – it’s not easy.

Around this time, quite by chance, I met Ann Wilson, known as the Wealth Chef. She’s a best-selling author and a “wealth guru” – a title that sounds trite, but which I assure you is well-deserved.

Ann has been my “wealth mentor” for 3 years now. Learning from her has transformed my life and relationship with money.

If I could have one wish about my “wealth”, it would be this – I wish I’d met Ann 20 years ago when I was still at University. 

Ann has just released a new video series and in it, she’s teaching some of the most valuable things I’ve learnt from her – things that have made a huge impact on my own mindset about wealth as well as my financial attitude, planning, aspirations – all of it!

In the videos, she’s going to share:

▪ How to create passive income stream businesses; (I do this now)
▪ How to invest safely and easily in the stock market; (I do this now)
▪ How to put our whole financial freedom plan together so we know we have everything covered; and (I am getting there with this!)
▪ How to get rid of limiting beliefs that have held us back in the past. (I am getting better and better at this!)

Ann is so committed to helping others live the greatest versions of our lives with money supporting us, so we can:

▪ Free ourself up from having to work harder and harder for money;
▪ Travel and experience more of life’s wonders;
▪ Spend more time with our family and friends;
▪ Contribute more to the things we feel passionate about; and
▪ Know we will be safe and secure in our old age.

It’s hard to put into words how deep an impact this woman has! There’s nothing sleazy or dubious about the way Ann teaches. It’s solid, sensible yet also life-changingly eye opening.

Go here to watch her free video and be sure to take lots of notes because she always gives huge value! However, just to warn you…her videos will only be up for a short time, so go watch it now before they come down!

Click here to watch this free teaching video now.

This is the stuff they should have taught us at school and which I’m starting to teach my boys – slowly but doggedly!

Please tell her I sent you in the comments!

 Here’s that link again

I was in Ireland on Mothers’ Day a few weeks ago; the boys were with their Dad back here in England.The trip to Ireland had been booked months before and I realised I’d be away from my boys for “the big day” only when I noticed the ubiquitous Mothers’ Day marketing messages everywhere a few weeks earlier.

Unfortunately, neither boys nor Dad are very good at remembering things like Mothers’ Day! And I forgot to remind their dad to remind them (anyone else do that?!) I didn’t even receive a text until I sent a snotty missive at midday to their Dad: “It’s Mothers’ Day you know! Not even a text!!!”

However, other than a bit of irritation, it didn’t consume much of my thoughts on the day or afterwards.

Let me tell you why it didn’t matter

I realised that I don’t measure my worth as a Mother or as a Woman based on how well I’m treated on that one day of the year.

Of course it would have been nice to find a card surreptitiously hidden in my suitcase, but that was never going to happen!! ☺

The reason why? I know how to cherish myself. And knowing how to do that helps me to have a high self worth.

Let me expand on that

On my self-belief masterclasses, one of the strategies that I share is this:

“Treat yourself as you would like to be treated by others”

What this means is that YOU have to learn to be kind to yourself. You have to identify your own needs and if necessary, meet those needs yourself first, rather than hoping others will do so for you. It’s wonderful when other people (especially partners or kids) make us “feel special”, but I want you to feel special whether you have those people in your life or not!

I teach this in the context of helping women to boost their self-belief. But it goes WAY beyond that. I believe that it is a key ingredient in being a resilient, happy and successful woman.

I was running my self-belief masterclass last Friday at The Cooperative Bank for their Aspire Career Network. I asked a question:

“Who has _never_ bought themselves a bunch of flowers?”

In this particular workshop, only a few hands went up, but usually there are a fair number of hands that rise in admission of never having bought themselves flowers.

NO!!!

Have you ever bought yourself flowers?

**I have spoken to a number of women over the past few weeks who are living through very challenging transitions** – serious illness, separation, divorce, bereavement.

**It’s at these times when our self-worth – and therefore our self-belief, takes a knocking**. And it’s at these times where looking after yourself in the way you’d LIKE someone else to look after you is a good habit to have got into beforehand.

One of the many things I’ve learnt since I separated is that it is essential that I cherish myself. When you’re alone in the house with 2 kids, you simply HAVE to because nobody else is going to!!

Some Ideas for Cherishing Yourself – and Increasing Your Own Self Worth

Here are the things that I do to met my own needs and remind me that I matter, that I’m worth the effort!

1. I cook a decent meal for myself when the boys aren’t with me, rather than just throwing something together “because it’s only me”
   Tonight is one of those evenings.. home made burgers, sweet potato wedges, baked tomatoes and avocado. I even garnished the tomato with a basil leaf! ☺
2. Dressing to feel good, with my make-up on, even if I’m working from home all day and not seeing anyone apart from the boys. I don’t do this every day, only when I feel the need – if I’m feeling a bit “frumpy”. When the boys see me “dressed for the office” they ask me “Where are you going?” and look at me strangely when I say “Nowhere!”
3. Going to bed early with a book when I’m tired and I just want to hide away from the World. This means resisting the urge to re-commence work after the boys are in bed as well as resisting the urge to look at fascinating things on Facebook!
4. Building a fire each evening and often lighting tea lights in the living room. Like most women, calm surroundings soothe me and the fire burning away helps me wind down in the evenings. Our wood burner is roaring every single night unless it’s summertime and the boys are expert fire starters! 🙂
5. And of course.. buying myself flowers.I haven’t done this for a while, but today, I was at the greengrocers and noticed some beautiful gerberas. I love bright colours and I remembered the question I had asked at the workshop on Friday.

YOU matter – YOU are worth the effort

The more you cherish yourself, the more you will increase your own self-worth.

So, what are you going to do for yourself?

Will you buy yourself a bunch of flowers? Get to bed early? Take yourself to a museum? Put your make-up on, even when you’re not going anywhere?

Start treating yourself as you’d like others to treat you!