Esther Perel on How to Be More Self-Aware

Esther Perel is a Belgian psychotherapist and relationship expert who studies the importance of trust, freedom, security, and eroticism in modern partnerships. She is the author of the bestselling book Mating in Captivity: Unlocking Erotic Intelligence (2006) and the host of the podcast Where Should We Begin? In 2021, Forbes named her an inaugural member of the 50 Over 50 list. According to Esther, “it is the quality of our relationships that determines the quality of our lives.”

Self-awareness is a form of cognition by which you bring your sense of self into conscious awareness. High self-awareness is a valuable trait that allows you to better understand who you are as a person, your thoughts, your beliefs, biases, blind spots, and how others perceive you.

“The question often is: Do you need to understand yourself in order to understand others? And my answer is yes.” —Esther Perel

Self-awareness offers significant benefits, including increased mindfulness and a deeper understanding of yourself in the present moment; more informed decision-making; a greater ability to be an effective leader; improved mental health and self-esteem; and higher emotional intelligence (or, as Esther calls it, relational intelligence). Many people aim to achieve greater self-awareness—for instance, you might increase self-awareness by monitoring your internal state, noticing how your own emotions on a given day might color your self-perception more holistically.

According to Esther, self-awareness is a foundational aspect of understanding yourself and others. Self-awareness means “you can look at yourself and how you are acting and reacting in relationships,” which includes “how you are communicating in a relationship, [and] how you are showing up—or how you are not.”

When you practice self-awareness, you are more in tune with your emotional reactions and have more control over how and why you interact with the world. And building self-awareness doesn’t just help you with yourself—“that piece of self-knowledge is also what gives you a sense of looking at others and being able to understand them.”

One exercise to become more self-aware is to create what Esther calls an “alternative résumé.” It follows the format of a job résumé, but instead of summarizing everywhere you’ve worked, and what job experience you have, it lists the experiences that make up your identity. The alternative résumé “tells the story of all the other lessons of life, the other experiences that we have accumulated.” Esther suggests five self-reflections to build your alternative résumé:

1. 1. Consider your family history. Esther recommends you start your résumé by considering where you come from. “To go to history, to go intergenerationally, to look at cultural transitions,” she explains, “is extremely useful for understanding how relational thinking and values evolve in a particular family, context, or culture.” Think about your parents, grandparents, extended family, childhood, and how those experiences inform who you are now.
2. 2. Determine where you are on the spectrum between security and freedom. “Everybody has two fundamental sets of human needs,” Esther says. “We all need security, and safety, and stability, and predictability. And we all also need freedom, and adventure, and the ability to experience change, and risk, and novelty, and surprise.” Esther thinks of these things as opposites—and that everyone falls somewhere on the spectrum, either tending toward security or tending toward freedom. Do an honest analysis of where you believe you fall on the spectrum and why. “Would you say coming out of your childhood that you were more in need of connection and protection? Or would you say that you were more in need of freedom and individuality?”
3. 3. Find your place on the spectrum between autonomy and loyalty. Another spectrum Esther identifies ranges from self-reliance to interdependence. She asks: “Were you raised for autonomy or were you raised for loyalty?” Some families or backgrounds encourage independence, while others emphasize and encourage relying on a network around you. Pay attention to your past to determine where you fall on the spectrum (and why).
4. 4. Identify your expectations of relationships. Everyone has a set of expectations that they bring to their relationships with others, informed by their background and past experiences. Esther recommends you identify precisely what these expectations are—how you anticipate others treating or perceiving you and how you act in response. She likes using a metaphor: “Imagine yourself literally entering a house, a place that you can call the relationship. What’s the mood with which you enter? What is the set of expectations, anticipations with which you enter? And do they vary or do you notice that they often are the same regardless of where you go and who you meet?”
5. 5. Ask what stories you tell about yourself. “So many of us think,‘I know myself. I know my story,’” Esther says, “But sometimes the stories that we tell … become [true] just because we keep telling them.” She cautions against falling into “the trap of constricting narratives about yourselves, about your relationships, about others,” because doing this can hinder relational self-awareness. Esther suggests identifying the stories you tell about yourself and determining which ones might no longer be useful to you. “[There are] two questions that I love to ask,” she says. “What is a story that I have told one too many times about myself? … [And] what is a part of myself that I need to break up with?”

Developing relational intelligence and improving communication are essential to boost the quality of your personal and professional relationships. Discover Esther Perel’s approach to resolving conflict, having difficult conversations, and building trust when you sign up for a MasterClass Annual Membership.