Self Steem....can it really all come down to lack of Self Steem?

[creativist]

Hi Everyone, this is the first time i write in this pages and I hope someone can help me with this question.  I have been doing personal development for over ten years now, and I have seen myself growing in many aspects of my life, obtaining amazing changes and goals once I thought they were only for rich people to have.

I am going to an interesting stage in my career and I will become finally my own boss; I am creating a job as a consultant which i have been cooking in my head for over two years now.
I am exiting a permanent job, with a consultant contract, and although I am happy, i know that over the last year some things did just not worked out the way I expected, specially in relation to team work and professional relations. 

I decided to start coaching to assist the process, take the lessons learn and enjoy the task of setting up a company.  But I am a bit disconcerted after my first session, where we explored the pass year and my relationship with people, what worked and did not worked, and also reviewed some values issues.  I was told that it all comes down to lack of self-esteem!

I am so disappointed! after all these years of personal work and after achieving so many things, I have just paid to be told the very initial subject I started to do personal development 10 years ago.

Is it really possible? I mean, I am open to the idea and the work, but it is so discouraging...
I went with the idea of learning more about myself, i know that it takes "two to tango", and that sometimes being insecure about things on myself does not help, but in the other hand i think I have a great self love, i try to take care of myself when i feel i have been too critical and hash, and i try to understand the other side as a non personal attack.  Sometimes I succeed, others ...well, it feels "is as good as it gets", it can only get better next time....
 
What about if I never managed to have this super self-esteem on me?!  Is that mean i cannot be successful and brilliant?

May be this should be the focus, but really at this stage I would rather be concentrating on other parts of my self the just my "esteem"...
can someone help me with this?
thanks,
Cristina

[Evelyne Brink]

Dear Cristina,
thank you for such a wonderful question!
Is it down to self-esteem?! Is that what it's all about?

If success was down to self esteem, how come many successful people think very little of themselves?
Michael tells many a story of insecure millionaires, some of my clients are models and signed musicians, that doesn't mean their super-confident people at all times. Actually some of model's biggest issue is that they feel so ugly (and therefore like a fraud for charging for their perceived beauty)

Self esteem is an interesting concept, I just looked it up on Wikipedia and it says
"Self-esteem is a term used in psychology  to reflect a person's overall evaluation or appraisal of his or her own worth. Self-esteem encompasses beliefs (for example, "I am competent" or "I am incompetent") and emotions such as triumph, despair, pride and shame. "

what becomes apparent is that self esteem is your evaluation of your self.
But what if your success was less based on your evaluation of your self and more on how you show up and serve in the world?

If you are a kick-ass consultant and you help people crack their biggest issues and help a company create a healthy culture and generate revenue beyond their current abilities-
would you call that successful and brilliant?

Or what else is involved for you to be that?

The main difference between a Psychology approach and the coach approach is that in psychology we love labeling things "self-esteem", "confidence issue" and then talk about why that is and how that is and where it came from. I say we because I used to spend hours analyzing myself and others feeling really advanced and developed. (not that it did anything but I felt smart)

The coach approach suggests to look at what you would actually love and create that. Usually feelings such as confidence or self-esteem follow and rise as we follow what we truly love. But nowadays I don't make them quite as important because I know they come.

we explored the pass year and my relationship with people, what worked and did not worked, and also reviewed some values issues.  I was told that it all comes down to lack of self-esteem!

I love to think that there is nothing actually wrong with you and that from reviewing your past, you can identify which skills you may benefit from to create with more ease.

May be this should be the focus, but really at this stage I would rather be concentrating on other parts of my self the just my "esteem"...
can someone help me with this?

I can hear your wisdom speaking right here...
If you followed THAT....focussing on what really makes a difference (rather than getting caught up in various parts of the perceived self...that doesn't even exist if we look at it more deeply...)

ahh the places you could go, the success you will create and the brilliance with which you will lighten up this world!!!

In my never so humble opinion coaching is here to empower you, it's a way to connect deeper to yourself than ever before, dream bigger than ever before and accomplish in exactly the way YOU CHOOSE.

Use the forum as much as you like this month, there are plenty of amazing coaches here to serve you! And feel free to get in touch any time.
Oh and I love your username!!! Creativist...wowowowoww now that's super cool. And deserves extra special treats. (I work with creative people!!)
I want to see you shine.
Love to you, Cristina!!
Evelyne
www.evelynebrink.com

[creativist]

Hi Evelyn
and thank you very much for your feedback...these were more likely the lines I have hear from Michael and it resonated to me the whole time in my session after I spoke with the coach i have just hired!

I did not left the session feeling inspired or challenge, rather thinking that I had to start all over again! however, i am having this reaction because deep inside I know this is not the answer.

I found this coach a year ago, and than i was not sure about it.  I live in France and I do have have options when it comes to have a coach who can speak English.

However, the reason also I bring this to the forum is because I always wonder; may be i am not liking the coach because he is saying something challenging that does not make me feel good? Perhaps I should take this as an opportunity to really learn about myself?

but i know myself, and this type of answers do not take me to the next stage.

I agreed with you Evelyn that once I start to work on an action plan and see things in practice, i would be able to develop my confidence and perhaps my esteem, but for now i have a plan and i want to execute it.

In fact I have high regards of myself, i think I am brilliant, I valued my work and the contribution I am making to the world.  I feel comfortable in my skin, and although I can have ups and down, I feel I see myself as a powerful and creative person, able to convince others and myself of visionary ideas! that is why I want the coaching.

I have to think about this...
thanks for the feedback..
cristina

PS i am creating my consultant company and my title would be Business Creativist...and Yes! i do work with the poorest people in the world...i love my job!

[Evelyne Brink]

HI Cristina,

deep inside I know this is not the answer.

what is YOUR answer to this deep inside?

 

I live in France and I do have have options when it comes to have a coach who can speak English.

Bon salut a France! I speak English, French and German. I coach in German and French. My clients are all over the world. They talk to me over the phone, over the internet, I even run an international group coaching programme. My coach is LA,  Michael coaches people all over the world... You have a lot of choices. 

I have worked with several coaches and I woudn' t recommend working with one you don't resonate with 100%. I like that you are questioning yourself as well, leaving room for the possibility that you may be escaping from something but deep inside you already know what empowers you and what doesn't. Coaching isn't therapy. I'm not interested in finding out how wrong I am and how much I am avoiding things I should go through- because that really doesn't help me fly. Anyone can put themselves down. In fact most people do and that's the problem. Coaching is about options and choices and allowing you to see that you create your magical wonderful life.
Creating from love. Bringing into existance this which isn't here now. Creating the impossible.

I have worked with Michael and am part of his team on "creating the impossible" which I would highly recommend to you too because you get a lot of free super coaching from very exclusive coaches all aligned with Michael's work.

In fact I have high regards of myself, i think I am brilliant, I valued my work and the contribution I am making to the world.  I feel comfortable in my skin, and although I can have ups and down, I feel I see myself as a powerful and creative person, able to convince others and myself of visionary ideas! that is why I want the coaching.

I am glad you can see and feel that. Now as a powerful creative person, what would you really love to create in this world?
And what/who can really support you in undertaking this?

Respect and love to you,
greetings from London!
Evelyne

[creativist]

Hi Evelyn
Ohh! I think i just made a mistake 
I have just sign a 12 session with the current coach...I feel resistance, but since I like challenges I thought that it would be good to go through with him...when I talk to him it feels I am doing my own coaching, but I also thought that if he was not there I would not be feeling the same about it, and only for that may be it is working out...

He spoke of GOALS...when i have just being listening and reading Michal's book Super Coach and he talks about CREATION...what would i like to create..
I have this wonderful and exiting project and I think I rather look for some one like you to be coach....!
I think i am so eager to get the project happening and until now i did not seem to have so many options, so I settle for a coach which i am still not sure about it...

Do you think it would be possible to talk over email about this possibility?
culturalcreativist@yahoo.com

I have been checking out your web site and it definitely resonates with me...i would like to give it a go...

Cristina

[drgarcy]

Dr. Albert Ellis was a prominent psychologist who founded Rational Emotive Therapy in the 1950's (which he later renamed as Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy). 

Ellis basically started the movement in psychology which is now so powerful--the idea that THOUGHTS which we BELIEVE are extremely powerful over our emotions and behaviors.

Anyway, he said that one of the greatest disservices that psychology ever imposed upon humanity was the myth of self-esteem, which he saw as a form of pathological self-rating.

Rather than rating ourselves, he encouraged us to rate our behavior.
So, rather than saying, "I am bad," we would say, "It is bad," etc.

In addition, rather than saying, "Once I reach this goal, then I can like myself," which leads to high self-esteem, one could say, "I accept myself whether or not I reach this goal & I am okay even if I don't," which leads to high self-acceptance.  Ellis emphasized unconditional self, other, and life acceptance.

Anyway, Dr. Ellis was so impassioned by this pathological tendency to have ever evolving standards to measure our SELVES by, that he wrote a book called THE MYTH OF SELF-ESTEEM. 

I think he'd like the fact that you are exploring this idea & not simply taking it for granted or claiming that self-rating is a necessary part of goal attainment.

Best wishes,

Pam Garcy, PhD
Psychologist & Coach in Dallas

[DAL]

Hi,

Run, Do not walk...away from this person who is trying to put a damper on your dream! Get your money back or lose it, but do not continue to listen to this person who does not have your best interest at heart. You sound totally ready to take on this new role. As Nike says, JUST DO IT!

Best of luck to you,

Dorothy

[Jay Budzynski]

Hi creativist


Everyone's advice seems sensible, yet have you considered maybe just living your life for a few weeks, without doing much other than just being you.

If you have been doing self development for ten years, I can promise you your done, and all you have to do now is just get on with it.

Let me use a crude metaphor- lets say you start doing martial arts your first visit to the Dojo you "know*" very little, your balance is off you have "no* power" in your defence, yet you keep on going, week after week month after month, year after year and slowly your skills increases, soon you move up the ranks and then one day, your a teacher, and then you look back from where you started to where you are, and then you notice that you have come a lot father then you thought.

One of the things we humans are really good at doing is projecting our selves into and on to the things that we do, like you will catch this all the time, like I am a coach, or an NLPer or psychologist, where it fact I am a human being that uses the tools and ideas from coaching, NLP, etc to assist other to reach their goals etc. you see we identify into a set of categories and detach from our humanness, and become a little mechanical, now when we have been saturated in the ideas and concepts of personal development we have a massive array of groups, categories, sorts, frames, evaluations, persona's, labels off all kinds, that we are trying to fit into- and if you do give yourself enough space for incubation and integration, than there is a big chance that your opening, one loop, inside another again and again and again, never giving your body-mind enough time to live in the new learnings that you have been learning.

So maybe just for a little while- just consider enjoying living, and do the simple things in life that allow you to connect and just be you, and you can always return the personal development, after a little while.



J


Just be you.                      

[Rosanna]

Simply want to appreciate what you wrote.

Thank you!

Rosanna