Self-Esteem Definition: How to Build Self-Esteem or Self-Worth

Self-esteem describes your subjective perspective of yourself and your own worth. Your sense of self-esteem is a significant component of your mental health and overall well-being. It impacts your ability to pursue goals, maintain relationships, and enjoy your quality of life. Self-esteem is closely related to other conceptual terms, including self-concept, self-regard, self-worth, and self-respect.

A healthy sense of self-esteem is necessary to maintain strong relationships, practice self-acceptance and self-love, and find the motivation to reach your goals.

Psychologist Abraham Maslow believed the concept of self-esteem was so important he included it in his hierarchy of needs, a theory of motivation that detailed the physiological and psychological needs humans require to develop into complex individuals. Maslow placed self-esteem near the middle of the hierarchy, between basic needs (like food and water) and self-actualization, a state of self-awareness in which a person is capable of operating at their highest potential.

Many internal and external factors can impact your self-esteem, including:

• Childhood experiences: The development of self-esteem begins during childhood. A childhood featuring supportive relationships, positive feedback from family and friends, and high academic achievement could result in a higher level of self-esteem. Young people who experience negative feedback, poor grades, or physical or emotional abuse are likely to develop a negative self-image.
• Media messages: Films, TV shows, podcasts, books, and news programs all have the potential to send messages that can impact your self-esteem positively or negatively. For example, young people and adults alike are susceptible to a media message that correlates a certain level of self-worth to a certain body image or possession.
• Significant life events: Experiences that bring you personal or professional satisfaction are likely to contribute to higher self-esteem. Possibilities include starting a new job, receiving a promotion, reaching a fitness goal, finishing a big project, buying a house, or getting married. On the other hand, an experience that affects your physical health or emotional well-being is likely to contribute to poor self-esteem. For example, an illness, the loss of a loved one, the loss of your job, or a financial setback could impact you negatively.

There are many ways to measure self-esteem, but the most common method is Rosenberg’s self-esteem scale (RSES), which sociologist Morris Rosenberg designed to measure high school students’ self-esteem.

Using Rosenberg’s system, participants conduct a self-evaluation of their sense of self. First, they respond to ten statements about their self-confidence, self-worth, and personality traits. Then they choose from one of four answers, ranging from “strongly agree” to “strongly disagree.” Each answer has a value between one and four points, and there are thirty possible points. The closer to thirty a respondent scores, the greater the indication they have high self-esteem. A person with low self-esteem usually totals fewer than fifteen points.

Low self-esteem manifests itself in a number of ways, such as:

1. 1. Fear: Individuals with lower self-esteem often worry about perceived or possible failures. Their self-doubt about their abilities is often so great they’ll avoid specific life experiences to avoid the potential for failure.
2. 2. Lack of confidence: Low self-esteem robs you of self-confidence and self-compassion. You might find it difficult to accept positive feedback, instead focusing only on your failures and weaknesses. You might also believe others have greater value than you do.
3. 3. Negative thoughts: A sign of low self-esteem is a constant throughline of negativity in our thoughts, words, and actions. You might make negative comments about yourself, shoulder the blame when events turn in a negative direction, or tear down your own ideas and accomplishments.

While having high self-esteem is important to your mental health and emotional well-being, excessive self-esteem can indicate narcissism or other negative issues. Traits you can sometimes associate with excessive self-esteem include:

1. 1. Infallibility: Those with excessive self-esteem believe they will complete every task and never fail at anything. This is in contrast to people with healthy self-esteem, who feel confident in their abilities but also accept they might not succeed at everything.
2. 2. Overconfidence: An overinflated sense of self and of one’s abilities is a hallmark of narcissism. Excessive self-esteem leads the individual to believe they possess more skills and more abilities than anyone else at a given task.
3. 3. Perfectionism: An obsessive need to be perfect often accompanies the overinflated ego of a narcissist. This perfectionism means tasks often take longer than they should because the individual refuses to complete it unless it meets unrealistic criteria. People with excessive self-esteem might also find it difficult to accept certain conditions or even people who do not live up to their ideals.

You can work toward maintaining positive self-esteem or even improving your self-esteem by following these tips:

• Practice awareness. Try to be cognizant of when negativity enters your thinking. Instead of pushing it aside, explore the underlying causes of the negativity and determine how they are impacting your self-esteem. Getting to the root of the matter will better enable you to tackle your self-esteem issues head-on.
• Practice self-help. Building self-esteem means challenging negative thoughts by rephrasing their messaging and reframing your beliefs around the topic. If you’ve done the mental and emotional work to better understand the source of this negativity in your life, surround yourself with resources that are specific to your situation. Talk to a mental health professional, read a self-help book on the subject, or download an audiobook or podcast that outlines strategies relevant to your circumstances.
• Practice positive self-talk. Negative thinking wrongly paints your experiences as failures. Counteract this with positive affirmations and positive self-talk to develop healthier self-esteem. This will better enable you to emphasize your accomplishments and value yourself. Don’t beat yourself up for any negative self-talk or negative thinking up to this point. Remember, every day is a new opportunity to move past toxic influences on your thinking and make incremental improvements.

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