I've been having self-doubt again the last couple of days.

I've been writing as much but i keep finding myself wondering, "but what if i'm wrong?" And being very uncomfortable.

I feel like i'm just not good enough.

What can i do for myself to stop so much doubt and second-guessing?

I don't want to be arrogant or step on others' pride either... what can i do?

Hi Holly,

I hear what you are saying. I wish I could say I've never experienced this, but I have. It's a "yuck" place to be in and I sincerely hope you don't stay there for long.

When I'm feeling bad about myself I know my thoughts are on the wrong path. What helps me is to take control of my thoughts. I make the conscious decision to say no to ALL negative thoughts and self doubt.

I then think about the value of every person and recognize that I am just as valuable as anyone else. I can't be wrong! A great question which helps me is, "What would you say to your best friend in this situation?"

Another thing that helps is to write down all the positive things about myself, especially in the area I'm struggling in. I also write down my intentions on what I really want and what I'm going to do about it.

We all go through some form of discomfort when we go through change in a positive direction. What really helps is to recognize it as a sign post to say we're moving into new territory. That's exactly what we want when we want change! Sometimes our discomfort is in adjusting to what is unfamiliar. Before long, it becomes familiar and we're ready to move on again.

Somehow it's empowering to create a strategy that moves me from where I'm uncomfortable to where I feel I really want to be.

Forgive me if this sounds like a broken record. It's just that it happens to work incredibly well for me. Sometimes the most powerful things are simple.

I see confidence as being sure of who you are in a way that does not compare oneself to others. It is not dependent value because we are all valuable.

I see arrogance when someone lifts him or herself above others as if they are more valuable than others. It also seems to be related to "approval addiction" where the self esteem must continually be fed by others or they don't feel good about themselves. Thus, some arrogant people put others down so they can see themselves as above.

Holly, when you just want to be confident in who you are, it has nothing to do with others. More people will be impacted in a positive way than the ones who get offended because of their own insecurity.

Which would you rather do, make a greater difference by lighting up the path of many others or hide your light under a lamp because only a few people don't like your kind of light?

can i say hide?

it's just so intensely painful.

Wrong about what?
writing?
the path you are taking?
You are right and going on the right path.
Time will show you the result soon.

Holly, I've been reading your posts long enough to feel confident when I say....you are a gentle, sensitive person and would never intentionally hurt another's pride. If, inadvertantly, it affects them, maybe it was needed. You have alot of good to share. Go for it!

Sue, you are right.

Holly, I don't think you'd be a healthy person if you never experienced self-doubt. No matter how "expert" any of us are, in the end, we all know there aren't many hard-and-fast answers in life. But you have a lot of valuable things to say, and I know I'm not the only one in this forum who appreciates and loves you for being brave enough to do that. Every day on this forum you give us the gift of yourself and your thoughts with the pure purpose of helping others. There are few gifts as great as that.

And while I'm thinking about it, everyone, let's remember we can only be who we are, and any kind of "not good enough" thinking is based on comparing ourselves to others. Every time I hear this, I immediately think of Desiderata, my favorite poem:
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I asked Holly this question: Which would you rather do, make a greater difference by lighting up the path of many others or hide your light under a lamp because only a few people don't like your kind of light? Her reply was...



Oh Holly, you are too beautiful to hide! So many of us here are blessed by you. I sincerely miss you when you draw back.

Besides, you let us at Bella in on a little secret in other posts: YOU DON'T WANT TO HIDE. YOU'RE JUST UNCOMFORTABLE RIGHT NOW. Retreating will not get you to where you really want to go.

I too, am very sensitive. However, it is not up to others to decide my value or yours. What they think does not change WHO WE ARE. One of my favorite quotes is from The Princess Diaries movie, "No one can make you feel inferior unless you give them permission to."

Holly, what would it feel like to tune into all the positive energy so many of us here are sending your way and tune out from the negative energy you're getting elsewhere?

Sending love and warmth and lots of positive energy towards you...

Tami

Holly,

I was just reading what you told Sue about her art work and something occurred to me.

Would it help for you to focus on your PURPOSE rather than on you?

Only your perception is the one that truly matters, Holly. Remember that!

Self esteem, self confidence, i lack both. i am very self conscious about my looks and my body, i have a problem with people looking at me, I will not aloud my picture to be taken, i see people with facial disfigurements, and feel so guilty, because i feel like i do about my self. I feel so ugly. and now being 60yrs old, fat,old n ugly. its just getting worse. i am a good person, i wish i could feel good about myself on the out side, because it makes me very unhappy

Skyhaven, !

i'm so sorry you feel this way.

May i ask, are there times when you feel less awful or more awful about your appearance? What makes the difference?

Usually, perhaps. But not always.

I once lived for 18 months with constant threats and harrassment by a certain person who was definitely obsessed with keeping me in my place, dangerous, and unstable... and it was believed by at least half a dozen people other than me... including professionals... that he might well cause me serious harm or try to kill me. It was also quite clearly in response to my revealing my talents, etc., that this came on.

That was then, this is now, and i have to remember that.

But i want to point out here that we're not talking about my having ordinary fear of disapproval! God, i wish!!!!

I don't feel SAFE expressing myself. Some days, it's worse than others, like it was this past week.

Before the threats, mental abuse, programming, financial sabotage, physical intimidation, severe public slander and even threats to my friends and their families (which ended many of my relationships),... there was that more ordinary disapproval of which all of you are speaking. Unfortunately now if there is ordinary disapproval it sometimes triggers me to feel mortally in danger and makes me feel the need to hide myself. I don't even always recognize that this is what is going on... i just react and feel very insecure about myself.

I know this isn't rational. It was too bizarre for it to happen again. Almost too bizare for it to happen the first time... i would have thought so, once.

But if you had walked in my shoes... you'd understand!




I WANT to have my freedom back. Inside. I want to have ME back! I'm working on it.

But do you see now that this is not about approval seeking for it's own sake or because i measure my own value by what others think! Yeah, i have self esteem issues, too, and that certainly plays into it... but that's not what's making this so hard to get over.

maybe. I don't know.

When others are in need of me, if it is important enough, i forget about myself.

It is very good to forget about yourself when others need you.

no i feel the same way all the time, growing up i was called names by my mother n her side of the family about my weight, then my childrens father during or 30yr relationship would so many times tell me "I don't know why i'm with you i know better looking women than you " so people have took away any self esteem i ever had.

Just remember... you knew smarter and nicer men.

He wasn't saying that to you because it resembled truth, you know. He would have told you your breath smelled like Spam if he thought you'd believe him. But he knew exactly what to say that would get to you and that's why he said it. What a jerk.

I am desperately sorry people here go through such dreadful periods of abject internal pain. I think of you with much Love and Compassion (please - I hope nobody considers this patronising, I mean it with all my heart) and I offer up "prayers" for your relief and happiness.

Thank you both

In one of the best sermons I ever heard was this little jewel: "Being you must be pretty important, or God would not have created you." This helped me. Hope it helps someone else.

I had an "extreme mom," an experience that permanently affected my self esteem. I try my best to remind myself that God's opinion of my worth outranks anyone else's!

That gets into the issue of why God would give someone an extreme mom if he loves us so much. Well, to me, he definitely gives us free will. Extreme moms are among the people who aren't using theirs constructively. Free will is not an easy job.

Thank you both, also.

And i'm sorry guys... i'm just kinda "all spleen" this week and blathering.

Those were very nice thoughts, cela. You have a wonderful way of putting things. I agree with you that we are given free will. It is a precious gift, but obviously one we can misuse.

I heard someone say once, "parents aren't able to give what they don't have," and it stuck in my head.

Another thing I have personally heard is that "every parent just does the best they can with what they've got". I guess every perosn has their own agenda, and if a person has an abusive relationship with their parents, or their dad's a drunk, and their mother is uncaring and callous, it's easy to see their parents' faults and condemn them... and yes, indeed, they certainly should bear responsibility for their thoughts words and deeds... but events and experiences helped me to see that all people experience their own personal Pain and obstacles... whilst I would never presume to make excuses for others, I am merely saying that trying to understand that they had problems in their lives they couldn't cope with, made them subects for Compassion. Difficult - maybe impossible - to consider, I do know.... some folks cope better than others... when my parents were young, they did not have the advantages of the countless self-help books available today... they had no access to internet forums and like-minded people with whom to share their troubles... many things were internalised and blocked emotionally... And what a person is unable to face/control/govern within themselves, they will manifest outwardly... this causes them to express themselves very often in a negative, destructive way... so the pain inside is "alleviated" by pushing it outwards...
if they can just dominate and control something/someone else, then they will feel they have more power....
This is what I have learnt thus far, in such matters.
Many may disagree....

With deep bow and respect to all, and the fervent prayer that my words have not offended.

Well, let's see what we can do about our generation, and improving our self esteem.

cela suggested we remember that God values us... Tami said something similar in another thread that it helped her a lot with her self esteem.

What else might we do?

For healthy self esteem we need a strong sense of self worth and confidence.

Many times I was praised for something mediocre I did and ignored when I did something good. In both situations I made own judgment. I get rarely affected by other's opinions.

I think that we should all do that.

Hello Skyhaven,

We ALL have beauty to share, including you. True beauty comes from within. Our bodies are only a shell of who we are. It is our light which illuminates the finest points. If we are staying in the darkness within (especially with negative thoughts about ourselves), how can we expect to illuminate and see our beauty on the outside?

I have seen disfigured people look remarkably beautiful because they glow from within. They have chosen to live fully alive and not hide.

If I'm hearing you correctly on your posts, it sounds like there was some point in your life that you came up with the conclusion, "I am ugly" based on the negative things that happened or the negative words that were said.

What if that's not true? What if your true beauty is hiding in the darkness within because you haven't allowed it to come forward?

What if all you need to do is INVITE your true beauty forward?

What if you took a wild leap of faith and chose to believe you are beautiful and valuable and all those things you've always wished to be?

It's never to late to live fully alive as all of who you REALLY are.

With much warmth,

Tami

Tami,thanks for your insight. what you said really touched me.

Yes Tami. a lovely post.

Tami, you said-

I have seen disfigured people look remarkably beautiful because they glow from within. They have chosen to live fully alive and not hide.


Lovely!

I saw someone today... she isn't disfigured but she's old and has a lot of wrinkles and is not what you'd conventionally consider pretty. But i thought she was pretty today because she glowed, so i said so. It's clear she is happy these days.

That is glow of happiness.

yes, she looked relaxed and i knew as soon as i saw her that she's spent a lot of time outdoors in her garden this summer.

Who is she?

yeah Holly, who is this lady?

She is just someone in town. An artist-type.

Is she an artist?

Sort of. I don't know her really well, but i have known her in passing for a long time. She is not trained as an artist and does not sell any artwork. She used to be a hair dresser. But she is often doing creative things. She's made huge items for parades, costumes, sculpture for her garden, etc. She has an artist kind of mind. Artists often "march to the beat of a different drummer." That would be her.

Yes.

hi pratibha. How are you today?

She had it yesterday.

No, I did not.

She was all ready for it. Don't know what went wrong.

I had a major insight this week about self esteem.

I will try never, ever, to treat myself as a lesser person again.

I learned the difference between lacking money, and believing that i don't deserve the best. I will try now to believe i deserve the best, while still being practical with what money i have to work with.

Anyone else have similar insight?

All of us deserve the best. We undervalue ourself for no reason.

Holly, I am delighted with this change in you.
This is a major change.

yes... it is a little paradigm shift. It will probably be a struggle at first, for me to remember, so it will be helpful to me to get reminders. But it is a good beginning.

I was thinking about it a short while ago, when i was walking home, because i noticed i was holding my head down.

That is not a little shift.
Over time it can change you totally.

Holly, I have also brought many changes in life.

If i can get it to stick.

"Nothing is more fleeting than enlightenment."

Probably the best way to get it to stick is to put it into action right away.

What might i do that would be examples of practicing this new belief?

Like what, for example?

These people called you like this because they had power over you. Do not allow others to label you.

How about some new names for her... like, "Beautiful," and "kind."

Yes. I will call her a beautiful heart in a beautiful body.

Skyhaven, some of my favorite stories are sort of "ugly duckling" stories. One is the opera Carmen, another is the movie Babycakes which has Ricky Lake in it. Another is the Australian movie Strictly Ballroom... one of my favorite movies of all time. Please rent them or get them at your library and watch them over and over if you like them... you will see! You will see that beauty and sex appeal is more about attitude and caring for yourself.

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i had to add my two cents...one of the best books i have ever read is emotional intelligence by Daniel Goleman. It helps you break past the barriers that we have allowed other people have set on us.

Unfortuantley as a child we tend to believe the things that adults tell us which affect our self esteem. Alot of times we then carry these feelings of worthlessness into adulthood even attracting partners that arnt good for us because of our low self worth.

But we have a choice to either allow the negative [censored] to affect the rest of our lives, or choose to realize that we are what we allow ourselves to be. Its a very difficult path to change especially when you've had low self-esteem all your life, but you can't depend on others to provide it for you. You really have to dig deep at the root cause and make positive changes.

To change the way you feel...you have to change the way you think...all of us our worth something but each individual has to decide that for themselves.

It sounds like a very interesting book. Does it give suggestions on how to create this change?

It is a really interesting book. I read it a long time ago. I can't remember if I fully finished it though (I used to have many books going at a time depending on my whim ) I have it here and I'll take a look through it again if your question isn't answered Holly.

I just read through this thread... it is absolutely beautiful and I was touched to read through it since I last posted.

I *LOVED* the renaming idea. It makes sense that a name reflects the truth of someone's value. "Beautiful" is what every one of us women want to feel we are... at least I haven't met a woman who doesn't want to feel beautiful in some way.

OK, I suppose it's time to share a little secret. I'm risking this because I'm hoping someone will be inspired. Of course, someone may laugh, but if one person is touched, well, it's worth it to me Here goes...

Years ago, my girlfriend and I were on a huge journey of personal growth and self discovery. We kept speaking truth to each other and reminded each other of how valuable we truly are. Something happened to inspire us and we decided to refer to each other as Princess. We even got tiaras one Christmas to remind us of our value.

If I'm ever feeling self doubt or feeling a little low, I'll put that tiara on and remind myself of who I REALLY am. It works every time! It sits on top of my jewelry box where I see it every day in my bedroom. No, I don't always notice it, but when I need it, it's there!

When you shared your "silly little game" on a different thread about living in a castle, Holly, I almost spilled the beans then. After all, I AM a Princess, I don't have to pretend!

With much warmth,

Princess Tami

That's really sweet, Tami.

Tami is a princess.

Genius is not a possession of the limited few, but exists in some degree in everyone. Where there is natural growth, a full and free play of faculties, genius will manifest itself.

- Robert Henri, In Education/Genius

Shall a man go and hang himself because he belongs to the race of pygmies, and not be the biggest pygmie that he can? Let everyone mind his own business, and endeavor to be what he was made.

- Henry David Thoreau, "Walden" ( $ ) ( ? ), In Happiness

its a great book i found it amazing & helpful, i'll find the book my house is in such a dissarray right now & let you know i cant remember off hand its been years since i've read it.

But one thing to remember withanything regrading change is it is really darn hard and even when you feel like giving up you have to push yourself to get over your demons!

Anastasia.

It is correct that to bring change is difficult.

I have found that pushing or fighting personal demons often backfires on me, and that it is better for me to make allies of them if i can.

My sleep is an example. Fighting sleeping does not work, yet still sometimes i try.

When i tried to push my way through creative blocks, it did not work. When instead i worked with the block, it did. (Hard to explain that one.)

Pushing myself too hard to advance through fears also does not work for me... it overwhelms me and i collapse. But if i go slowly and try to encorporate fear as excitement or get used to it, it goes better, and i can progress.

That is a common reaction Holly.

I have tried to express this before, and I know from my oiwn experiences that this is not a false-hood..."At times, the very worst enemies we have in our lives, are our own fears".
The demons we fight, resist and fear, the things that assault us are, more often than not, things of our own invention, our own making, and we inadvertently place obstacles in our own way. We effectively sabotage our own efforts.
We fear the poisonous snake in the darkened room, little realising that when we turn the light on, it is a mere neck-tie.
Thatis not to say that the fear is not real... and that the tie - or snake - is not there. Both seem real enough, but then, when we examine the situation accurately, "in the cold light of day" we can see that the fears are largely unfounded, and that the object of our fear is not the scary thing it seems....

I hope this helps.
If Holly, you have decided to ignore me, I'd be grateful of the simple courtesy telling me so.

That's all.

Holly, listen carefully,

We are all very afraid of our fears. we hate ourselves for that. We feel helpless and guilty. But that approach is wrong. we are all products of genes and upbringing. We have to suffer from few things. rather than feeling guilty , we should accept that we are human and mistake repeatedly. pamper yourself and love yourself. Most of your fears and guilt will slowly go away.

Earlier I used to curse myself for all the trouble. Now a days i pamper myself and say- I know that you are having a hard time. Relax, you are human. relax.

that changes my mood. Or I imagine my wife pampering me.
i have decided that I will never forget that I am precious for whatever I am.

You are precious. You are to me and many people.

I see what you mean. I am critical of myself when i am very afraid. This also, i think... is trying to fight a demon... the demon Fear.

It is sort of like a Chinese finger puzzle, isn't it? The more you struggle, the tighter it gets. When you do not struggle, you are free.

I am right now under tremendous pressure to work , but I am not able to. I do not blame myself, but Understand why that is happening. Self blames are very bad.

Always remember-

Also, remember this -



Trish

To break the chain of self blame we need to act... to take the RIGHT action... whether it is to take time to heal, make amends, improve our self, commit, apologize, or forgive ourselves. I'm thinking that when we are blaming ourselves we probably do not have the right direction yet, of our thoughts or actions.

Comments, anyone?

True. At the same time remember that we are humans and we will err again. Better to laugh at our blunders than carry guilt.

Yes.

A few days ago i had an argument with one of my friends. I showed temper, which i do so rarely. For two days i felt RIGHT... hahahaha. But last night i realized i was unfair to him and i created the argument, so i apologized. Now i feel better.