Why self-confidence is not always good

And why you shouldn’t strive to raise it at all costs

Howdy fellow readers & personal development enthusiasts! As spring takes over (at least in Romania) I noticed how people become calmer, plans roll out and we start discussing how to schedule our vacations. 

At the same time, spring is sometimes that time of the year when we start feeling good about ourselves and this is the introduction to today’s topic about self-esteem. 

We are used to thinking about self-esteem as something that we need. The bigger the better. 

But is that actually true? 

As you can imagine - it is not true.

This study shows that efforts to raise self-esteem are not only futile but actually, they can negatively impact performance. 

In short, the study shows that efforts to increase self-esteem usually lead to poorer performance, and lower self-esteem in the long run. 

The story is that if you have low self-esteem then you feel bad. If you have high self-esteem, then you will be afraid to lose it. 

So you will do whatever it takes to keep it. Even if that includes, anxiety, comparison, and sometimes even lying and cheating - the extreme cases. 

What? But what have I been doing all these years when I thought that only if I had more self-esteem, my life would be better, I would do so much more: 

I would set boundaries.

I would get that promotion! 

I would have more money! Etc. 

Sorry to disappoint, but things don’t play out like that. 

And the fact that you shouldn’t strive to increase your self-esteem is good news.

Most of the time, having high self-esteem means thinking good things about yourself - that you are smart, capable, confident, and so on. 

As opposed to having low self-esteem - which usually means thinking that you are not confident, not good enough, not smart enough, not fit enough, and so on. 

If we base our life and performance on self-esteem and confidence, then we will mentally account for the good and the bad that we are doing, thinking, etc. 

Usually, that leads to rigid thinking. 

I cannot keep up with the training, so I am not a fit person. 

I cannot run as fast, so I am not a good runner. 

I don’t read as much, so I am not much of a reader. 

I yell at my kids sometimes, so I am not a good mother. 

You get the gist. It’s a list of what I did well and not.

In ACT (Acceptance & commitment therapy), we are not so interested in the veracity of these labels. I do not care in therapy if these labels are true or false - they are neither. Sometimes you do good things, other times not so good. 

Most clients will give me so many examples of situations where they were not good enough, smart enough, witty enough, parent enough - and the list may go on. 

What I am most interested in is how these can help you live the life you want to live. And by that, I mean a life based on values. 

See, I believe the benefit of not basing everything on high self-esteem is that you try hard. You discipline yourself. 

Just don’t focus on winning the game. Nobody wins at the game of self-esteem. We just do things that are good for us, sometimes more, sometimes less. 

And now a thought for you: what would be possible in your life, if self-esteem would be off the table? Imagine that there is no self-esteem, no labels, and no evaluations. 

What would become possible for you? How would you approach things that matter to you?

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