Culture and self-esteem

And there is something else that has an excessive effect on our single unit of self-esteem – our culture. Culture is like the bodywork of a car that surrounds the engine. Culture decides what is acceptable and what is not; what is success and what is not; what is beautiful and what is not; what is of value and what is not. It’s not always right or fair but culture, be it national, local or even at school through bullying, is a strong force adversely affecting our self-esteem. Nobody would blink an eye if Rosa Parks sat wherever she wanted on a bus today, but in 1955 this small act sparked a revolution. In 1895 the British establishment crushed the genius that was Oscar Wilde because of his sexuality, while today we’d be celebrating his civil partnership. A fabulous example of a cultural transition was demonstrated by the publication in 1961 of John Howard Griffin’s seminal book Black Like Me which devastated thinking white America and was the progenitor of the much needed equality that was to come.

‘No one can get you to feel inferior without your consent.’ Eleanor Roosevelt

Strategy 1: no comparisons – you are who you are

Life is not about living up to the expectation of others, no matter how precious they are to you. Nor is it about how much you have amassed, whatever society values, such as the trappings of success, be they money, property or the world’s accolades. Nor are you your job title.

Ask people who they are and 99 times out of 100 they will respond with a job title that some organisation or profession has given them. Self-esteem is not dependent on your job. I’d go so far as to say it’s dangerous to allow yourself to become identified by what you do. What happens if you lose your job through no fault of your own? What if you are made redundant or the company goes bust? What are you then? There is little self-esteem behind the statement ‘I used to be a ...’

‘I would rather be an original copy of myself than a second-hand copy of someone else.’ Eleanor Roosevelt

Strategy 2: acceptance

You have been given a body, you have developed a personality, acquired some skills and competences and that is it. Whether you like your body or not, or wish you were taller, shorter, thinner, fatter, leaner, muscular, blonde or brunette is not relevant. You have what you have, so accept it. For the most part it’s not constructive for self-development to spend your life wishing for things you cannot change, nor is it emotionally helpful.

Occasional daydreaming about being a superstar, however you conceive that notion, can be both inspiring and motivating, even psychologically healthy. But you must tread carefully between the line of healthy ambition and allowing your unrealistic fantasies to become toxic, especially as you realise you are probably not one of the few people that society rates as prestigious, intellectual, courageous, handsome or beautiful. This can only lead to your self-esteem being corroded and again you will become a lesser person for it. But enough of this negativity!

‘All men dream: but not equally.
Those who dream by night in the dusty
recesses of their minds
wake in the day to find that it was vanity;
But the dreamers of the day are dangerous men,
for they may act their dream with open eyes,
to make it possible.’

T.E. Lawrence, army officer (Lawrence of Arabia), Seven Pillars of Wisdom

Strategy 3: go easy on yourself

There are enough people in the world who will gladly remind us of our errors and mistakes. There’s no need for you to become a card-carrying member of life’s ‘beat up union’. After all, the only people who can return no recent mistakes on life’s scorecard all have permanent abodes in boxes six feet under. Mistakes, errors and poor judgements are proof that we are alive, well and doing the best we can with what we have at the time.

No one deliberately makes a fool out of themselves or sets out to make errors or misjudgements. These are life lessons and usually life keeps presenting them to us again and again until we learn from them. Such lessons are nothing to do with self-esteem.

‘Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself.’ ‘Desiderata’ by Max Ehrmann

If you are wrong or in error, say sorry, apologise and move on. And if you find that the other person is still not happy, ask them what else you can do to make amends. In all likelihood there is nothing, they just need extra reassurance of your sincerity.

Life’s formula would appear to be:

Act, error, learn;

Act, error, learn;

Act, error, learn;

with the development strategy being not to make the same error again.

Strategy 4: judge not

This is the opposite side of the coin from making unfavourable comparisons of yourself against others. When you make judgements about others, you are into the comparison game again, letting your ego run in the wrong direction with the comparison/judgement: ‘I am better than him/her because ...’. Well, no, not really, because whoever threw your life die did a better job for you than your comparison person or group in terms of intelligence, health, background or opportunity.

‘Humility does not mean thinking less of yourself than of other people, nor does it mean having a low opinion of your own gifts. It means freedom from thinking about yourself at all.’ William Temple, Archbishop of Canterbury 1942–44

‘There are two kinds of egotists: those who admit it, and the rest of us.’ Laurence J. Peter, educator

It’s not easy because who we are is very much influenced by who we are not. We see ourselves as someone other. At a simple level: ‘I am a male because I am not female.’ However, the same logic follows with ‘I’m not someone who is on welfare, lives in a slum or wears clothes from charity shops and consequently I must be better, more important, and more significant ...’Again, no, not really. Nor does it work if you came from a welfare home in a slum area and became a huge entrepreneurial success. That is most laudable and may give you a boost to your unit of self-esteem, especially since the world values wealth, but it does not make you a better person.

	‘Do not judge yourself or others when attempting to preserve your self-esteem.’ Anon
	‘If you really think you are somebody then put your head in a bucket of water, withdraw it, look back in the bucket and contemplate the size of the hole that your head has made.’ My Welsh father-in-law (who can’t remember where he heard it)

Strategy 5: deal with negative criticism

Criticism can be useful, especially when it’s constructive. However, when its intent is to put you down, your self-esteem will be in for some dents. Some people need to put others down in a poor attempt to make themselves superior. Usually, if they need to do this it’s for their own ego needs and they get very good at it with all the practice they give themselves at the expense of others. Remember, they are still playing the comparison game and will be suffering from a good dose of low self-esteem themselves.

In life, the unhealthy criticism you can expect will include:

1. inappropriate and/or cruel insults
2. unwanted physical contact
3. verbal and non-verbal attempts to intimidate
4. status and achievement put-downs
5. political sabotage
6. ridicule in both private and public situations
7. being the butt of jokes
8. being at the unwanted end of sarcasm
9. aggressive interruptions and put-downs
10. interference with your personal property
11. aspersions about your gender, ethnicity, colour, background, experience, etc.
12. challenges on your competence
13. barring you from the ‘in group’.

A real dirty baker’s dozen, but I’m sure that there is a whole bakery out there of similar comments just waiting to be given to you for free.

Some relief is at hand. People who engage in such unacceptable behaviour are very much creatures of habit. Just as when you hear thunder you get your umbrella and raincoat, when those people begin to rain down their ‘put downs’ you can be prepared. Like a punch in the stomach, if you can flex your abs it doesn’t hurt as much.

For totally inappropriate, rude or just plain silly criticism, one of the most powerful, shortest and by far the easiest response is not to ignore it – your silence might be interpreted as acceptance, which will only massage the critic’s ego and encourage repeat behaviour – but to make the simple comment: ‘That was an interesting statement/comment and I wonder why you found it necessary to make it?’ ‘Wonder’ and ‘why’ are two very authoritative words and when this question is aimed unexpectedly, it is very difficult for the critic to answer without either making their justification incriminating or making themselves look very silly.

Strategy 6: be rational not emotional

Sometimes it’s important to evaluate the criticism rationally to discover whether this is something you should take to heart and act upon, or just a barb sent your way by someone who should be looking at their own inadequacies. So before you give criticism of your behaviour the power to damage your self-esteem, here are some questions you might reflect upon:

• How qualified is the person to make such a statement?
• Are you aware that you behave in this way (maybe this is constructive criticism)?
• Is this behaviour frequent or significant enough for you to give it your attention?
• If you changed this behaviour are there any advantages that would accrue to you or is it in your interest to continue to be the way you are?
• If you wanted, is this behaviour something you could change?
• Changing behaviour is not easy, so are you prepared to put in the effort and psychological cost that is required to change?

Only bother reflecting on criticism that is about your specific behaviour – in other words, behaviour that can be observed. Non-specific feedback using ‘fat words’ is not worth thinking about. For instance, take the statement ‘You are too quiet’. This has the ‘fat’ word ‘quiet’ and consequently really does not mean very much. What does ‘quiet’ mean in specific behavioural terms?

• That they cannot hear you?
• That you speak too softly?
• That you speak in a monotone?
• That the frequency of your speech is too ponderous?
• That you are hesitant when you speak?
• That you should express your opinions more often?
• That you do not express your emotions?
• That you do not show appreciation at some entertainment event that you have enjoyed?

If you think you might benefit from what lies beneath the fat words, and you would like to explore the ‘fat comment’, then you can ask, ‘Please help me here – in what way specifically am I too quiet?’ Then, if you get the specifics and the facts that support the criticism, you can do something useful about it, if you feel it’s the right thing to do.

As a final point here, always challenge absolute comments: ‘You always ...’,‘Every time you ...’,‘All you do is ...’,‘You constantly ...’ Here you just throw back the words as a question: ‘Every?’ ‘Always?’, and so on. The advantage here is that whilst your behaviour might justify the comment, no one is that consistent. It may be a significant aspect of your behaviour which needs attention or it could be very infrequent. Asking for examples encourages the other person to give you specific instances so that you can assess to what extent (if at all) you need to act on their criticism. If no examples are forthcoming then their criticism falls away, counting for nothing.

Strategy 7: deal with positive criticism

Some people with low self-esteem have difficulty with positive criticism or compliments because they wear permanent anti-esteem earplugs. Compliments are vacuumed up, like cat hair on a Persian carpet, rather than accepted.

It’s important here to note the difference between pride and self-esteem. Self-esteem is the ability to recognise your talents. Pride, on the other hand, is the need to demonstrate how wonderful you are, continually assuming that you are better than everyone else.

Sabotaging praise with ‘anyone could do it’ just corrodes your self-esteem and you are also being dismissive of the friend or colleague who recognised your talent or achievement and wants to congratulate you. Such behaviour is unlikely to encourage the person to be so appreciative in the future.

Praise and compliments are the lifeblood needed to confirm, maintain and grow your self-esteem; failing to acknowledge them will haemorrhage the little which you still have.

	‘I can live off a compliment for a good two months.’ Mark Twain, author
	‘Low self-esteem is like driving through life with your hand-break on.’ Maxwell Maltz, author of Psycho-Cybernetics
	‘Never bend your head. Always hold it high. Look the world straight in the face.’ Helen Keller
	‘Nothing builds self-esteem and self-confidence like accomplishment.’ Thomas Carlyle, Scottish satirical writer
	‘I used to be arrogant but now I know I’m perfect.’ Max Eggert

Self-esteem is one of the cornerstones to personal development. Work on it and build a strong sense of your place in the world and you will find it much easier to achieve your goals. Not only that, but you will be able to take risks and recover from failure, criticism or embarrassment because you will have the necessary psychological strength.

• Everyone has self-esteem at birth. Your self-esteem is not dependent on the opinion of others.
• You are a person not your job title, or how much you have or earn, or how society regards you.
• It’s not healthy to compare yourself with others.
• Accept what nature has given you.
• Do not judge yourself too harshly.
• Do not judge others.
• Evaluate negative criticism.
• Be rational and not emotional.
• Challenge absolute criticisms.
• Accept and enjoy compliments.