OVERCOMING THE UNHEALTHY INNER CRITIC.
Your self-esteem is characterized by the level of confidence and feeling you have about yourself.
You must understand what it is so you can do a whole lot of things through it.
Having a healthy sense of esteem about yourself will help you in the way you relate with people and how their opinion of you impacts you.
Many have done to themselves more harm than good by giving in to low self-esteem. They developed what I called "THE UNHEALTHY INNER CRITIC".
The truth remains that no one can condemn you to save on your approval. They might criticize or say unhealthy words about you but your perception towards them will go a long way to mean whether you are approving them or not.
What do you perceive about yourself?
Do you see less of yourself while God is seeing more of you?
Who do you see yourself becomes in years to come?
For example: if someone believes that he is a failure, he will quit trying and will avoid interaction with things or people that will help him break forth.
A recent one I discovered about life is that life excuses would always remain inexhaustible but only a man who allows them to rule over him become vulnerable.
What is your perception of life? What level of priority have you been giving to people's thoughts, words, actions and perceptions towards you?
While everyone's self-esteem is vulnerable to other people who openly criticise, ridicule or point out their flaws, "THE GREATER THREAT TO EACH PERSON'S SELF-ESTEEM LURKS WITHIN "
You are who you believe you are?
Now take this question "Who are you?"
Having this knowledge is critical to you scaling through every phase of life you find yourself in.
Thus, we may be our most severe critic, berating ourselves mercilessly when we find ourselves making an error in judgement, forgetting what we should remember, expressing ourselves awkwardly, breaking our most sacred promises to ourselves, losing our self-control, behaving in ways that we regret and may deplore.
What is the main cause of low self-esteem? Fear.
Yes. The fear of so many things has caused many to develop low self-esteem which eventually aggravated into something else.
The fear of the unknown or what tomorrow holds.
The fear of what will become the outcome of what they are about to try or get themselves engage in.
The fear of how to start.
The fear of if they can succeed when others have tried the same thing they are about to try but has failed.
Fear! Fear!! Fear!!!
The activator of low self-esteem.
Fear depreciates man's worth.
What does the Bible say about fear?
It said, "It is a spirit and that God has not given it unto us save the Spirit of Power, Love and Sound mind" (2 Timothy 1:7).
Therefore, low self-esteem is never for us the children of God. It is never for you!
HOW DO YOU KNOW OR IDENTIFY A MAN WITH LOW SELF ESTEEM?
Below are some traces you can see in someone having low self-esteem.
✅Avoiding new things and not taking up opportunities.
✅ Blaming others for their own mistakes.
✅Not being able to deal with normal levels of frustration.
✅ Negative confessions and comparisons to others.
✅ Inability to utilise that which one has been loaded with.
✅ Feeling of defeat before trying.
✅ Refusal to take up responsibilities due to the perception of how great such responsibilities are.
DESTROYING LOW SELF ESTEEM.
It's a process, and it won't happen overnight, but there are things you can do to get it started and keep it moving.
1. GET CLEAR ON YOUR VALUES. i.e. Determine what your values are and examine your life to see where you're not living in alignment with your beliefs. Then, make the necessary changes. The more you know what you stand for, the more confident you will be. What do you stand for? The word or the world?
Values never go out of fashion. Knowing your value most especially in Christ Jesus will help you surmount challenges, storms and Problems.
It will help you to choose who should be in your life and who shouldn't be in your life.
Values are like the anchor that helps you to navigate all your relationships and how you see others.
What are the Values you should follow after?
You must know that you are created from the good hands of God for good works and unto good works. (Ephesians 2:10) Therefore, the good works are what you are expected to walk in daily.
Let us see some of the values which Apostle Paul asked Timothy to walk in; 1 Timothy 6:11
"But thou, O man of God, flee these things; and follow after righteousness, godliness, faith, love, patience, meekness."
Taking a clear look at the above, we can see that majority are the composition of the fruits of the Spirit. Hence, more reason why you should understand that every worth in the life of man comes from the indwelling of God's spirit in that man and a man who possesses not the Spirit can't have those things.
2. DISCOVER YOUR PURPOSE IN LIFE AND BE DETERMINED TO FULFILL YOUR PURPOSE:
This place is very important that God be the one to guide and direct you into achieving Purpose.
Man's Purpose is from God, in God and For God. Therefore, God should never be excluded from the equation of getting it achieved.
Get to Know Yourself/Become Your Own Best Friend.
Do you love yourself? How you value yourself matters.
3. MASTER A NEW SKILL AND EXPLORE:- When you become skilled in something that corresponds with your talents and interests, you increase your sense of competence.
You might also want to go deeper into what you love to do and give value to the world.
4 . SURROUND YOURSELF WITH THE RIGHT PEOPLE:
Be Judgemental about your life and those you allow to be part of your Journey.
When we approach our lives in a non-judgemental way, we simply accept ourselves, our experiences, our failures and successes and other people just as they are, whether good or bad, without pride or shame.
Let go of negative people from your life.
If there are people in your life who are negative - who put you down or take advantage of you - do the smart thing and let them go. The only way to positively develop your self-esteem is to surround yourself with supportive and positive people who respect you and value you.
People that are never going to add to you should be disconnected from you.
You are created to become active in life not otherwise. So, the best you could do to assist yourself in that aspect is to keep company that increases you.
5. HEAL YOUR PAST: All that we have been saying since the beginning of this page will never make any impact in the life of a man who still allows his past to linger.
A man who is bent on sticking to his past would never have a glimpse of what the future holds for him.
Beyond Whatever has happened in the past, Jesus needs you to completely allow those old things become pass away. As long as you have made that decision of coming to be a partner with him, there is no more condemnation in you again.
The new creature you have become in him should create in you great need not to be part of the past again. (2 Corinthians 5:17).
Only an intentional man would do this.
6. ALLOW GOD BE THE RIDER: Putting this as the last point never make it the least. In short, this must be the foundation of all.
Allow God to be the only person who controls the affairs of your life. Allow him to set and furnish you thoroughly. Make him your priority and you will see how he will release upon you a great deal of confidence and Fortitude to overcome every feeling of inferiority.
You must recognize your place in the realm of the spirit.
The spiritual controls the physical.
Beyond your background, environment, traditions and culture of men, who GOD says you are is what you should behold.
Find it, own it and live it.
Faith Agi
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