With warmth and encouragement, along with her original ten-step process, Carolynn Hillman puts self-esteem and the accomplishment and real satisfaction it engenders within the reach of every woman. Her straightforward approach to conquering feelings of inadequacy and self-defeating behavior include:
- Practicing six key ways of nurturing yourself
- Recognizing and appreciating your good points
- Silencing the inner critic and heeding the inner child
- Breaking the self-imposed failure cycle
- Overcoming external obstacles that limit your progress
With warmth and encouragement, along with her original ten-step process, Carolynn Hillman puts self-esteem and the accomplishment and real satisfaction it engenders within the reach of every woman. Her straightforward approach to conquering feelings of inadequacy and self-defeating behavior include:
- Practicing six key ways of nurturing yourself
- Recognizing and appreciating your good points
- Silencing the inner critic and heeding the inner child
- Breaking the self-imposed failure cycle
- Overcoming external obstacles that limit your progress
Recovery of Your Self-Esteem: A Guide for Women: New Techniques & Understanding for Women Who Want to Feel Better About Themselves More of the Time
304
Recovery of Your Self-Esteem: A Guide for Women: New Techniques & Understanding for Women Who Want to Feel Better About Themselves More of the Time
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Overview
With warmth and encouragement, along with her original ten-step process, Carolynn Hillman puts self-esteem and the accomplishment and real satisfaction it engenders within the reach of every woman. Her straightforward approach to conquering feelings of inadequacy and self-defeating behavior include:
- Practicing six key ways of nurturing yourself
- Recognizing and appreciating your good points
- Silencing the inner critic and heeding the inner child
- Breaking the self-imposed failure cycle
- Overcoming external obstacles that limit your progress
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781497663220 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Open Road Media |
| Publication date: | 07/01/2014 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 304 |
| File size: | 2 MB |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
Recovery of Your Self-Esteem: A Guide for Women
New Techniques & Understanding for Women Who Want to Feel Better About Themselves More of the Time
By Carolynn Hillman
OPEN ROAD INTEGRATED MEDIA
Copyright © 1992 Carolynn HillmanAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4976-6322-0
CHAPTER 1
Being There for Yourself
Marcy was laid off from work. After a month of fruitless job-hunting, she feels like a nothing and a nobody.
Nancy's three children are late getting off to school, despite her waking them on time, continually urging them to hurry, and finally yelling at them. After they leave she sits with her head in her hands, feeling like a nag, a screaming meanie, and an inadequate mother.
Linda gets up her courage and phones the man she met at last week's singles party. He says he is too busy preparing a case for trial to make any plans at this time. She hangs up and feels embarrassed, ashamed, unattractive, undesirable, and unlovable.
Karen, a vice president for marketing, writes a report that includes her recommendations for increasing sales. Her boss decides to go with Charlie's recommendations instead. Karen spends the next week in a funk, questioning whether she's fit for her job.
Sally has struggled with her weight all her life. She diets down almost to her goal, then gradually puts the weight back on, plus a few more pounds. When her weight reaches what she considers panic proportion, she frantically starts dieting again. Whenever she is more than five pounds above her optimal weight, she feels fat, ugly, unattractive, and undeserving.
Elaine is driving to work when her car sputters, stalls out, and won't start up again. She turns to her husband beside her and berates him for not taking better care of the car, though he knows no more about cars than she does.
Marcy, Nancy, Linda, Karen, Sally, and Elaine are all competent, likable women; yet they all have fragile self-esteem. However others may view them, inside they feel deficient and inadequate. Whenever something goes wrong, they are sure they're to blame. Even Elaine, who seems to react by blaming her husband and not herself, does so to ward off feelings of inadequacy. Her sense of self-worth is so shaky that she can't bear thinking herself responsible for one more difficulty, so whenever anything goes wrong, she looks for someone else to blame. These women are like many of us.
When we react to disappointment with self-blame or by blaming others, it is because we do not have an ample inner reservoir of self-liking and self-appreciation to weather whatever storm we're in. We are not grounded enough in our sense of self-worth to be able to take responsibility for what we contributed to our troubles without condemning ourselves totally. Nor are we secure enough in ourselves to recognize the role that people and events beyond our control have played in our difficulties, rather than blaming ourselves for not having been able to control the uncontrollable. Instead, when things don't go the way we want them to, rather than being there for ourselves, most of us blame ourselves, dredging up all the things we think are wrong with us.
We may blame ourselves for a few "glaring" faults, or we might have a long mental list of our failings, such as: socially awkward, timid, unassertive, fat, clumsy, ugly, dull, boring, dumb, lazy, overemotional, aimless, fearful, selfish, unambitious, disorganized, unworthy, and unlovable. Some of us have gone through our entire lives feeling not good enough, or no good at all, often without a clear idea of what's really wrong. There's just this feeling that, deep down, there is something terribly wrong with us, some nameless thing that is defective or missing.
We long to feel better about ourselves. We know that the more we like ourselves, the better we will feel, and the more others will like us. It is common knowledge that people with high self-esteem have an aura about them that makes them attractive and desirable. Yet, to many of us, realizing our worth seems a goal beyond our reach. Despite our discouragement, however, most of us don't give up. We keep thinking that, if only we could correct what's wrong with us or our lives, then we would approve of ourselves.
As a teenager I was overweight, young-looking, and awkward. I longed to be sophisticated and sought-after, and thought that, if only I were older and thin and had the right clothes, then I would be glamorous and popular. By the time I hit thirty, I realized that no matter how old, thin, or smartly dressed I might become, I would never be sophisticated. My personality is more warm and forthright than it is charming and coolly contained. I decided I needed to learn to feel good about myself as I was, rather than continuing to long for the elusive sophistication that I had believed would make me desirable.
Many women erroneously believe, like I did, that they don't appreciate themselves at present because they haven't accomplished enough to merit feeling good about who they are. They think that, in order to value themselves, they first have to do more: lose weight, get married, earn more money, get a promotion, obtain a degree, have children, be a better mother, acquire poise, or produce something wonderful. However, in many cases even reaching these goals doesn't provide the desired results.
Many high achievers remain on a treadmill where, no matter how much they achieve, they feel it's not enough. They just keep needing to do more and more to fill their inner sense of inadequacy. Often, despite receiving the respect and admiration of others, inside they feel like imposters, and live in terror of failing the next time, thereby exposing their deficiency. They look at each achievement as something that only increases others' expectations of them, setting them up for a harder fall when their unworthiness is revealed. They long to feel content and pleased with themselves, but self-contentment is the one thing they cannot achieve.
Self-esteem can come only from the inside, from inner acceptance and approval. If this self-approval is not there, then the effects of outside commendation and rewards last only as long as the kudos keep rolling in. When they cease, the achievement junkie suffers a dramatic drop in self-esteem, and often becomes depressed. To be truly anchored in feelings of self-worth, we need to approve of ourselves for who we are.
Women are especially vulnerable to feeling inadequate and depending on the approval of others for our sense of self-worth. Society, rather than valuing us as full human beings and empowering us, socializes us to focus on attracting, giving to, and pleasing others. We are "good girls" if we do as we're told, keep our voices down, willingly help out, and mind our manners. Advertisements and the media constantly barrage us with the message that we are to be beautiful and desirable, that our purpose in life is to snare and keep a man, and that failure to do so or the choice of other options means we are deficient and inadequate. Co-dependency, a problem that has received a lot of attention in recent years, involves getting your sense of self-worth from the approval of others, rather than generating it from within yourself—but this is precisely what women are taught to do. It is therefore not surprising that so many of us have limited or fragile self-esteem. We need to challenge our upbringing and culture in order to learn to value ourselves for who we truly are.
If you've ever rehashed your day in your mind, thinking about all the things you should have done better and telling yourself how inadequate you are, then you know how this self-recrimination drains time and energy from your life. If you've ever procrastinated before doing a task, and then spent the day (or week or month) feeling guilty, then you know how guilt can sap your strength, and sour your free time. It is quite common for women from all walks of life and with varying degrees of accomplishment to waste their time and energy making themselves feel deficient and therefore miserable.
Usually, though, a woman is not aware that she is actively undermining herself and eroding her self-esteem. Instead, she may think she has a "poor self-image," or a "guilt complex" that is beyond her control. The good news is that nothing could be further from the truth. You are not the helpless victim of unmanageable internal forces. If you don't value yourself, it is because you are actively treating yourself in a critical and belittling manner. Let me explain:
A helpful way to understand what happens when you feel bad about yourself is to consider yourself as having an inner-caretaker and an inner-child. Your inner-child contains your feelings, wishes, desires, and needs. Your inner-caretaker's job is to care for you as a parent would: to see that you eat right, get enough sleep, show up on time, act ethically and morally, and fulfill your responsibilities. When your inner-caretaker sees you stumbling, she tries to get you to straighten up and fly right. However, she can do this in very different ways.
Some of us, the lucky ones, have an inner-caretaker who gives constructive criticism and advice while being understanding, accepting, compassionate, encouraging, supportive, and approving. Others of us, the less fortunate, carry within ourselves an inner-caretaker who is really an inner-critic, who tries to help us by being disparaging and demeaning.
Our inner-critic is the part of us that is always telling us what we might have done, and could have done, and should have done ... telling us how other people are better and luckier than we are, and how we are inferior ... telling us that no matter how hard we try, we'll never succeed because we just don't have what it takes, and success is for other people, not for us.
Can you recall hearing the voice of your inner-caretaker? Think of a time when you were under pressure ... feeling stressed ... had things to do, decisions to make ... were unsure of what to do and how to handle things. Perhaps your caretaker soothed you ... told you to calm down and take a break ... told you that your decisions are usually sound, but also that it's all right to make mistakes ... told you that you are a valuable, likable person and will remain so, no matter how things turn out. If your inner guardian talked to you this way, you won't have any trouble remembering how helped and supported you felt.
However, maybe your inner voice addressed you differently ... told you that you always get overexcited, that you can't handle pressure like others can ... that you can't make good decisions because you really don't know what you should know ... told you that you'd better not make a mistake because then everyone will know how incompetent you really are ... told you that you really are no good or unlikable and don't have what it takes, and now everyone will know it. If your inner-critic talked to you this way, you will remember how this added to the pressure you were under, and how much harder it was to operate effectively.
We all have our vulnerable spots, areas in which we feel particularly unsure of or bad about ourselves. These are the areas where our inner-critics continually criticize us. In my case, I'm vulnerable to feeling "fat" (I've struggled and see-sawed with my weight all my life), pushy (it's sometimes hard for me to find the dividing line between being assertive and overinsistent), selfish (it's not easy to balance my needs with those of others), impatient (I don't like waiting), and rejectable (based on some childhood experiences). My inner-critic, when left unchecked, is ever ready to push my buttons in these areas by interpreting events as proof that I'm too fat, pushy, selfish, impatient, and rejectable—in short, that I'm just not worthy.
If you dislike yourself, it is because you, like so many of us, have an inner-critic constantly telling you that you're inadequate and unworthy, that you should have done it better, acted better, felt better, or looked better; telling you that other people are much more capable than you and that whatever you accomplish isn't enough, that doom is just around the corner and that, if you make one wrong move, you'll slip into the abyss of rejection and abandonment.
Self-esteem can develop only if you turn this inner-censor into a loving, nurturing guardian. The ten steps described in part 2 will show you how to do just that. You will discover how to recognize and appreciate your good points, and how to be supportive and understanding towards yourself when you are having difficulty. You will learn how to give yourself credit and praise for the things you do, rather than criticize yourself for what you don't do; how to encourage yourself as you take steps to attain your goals, and not berate yourself if you stumble on the way. Most importantly, you will learn to give yourself the appreciation and respect that you are longing for. When you nurture yourself, you give yourself what you need to feel confident and capable, and create for yourself the conditions under which you will thrive. Then you will value yourself for who you are, not for what you accomplish.
Paradoxically, you will also be able to accomplish more and to feel better about the things that you do. This is the magic of self-esteem—the better you feel about yourself, the less you need to prove your worth to others and to yourself, so the more energy you have available for accomplishing things, having fun, and—as you come full circle—feeling good about yourself.
This is not a quick and easy process—a few exercises and your sense of self will be radically and permanently changed. We all know that life doesn't work this way. Change always takes time and repeated effort. You didn't learn to dislike yourself in a week, and you won't unlearn it in a week either. But you can do it! The steps in this book, synthesized from nearly twenty-five years' experience in helping women come to terms with and feel positive about themselves, are designed to give you the tools you need to treat yourself with the compassion and understanding that foster self-approval, growth, and success, which I define as:
Success is being happy first with yourself, and secondly with your life.
I firmly believe that what we really want and need, once our basic requirements of food and shelter are adequately satisfied, is a life where we feel good about ourselves, about what we are doing, and about the people around us. However, we cannot feel good if we are not happy within. Without inner assurance, no accomplishment ever seems enough—and it is hard to be close to others if we feel unworthy and are in inner conflict.
I know this is different from the common way success is defined and measured. After all, I am putting wealth, fame, status, achievements, or accomplishments in, at best, a secondary role. This is because there is no point in "having it all" if it doesn't make you happy, and if you are not happy with yourself, then all the accomplishments in the world are not going to make you so. There are many people who are rich and famous, the envy of others, but who never feel successful within. (A tragic example would be Christina Onassis, heir to the vast fortune amassed by her Greek shipping tycoon father Aristotle; she had four failed marriages and died at age thirty-seven. Her huge fortune and jet-set life-style could not enable her to find a fulfilling relationship or give her the inner contentment that she so needed).
Money, fame, and achievements are only of value when integrated into a positive sense of self. Otherwise the outwardly "successful" person remains discontent and unfulfilled. No amount of money, no degree of fame, no long list of achievements ever fills the hollow inner space.
When you learn to nurture yourself, you learn how to feel good about yourself as you are, freeing your energy to go after what you want. You will live not primarily in the future ("I'll be happy once I ... make a lot of money, or advance in my career, or find the right person to share my life with"), but in the present, enjoying yourself and feeling good about yourself even as you strive for more.
This will put you in what I call the Success Cycle, where nurturing yourself leads to increased self-esteem and hope, which leads to positive efforts for which you take credit and feel good and successful, which leads to more self-nurturing.
This may seem simple and self-evident; however, it is often difficult to put into practice. Many intelligent, wise, sensitive, knowledgeable women don't give themselves the nurturing they need to feel good about themselves and to take positive steps, but attack themselves instead. They criticize and berate themselves, believing harshness to be the best way to motivate themselves to change. They try to prod themselves into achievements by constantly focusing on their deficiencies, and fear that if they stop harping on their shortcomings, they will give up on improving themselves and do nothing.
Perhaps you feel this way, too. Do you use your energy to put yourself down, rather than using it to cope and grow? Do you seek the support and approval of others, without recognizing that it is you yourself from whom you most need encouragement and acceptance? Do you resent others or the world for not rewarding you, but ultimately blame yourself for not doing more and being so unworthy? Do you command yourself, "Do something impressive, then I'll approve of you?" Then you know that such behavior works about as effectively as telling a plant, "First grow, and then I'll water you."
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Recovery of Your Self-Esteem: A Guide for Women by Carolynn Hillman. Copyright © 1992 Carolynn Hillman. Excerpted by permission of OPEN ROAD INTEGRATED MEDIA.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
Contents
Introduction,PART I: THE IMPORTANCE OF SELF-NURTURING,
1 Being There for Yourself,
2 CARESS: Six Key Ways to Nurture Yourself,
3 Why We Are the Way We Are,
PART II: TEN STEPS TO LIKING THE PERSON YOU ARE,
4 Step One: Recognizing Your Good Points and Believing in Yourself,
5 Step Two: Looking at How You Berate Yourself,
6 Step Three: Recognizing the Real You,
7 Step Four: Finding Out Who Taught You to Feel Bad about Yourself,
8 Step Five: Letting Go and Liking Yourself,
9 Step Six: You Be You and I'll Be Me,
10 Step Seven: Learning What You Need to Feel Nurtured and Step Eight: Opening Your Heart to Your Inner-Child,
11 Step Nine: How to Listen with Your Heart and Talk so You'll Be Heard: Learning Empathic Communication,
12 Step Ten: Giving Yourself the Nurturance You Need,
PART III: NURTURING YOURSELF IN DIFFICULT SITUATIONS,
13 Nurturing Yourself When Anxious,
14 Nurturing Yourself When Depressed,
15 Nurturing Yourself While Raising Children,
16 Nurturing Yourself While Making Love,
17 Nurturing Yourself at Work,
A Final Word,
Suggested Readings,
Notes,
Index,