Self-esteem reflects the subjective opinion of one's self. People with high self-esteem like themselves and honor their achievements wholeheartedly. While some of the individuals lack confidence occasionally, people with low self-esteem feel unhappy, unworthy, and unsatisfied with themselves most of the time. It can be prevented but it takes attention, focus, hard work, time, and daily practice to boost and strengthen low self-esteem.

Seek a mental health counselor's advice if you’re having trouble improving your low self-esteem or whether low self-esteem is causing mental health problems such as depression and anxiety disorders.

Characteristics of Low Self-Esteem

People suffering from low self-esteem are extremely judgmental of themselves and believe they’re worthless. They don’t believe in their positive qualities and often ignore the significant positive traits of their inner self.

They think of themselves as inferior to others and use negative words, such as naive, stupid, nasty, ugly, or fat, to represent themselves. One of their characteristics is negative self-talk, and they not only criticize themselves but also usually blame themselves for almost everything.

They believe luck plays an important role in all their achievements and don’t give the credit to themselves, which they very much deserve. And whenever people praise or compliment them, they don’t trust them. In reality, they don’t trust their own abilities or achievements for which people are praising them.

How to find a Low Self-Esteem Therapist

If you are looking to find the perfect Low Self-Esteem therapist it is crucial to make sure that they have the appropriate qualifications, knowledge and experience. At Expat Therapy 4U we only accept therapists who have full professional proficiency in English and are highly experienced in working with people from culturally diverse backgrounds. The clinicians we approve share our values and commitment to provide high quality therapy to the expatriate community in the private sector across Europe and online worldwide. We strongly believe that therapy changes lives, and being accredited ensures all our therapists are qualified to a high standard. You can find a Low Self-Esteem therapist who is insured to practice and accredited with a recognised membership body online here.

Quality of life and Low Self-Esteem

Low self-esteem may play a role in the reduction of the quality of a person’s life in many different aspects.

A person with low self-esteem is always self-conscious and stressed around others, continuously looking for “signs” that others don’t like about them. They are hopeless and have a hard time coping with the challenges of daily life.

They have a low resilience level and lack a strong will to love and care for themselves. Low self-esteem may also lead people to ignoring themselves to the point that they start to self-harm. It also leads them to drug abuse and other mental disorders, and even to suicide.

Causes of Low Self-Esteem

Unhappy childhood is one of the leading causes of low self-esteem. Parents’ negligence and childhood trauma or abuse also play a role in lowering the self-esteem of a person.

Bullying and poor academic performance at school may also lead to low self-esteem. Low grades can be a cause of low self-esteem as they lower the confidence level of a child and even result in a poor and bad friends circle.

Loneliness and relationship breakdowns are two other reasons that lower the self-esteem of a person. Bad treatment from a partner or parent and being part of an abusive relationship not only make it difficult for a person to cope with the challenges of daily life but also lead to drug abuse and addiction, all of which lowers their self-esteem.

Socio-economic problems, physical disabilities, and serious illnesses like cancer and tumors also lead to low self-esteem. Not only physical illnesses but underlying mental illnesses such anxiety, depression, and personality disorders also causes a person’s self-esteem to be low.

Different underlying low self-esteem problems

Chronic problems might be discouraging and could lead to low self-esteem issues and problems. Have a talk with your family regarding the stressful problems or seek professional advice for issues such as relationship breakdown, abuse, mental health issues, anxiety disorder, depression, ongoing stressful events, bullying, or financial problems, and many other different types of problems and worries.

How to increase Low Self-Esteem

Low self-esteem is strongly connected to how you view, feel, see, and react to the things that happen in your life.

Some suggestions to increase your self-esteem:

Stop being hard on yourself

Talk to yourself frequently and positively and treat yourself as if you are your own best friend. Be supportive to yourself and show some kindness and understanding towards your inner self, even when you make a mistake.

Ask for help

If you can’t be objective, then ask a trusted friend or a professional therapist for their opinion. You will realize after your evaluation about your own self that most of your negative self-talk is wrong and destructive. Ask for support to build your self-esteem from family, friends, or professional counselors.

Don’t compare yourself to others

Recognize the differences between yourself and others — you need to realize that every human being has traits and qualities others don’t have. Accept your own self and try to discover yourself whenever feeling depressed.

Appreciate your special abilities

Be open to your positive traits and embrace your qualities. Don't dismiss your achievements or ignore your positive traits, and accept the compliments that others give you.

Write about your qualities

Think about your good qualities and keep reminding yourself of them. Scribble down your qualities, and if you can’t think of any, ask your family or friends. Every day tell yourself an inspirational, motivational, and positive quote, and enjoy your weekends.

Don’t think too much about the future

You’re still in the present moment, so enjoy this moment and stop yourself from thinking about the future. Accept that you can’t see or change the future, so do your best to keep your thoughts positive and encouraging.

Exercise can help

Do some workouts and physical exercises like walking, running, jogging, swimming, dancing, and many more. Follow some relaxation techniques and do some mindfulness activities and breathing exercises. Exercises are awesome boosters for the brain for all kinds of things, especially in fighting depression and other mental health problems.

Be an open-minded and loving person

Try communicating your needs, wants, feelings, beliefs, and opinions to others in a direct and honest manner.

Change your lifestyle

Replace your harmful behaviors into good ones and adopt healthier lifestyles. Practice good habits every day. Remember, it takes time to establish a healthy lifestyle, so give yourself that time.

Read

Start reading books on low self-esteem and how to increase it. Read books on self-development and accept yourself as you are.

Recommended treatments for Low Self-Esteem

The most researched treatment to help build self-esteem is cognitive behavioural therapy. It is a cutting-edge treatment to treat most of the major physiological problems. It is designed to be active, brief and focused on major problems. For low esteem, cognitive behavioural therapy include the combination of the following techniques.

Cognitive Restructuring Therapy

The main purpose of this therapy is to recognize the unhelpful thinking patterns and replace them with effective thinking patterns. Its focus is to only identify the distorted thinking, or negative thoughts about oneself.

Behavioural activation

People with low self-esteem often avoid situations and activities that they fear. They often become depressed because of having few opportunities for rewarding experiences. Behavioral activation therapy helps to reverse this cycle and re-engage them with life. In return, they have more rewarding experiences.

Problem-solving training

People with low self-esteem often feel helpless in many situations. Problem-solving training helps such people to identify their problems, potential solutions and resources to carry out effective plans.

Social skills training

It help self-esteem people to increase rewarding and positive social behaviors. This will result in reducing the level of negative social behavior such as complaining.

Find a Low Self-Esteem Therapist through the Expat Therapy 4U platform

Low self-esteem is subjective and can be overcome easily by following some of the techniques that are crucial and of great importance to help you cope with it. A professional therapist or psychologist can be your last target to help yourself to build low self-esteem and to be thankful for your positive capabilities and strengths.

Further Readings on Low Self-Esteem

https://theinternationalpsychologyclinic.com/problems/low-self-esteem-counselling-london/

https://theinternationalpsychologyclinic.com/self-esteem-10-tips-for-improving-your-confidence/