Dear Diary, Sorry Again For The Disturbance (low Self-esteem)

People with low self-esteem don’t always see themselves as useless or bad, although it’s true that they rarely say anything beautiful about themselves. This obviously has a very high cost from the point of view of the quality of life, because these people have to live with unhappiness and despair.

When we listen to the stories of people with low self-esteem, we understand that unhappiness, frustration and despair are the main difficulties they face in their life. This characteristic is based on a difficulty and an imbalance of self-acceptance and self-esteem.

For this reason, it is very important to examine how you feel about yourself, as there is a close relationship between low self-esteem and personal problems and this manifests itself in many different ways. Let’s see in more detail what happens in these cases.

I see myself and think about myself, but I can’t love myself. Do I have low self-esteem?

Low self-esteem is synonymous with a lack of affection towards the image that is projected. This means that, faced with the idea of ​​who he is and how he is, a person with low self-esteem does not approve of himself, devalues ​​himself and feels contempt.

In this sense, assessing the type of self-esteem is not an easy task, because experts have not yet managed to come to an agreement on how to reflect the different ways in which this personality trait manifests itself. Despite this, today we have several tools available that assess self-esteem directly and without the need for external information.

Here is one of the most used scales to measure self-esteem: the Rosenberg self-esteem scale ( adapted and validated in Italian by Miretta Prezza and collaborators in 1970 ).

This way, if you are interested in having a short view of your self-esteem, you can do it quickly by answering honestly to 10 simple sentences.

The first 5 are evaluated in the following terms: 4 points (strongly agree), 3 points (agree), 2 points (disagree) and 1 point (disagree).

1. In general, I am satisfied with myself and believe that I am a person worthy of appreciation.
2. Sometimes I think I’m good for nothing.
3. I feel like I have some good qualities.
4. I am able to do things just as well as other people.
5. I feel like I don’t have too many things to be proud of.

The following 5 sentences, on the other hand, must be evaluated in these terms: 4 points (strongly disagree), 3 points (disagree), 2 points (agree) and 1 point (strongly agree).

1. Sometimes I feel really useless.
2. I have the feeling that I am someone who has value, at least as much as everyone else.
3. I’d like to respect myself more.
4. In general, I tend to think I’m a failure.
5. Sometimes I think I’m not a good person.

Now add up the score you have obtained and evaluate it according to these criteria:

• From 30 to 40 points: high self-esteem. Normal and healthy self-esteem is considered.
• From 26 to 29 points: average self-esteem. These are not serious self-esteem issues, but it should be improved.
• Less than 25 points: low self-esteem. You suffer from significant self-esteem problems.

The psychological profile of a person with low self-esteem

When we want to evaluate the psychological profile of a person with low self-esteem, we must ask ourselves if that person feels extreme rejection of himself or if it is a mere distortion of his qualities and abilities that forces him to focus only on his own aspects. negative.

Despite this, it has been specified that people with low self-esteem need to think positive thoughts about themselves and describe themselves using beautiful words. What happens, however, is that  when something threatens their sense of courage, they find few reasons that lead them to listen and to emphasize the positive aspects that characterize them.

Let’s see some more details about it:

• People with low self-esteem tend to describe themselves more generally and without giving themselves too much importance. It is normal for them to do this by using phrases such as: ” I think I am slightly nice or nice “, ” hard-working or hard-working enough “, etc.

• When an unpleasant event happens, they tend to feel more responsible than they really are. Likewise, when something positive happens to them, they don’t think it has anything to do with their characteristics or behavior.

• People with low self-esteem tend to strive to achieve goals that are unclear or too difficult to achieve, which convinces them that “they have to get everything they set out to achieve .”

• They have a poor ability to cope with difficulties and, at times, even end up self-sabotaging themselves in achieving their goals. This helps fuel the negative view they have of themselves.

As we can see, low self-esteem is a lack of affection that one feels towards one’s self-idea. This is why we must avoid comparing ourselves to others, but work to transform the negative aspects into positive ones and develop a personal strategy that allows you to see yourself in a positive way. In the event that this process is very painful, then it is advisable to consult a specialist psychologist as soon as possible.