Self-esteem and ego go hand in hand
When clients first start working with me, they don’t typically come in saying that they love themselves and are happy with who they are – very rarely.
I commonly hear that people don’t like who they are and don’t think highly of themselves. We quickly discover that they are walking through life believing negative things about themselves that aren’t necessarily true. And many of us have developed fragile egos because of these harmful beliefs we carry around about who we are.
Self-esteem is part of a larger aspect of ourselves called our ego. Learning about the ego and how it impacts our thoughts and behaviors was life-changing for me personally and professionally.
Ego is not what we grow up thinking it is. If our fragile egos drive us, we do not have healthy self-esteem. And MANY of us are living a life dominated by our fragile egos. This not only hurts ourselves, but it is detrimental for our relationships with others.
In becoming aware of how your ego plays a role in your life and relationships, your perspective about yourself and others will change. This work is so important. The best way I can describe the experience of learning about your ego’s role in your life is that it is like wearing a veil over your eyes that dulls everything your entire life. Then one day, you take the veil off and see things in clear, bright colors. It’s that transformative.
Formative experiences can impact your life
At nine years old, you messed up on your piano recital, didn’t catch that ball to win the baseball game, or got a few bad grades on spelling tests. Any of these scenarios left you believing that you’re a choke artist and can’t perform under pressure.
And now you’re 40 and still spend your days assuming this about yourself. Imagine what this self-belief could hold you back from in life. Are you really a choke artist, or has anxiety been present? You weren’t taught the tools to manage it so that it didn’t impact you in those ways.
As a teenager, you didn’t fit in with the social groups you wanted to hang out with, and you felt invisible to your admired peers. This lack of fitting in caused you to believe that you were a loser, a nerd, not worthy, or not good enough.
Now you’re 28 and still think of yourself as not being one of the “cool kids,” not fitting in with the “in” crowd, not good enough to be chosen by the people with whom you want to spend your time. Might that hold you back from taking chances, engaging with certain people whom you’re interested in, a potential partner you deem “better” than you, so you never go for it? What if you just never found your people, the ones who value you for all that you bring to the table in your unique ways?
As a young kid, you felt comfortable expressing your honest feelings and quickly became labeled by your family as the one with the attitude problem for speaking your mind. Now you’re a 35-year-old who thinks of yourself as a mean, unlikeable person.
Your response to feeling unliked could cause you to become small, hold things in, and suppress yourself. There might be ways for you to improve on some of the abrasiveness that comes with being expressive, but speaking your truth is a powerful trait that can benefit you in your life if used correctly.
We will seek the truth and challenge the beliefs you hold about yourself. We will tweak the parts of yourself you aren’t fond of and enhance the positive parts that make you who you are.
After all, you are the only version of yourself that exists, and that is your power.
Discover your truth and build up your self-esteem
Sometimes, your fragile ego keeps you from gaining self-esteem. We will examine the stories you walked around believing about your life and challenge their truth and validity.
In the process of this exploration, we will replace false beliefs with accurate truths, allowing you to create clarity about who you are in the world.
This exploration is the process of building up your self-esteem and starting to change your relationship with yourself. Making that change is some of the most important work you’ll ever do, and I feel honored to be able to guide you in this life-altering work.
Don’t let the false messages you’ve come to believe about yourself define who you are. Life is too short to spend your days not liking the person with whom you spend 100% of your time.
Let’s get to work.