One of the many benefits shown from practicing regular gratitude is feeling better about other people, and having stronger connections. So how about using a similar technique to start feeling better about yourself? Here’s how gratitude can boost your self esteem.
(Last week’s blog’s was all about how much a regular gratitude practice might help – and how to make a start. Check it out if you missed it or need a refresher.)
Biggest obstacle I see that’s stopping people showing up as their true selves, doing what they long to and taking their place at the table?
Themselves!
So many of us are walking round constantly berating ourselves: picking at “faults”, dwelling on mistakes (usually slight slip ups), comparing ourselves unfavourably, spiralling in guilt and shame…
And it makes me so sad. How many people are working against, rather than for, themselves? How much lost potential there is, for absolutely no reason?
It’s something I work on so much with my coaching clients, and I’m proud of the leaps I see them make in their self-belief and self esteem. A beautiful quiet confidence builds, potential unfurls and doors that have been slammed shut for decades open up and feel so welcoming.
Mmm.
Ok I digress, how can we harness a gratitude practice to help some of this to happen?
Turn your gratitude radar on yourself…
Why not use some regular prompts in your gratitude journal to encourage yourself to see the good. Questions like these might help…
Celebrate your uniqueness and the true you…
Guess what, you’re totally unique. And no one can do you as well as you can. So rather than trying to hide what makes you, you, or force it into being something different or “better”, why not celebrate it and make it really work for you?
I absolutely love helping my clients to do this and wow, the results are amazing.
(oh, and by the way, this is a secret weapon against imposter syndrome and is a superpower if you’re an entrepreneur wanting to nail your offer to your people. If you get this right, then there’s no room for wobbles!)
This is a biggie, but a simple starting point can be to starting to ponder…
A helping hand
Want to know one of my soapbox topics?
It’s the sheer waste of talent I see in great people who turn their focus onto their own shortcomings, instead of accepting and celebrating who they are, and putting that energy into what they could be doing – the impact they could be making.
And guess what – one of my talents is in helping people to change this! To understand their strengths and gifts, feel at ease with any bits they’d like to tweak (we don’t have to be perfect!), to embrace who they really are and use that to move forward, rather than being stuck in a self-sabotage cycle.
And if that sounds like something you could do with, then please don’t struggle on your own. Let’s talk and enable you be your own helping hand (rather than worst enemy).