Today I would like to discuss the effects of low self esteem. I, in the past have suffered from a severe case of it which it has been a long struggle to come back from. Low self esteem affects every part of your life. It compounds after each incident until it is all consuming. Unless treated it could lead to chronic depression, and in some cases even death. It is hard to raise your self esteem but you have to start with a positive attitude and self actualizing affirmations.

Here is something I found on a site I thought would help.
Self-esteem, simply put, is the high regard and good feeling that I have about myself. It is my "feel good" about being me. It is extremely important for children to develop self-esteem in order to prepare themselves for their adult life. Individuals with healthy self-esteem will not fail in life because the only way a human being can fail is to self reject.

Healthy self-esteem is probably the single most important thing that we teach children. Self-esteem is not always healthy. We can hold ourselves in high regard and feel good about ourselves for the unhealthy reasons. It is not unusual for the school bully to feel good about himself for being able to beat up everyone else in the class. Sometimes children and adults feel good about themselves for getting even in a mean and vindictive way.

Additionally some people base their feelings of high regard on their successes and achievements. This attachment of worth to performance is actually a set up for a loss of self-esteem. No human being is able to perform at a level where they never have a drop off in performance. If you have attached your worth to your success then you will loose your self-esteem when you experience a drop in performance.

And yet most people believe that successful achievement is the basis of self-esteem. Self-esteem should not be based on what we do, but rather, who we think we are. After all I am not what I do, I am the precious human being that does it. If I make a mistake I am not the mistake, but rather the awesome learning machine that is capable of correcting mistakes. Self-esteem is ultimately an intrapersonal event that is fed and nourished and influenced and affected by external events.

Self-esteem is all about my relationship with my self and is the foundation of all relationships. If I hold myself in high regard and feel good about myself and others care about me, then I know they are people of good judgment. If I hold myself in low regard and I don't feel good about me and others care about me I know they must be stupid or maybe they are just using me. Or maybe they are forced to care about me due to external circumstances. Low self-esteem is often the root cause of interpersonal, social, and family problems.

In order to develop healthy self-esteem one must learn to accept the responsibility for developing it within one's self. I must learn to accept that I am 100% responsible for my own thoughts, feelings, and actions. Nobody can make me think anything I do not choose to think, feel anything I do not choose to feel, or do anything I don't choose to do.To achieve healthy self-esteem I must accept that I cannot control anything outside of myself. And I am in total control of the things inside of myself.

I must learn to face and accept unwanted reality with the awareness that that unwanted reality does not have to make me feel bad unless I choose to let it. The single most important thing to learn in order to achieve high self-esteem is to willing accept what IS. I cannot change what is. But I can change how I cope with it. The ultimate experience of self-esteem is too experience my self the same way my parents experienced me at my birth. They loved me unconditionally and knew I was a precious miracle, even though I certainly had never accomplished a thing. They loved me unconditionally as the miraculous embodiment of the gift of life. When I can experience myself that same way, then I have truly experienced healthy self-esteem.