Adequate self-esteem of the individual. Formation of healthy and adequate self-esteem. Distinctive features of such people

Self-esteem can be adequate or not. Adequacy is meeting the requirements of the situation and people's expectations. If people believe that a person can cope with tasks, but he does not believe in his own strength, they speak of low self-esteem. If a person declares unrealistic plans, they speak of his inflated self-esteem. The most important criterion for the adequacy of self-esteem is the feasibility of a person’s plans.

Adequacy of private and specific situational self-esteem

Specific situational self-esteem can be fairly objectively assessed as adequate or, for example, underestimated: if experience shows that a person actually copes with tasks that he internally could not solve for a long time, it means that his self-esteem is objectively underestimated. As a rule, the adequacy of self-esteem is confirmed not only by practice (the results of which can be interpreted in different ways), but also by the opinion of authorities: specialists in the field where a person declares his claims. The adequacy of specific situational self-esteem is usually aligned with experience. See→

How to assess the adequacy of personal self-esteem?

Adequate personal self-esteem – appropriate real results and facts, expectations reference group people, neither an overestimated nor an underestimated assessment of one’s capabilities, one’s limitations and one’s place among people (more broadly, one’s place in life). The self-esteem of an immature personality usually depends on the assessments of others, who themselves are not always adequate. The more mature a person is, the more adequate his personal self-esteem is. And vice versa, the more adequate a person’s self-esteem is, the more this indicates his maturity. See→

Inadequate self-esteem as a work task and as a psychotherapeutic problem

Inadequate self-esteem may need to be changed (for example, made more adequate), but a particular person can treat this both as a work task and as a personal, psychotherapeutic problem. He will solve the problem (he defined the context, specified the goal, formed the points of the plan, began to work), more often people worry about the problem. And they turn to psychologists and psychotherapists.

Specific situational self-esteem is more often posed as a work task, personal self-esteem is more often experienced as a personal, psychotherapeutic problem. See Translating a problem into a task

Why do you need to figure out whether your self-esteem is adequate or not?

Determining the adequacy of self-esteem makes it possible to:

In my practice, I constantly come across the question that clients ask me: " Why do people treat me this way, what’s wrong with my self-esteem?"First, let's figure out what self-esteem is in principle. It is an assessment of oneself, one's strengths and weaknesses. Self-esteem can be:

• underestimated - underestimating one’s own strengths;
• overestimated - overestimation of one’s own strengths;
• normal - adequate assessment of oneself, one’s own strengths in certain life situations, in setting one’s goals and objectives, adequate perception of the world, in communicating with people.

What are the signs of low self-esteem?

1. The attitude of others as an indicator. How a person treats himself is how others treat him. If he does not love, respect and value himself, then he is faced with the same attitude of people towards him.
2. Inability to drive own life. A person believes that he cannot cope with something, cannot make a decision, hesitates, thinks that nothing depends on him in this life, but depends on circumstances, other people, the state. Doubting his capabilities and strengths, he either does nothing at all or shifts the responsibility for choice to others.
3. Tendency to blame others or self-flagellation. Such people do not know how to take responsibility for their lives. When it is beneficial for them, they engage in self-flagellation so that they will be pitied. And if they want not pity, but self-justification, then they blame others for everything.
4. The desire to be good, to please, to be liked, to adapt to another person to the detriment of oneself and one’s personal desires.
5. Frequent complaints to others. Some people with low self-esteem tend to complain about others and constantly blame them, thereby removing responsibility for failures from themselves. It’s not for nothing that they say that best protection- this is an attack.
6. Focusing on your shortcomings rather than your strengths. In particular, excessive criticism of one’s own appearance. A sign of low self-esteem is pickiness about your appearance, constant dissatisfaction with your figure, eye color, height and body in general.
7. Permanent nervousness, groundless aggression. And vice versa - apathy and depressive states from loss of oneself, the meaning of life, a failure, criticism from the outside, a failed exam (interview), etc.
8. Loneliness or, conversely, fear of loneliness. Quarrels in relationships, excessive jealousy, as a result of the thought: “You can’t love someone like me.”
9. The development of addictions and addictions as a way of temporarily escaping reality.
10. Strong dependence on the opinions of other people. Inability to refuse. Painful reaction to criticism. Absence/suppression of one's own desires.
11. Closedness, closedness from people. Feeling sorry for yourself. Inability to accept compliments. Permanent victim state. As they say, the victim will always find an executioner.
12. Heightened sense of guilt. He tries on critical situations on himself, without sharing his guilt and the role of the prevailing circumstances. He accepts any showdown in relation to himself as the culprit of the situation, because this will be the “best” confirmation of his inferiority.

How does high self-esteem manifest itself?

1. Arrogance. A person puts himself above others: "I'm better than them". Constant competition as a way to prove this, “flaunting” one’s merits.
2. Closedness as one of the manifestations of arrogance and a reflection of the thought that others are lower than him in status, intelligence and other qualities.
3. Confidence in your own rightness and constant proof of this is the “salt” of life. The last word must always remain with him. The desire to control the situation, to play a dominant role. Everything should be done as he sees fit, those around him should dance to his tune.
4. Setting lofty goals. If they are not achieved, frustration sets in. A person suffers, falls into depression, apathy, and despises himself.
5. Inability to admit your mistakes, apologize, ask for forgiveness, lose. Fear of evaluation. Painful reaction to criticism.
6. Fear of making a mistake, appearing weak, defenseless, unsure of yourself.
7. The inability to ask for help is a reflection of the fear of appearing defenseless. If he asks for help, it is more like a demand, an order.
8. Focus only on yourself. Puts his own interests and hobbies first.
9. The desire to teach the lives of others, to “poke” them into the mistakes they have made and show them how to do it by the example of oneself. Self-affirmation at the expense of others. Boastfulness. Excessive familiarity. Arrogance.
10. Predominance of the pronoun “I” in speech. In conversations he says more than he does. Interrupts interlocutors.

For what reasons can failures in self-esteem occur?

Childhood trauma, the causes of which can be any event significant for the child, and there are a huge number of sources.

Oedipus period. Age from 3 to 6-7 years. At an unconscious level, the child acts out a partnership with his parent of the opposite sex. And the way the parent behaves will affect the child’s self-esteem and how he or she will develop a scenario for relationships with the opposite sex in the future.

Teenage years. Age 13 to 17-18 years. A teenager searches for himself, trying on masks and roles, building his life path. He tries to find himself by asking the question: “Who am I?”

Certain attitudes towards children from significant adults(lack of affection, love, attention), as a result of which children may begin to feel unnecessary, unimportant, unloved, unrecognized, etc.

Some patterns of parental behavior which subsequently passes on to the children and becomes their behavior in life. For example, low self-esteem among the parents themselves, when the same projections are imposed on the child.

The only child in the family when all attention is focused on him, everything is only for him, when there is an inadequate assessment by the parents of his abilities. This is where high self-esteem comes from, when a child cannot adequately assess his strengths and abilities. He begins to believe that the whole world is only for him, everyone owes him, there is an emphasis only on himself, the cultivation of egoism.

Low assessment by parents and relatives of the child, his abilities and actions. The child is not yet able to evaluate himself and forms an opinion about himself based on the assessment of people significant to him (parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, etc.). As a result, the child develops low self-esteem.

Constant criticism of a child leads to low self-esteem, low self-esteem and closedness. In the absence of approval of creative endeavors and admiration for them, the child feels unrecognized for his abilities. If this is followed by constant criticism and scolding, then he refuses to create, create, and therefore develop anything.

Excessive demands on the child can foster both high and low self-esteem. Often parents want to see their child the way they would like to see themselves. They impose their destiny on it, building on it projections of their goals that they could not achieve themselves. But beyond this, parents stop seeing the child as a person, beginning to see only their projections, roughly speaking, of themselves, their ideal selves. The child is sure: " For my parents to love me, I must be what they want me to be.". He forgets about his present self and can either successfully or unsuccessfully meet parental requirements.

Comparison with other good children lowers self-esteem. Conversely, the desire to please parents inflates self-esteem in pursuit and competition with others. Then other children are not friends, but rivals, and I must be better than others.

Overprotection, excessive taking of responsibility for the child in making decisions for him, right down to who to be friends with, what to wear, when and what to do. As a result, the child ceases to develop the Self; he does not know what he wants, does not know who he is, does not understand his needs, abilities, desires. Thus, parents cultivate in him lack of independence and, as a result, low self-esteem (up to the loss of the meaning of life).

Desire to be like a parent, which can be either natural or forced, when the child is constantly repeated: “Your parents have achieved so much, you should be like them, you have no right to fall flat on your face.”. There is a fear of slipping up, making a mistake, or not being perfect, as a result of which self-esteem may be low and initiative may be completely killed.

Above I have given some of the common reasons why problems with self-esteem arise. It is worth adding that the line between the two “poles” of self-esteem can be quite thin. For example, overestimating oneself may be a compensatory and protective function of underestimating one’s strengths and capabilities.

As you can already understand, most problems in adult life stem from childhood. A child’s behavior, his attitude towards himself and the attitude towards him from surrounding peers and adults build certain strategies in life. Childhood behavior carries over into adulthood with all its defense mechanisms.

Ultimately, entire life scenarios of adulthood are built. And this happens so organically and imperceptibly for ourselves that we do not always understand why certain situations happen to us, why people behave this way with us. We feel unnecessary, unimportant, unloved, we feel that we are not valued, we are offended and hurt by this, we suffer. This all manifests itself in relationships with loved ones, colleagues and superiors, the opposite sex, and society as a whole.

It is logical that both low and high self-esteem are not the norm. Such states cannot make you a truly happy person. Therefore, something needs to be done about the current situation. If you yourself feel that it’s time to change something, that you would like something in your life to become different, then the time has come.

How to deal with low self-esteem?

1. Make a list of your qualities strengths, qualities that you like about yourself or that your loved ones like. If you don't know, ask them about it. In this way, you will begin to see the positive aspects of your personality, thereby beginning to cultivate self-esteem.
2. Make a list of the things that bring you pleasure. If possible, start performing them for yourself. By doing this, you will cultivate love and care for yourself.
3. Make a list of your desires and goals and move in that direction.

   Exercising gives you tone, lifts your mood, and allows you to take quality care of your body, which you are so unhappy with. At the same time, there is a release of negative emotions that were accumulated and did not have the opportunity to come out. And, of course, you will have objectively less time and energy for self-flagellation.

4. Keeping an achievement diary can also boost your self-esteem. If every time you write down your biggest and smallest victories in it.
5. Make a list of qualities that you would like to develop in yourself. Develop them with the help of various techniques and meditations, of which there are now plenty both on the Internet and offline.
6. Communicate more with those whom you admire, who understand you, and from communication with whom “wings grow.” At the same time, minimize contacts with those who criticize, humiliate, etc. to the maximum possible level.

Scheme of working with inflated self-esteem

1. First you need to understand that each person is unique in his own way, everyone has the right to their own point of view.
2. Learn not only to listen, but also to hear people. After all, something is also important to them, they have their own desires and dreams.
3. When caring for others, do it based on their needs, and not on what you think is right. For example, you came to a cafe, your interlocutor wants coffee, but you think that tea would be healthier. Don't force your tastes and opinions on him.
4. Allow yourself to make mistakes and mistakes. This provides real ground for self-improvement and valuable experience with which people become wiser and stronger.
5. Stop arguing with others and proving that you are right. You may not know it yet, but in many situations, everyone can be right in their own way.
6. Don't get depressed if you couldn't achieve the desired result. It’s better to analyze the situation to see why it happened, what you did wrong, what was the reason for the failure.
7. Learn adequate self-criticism (of yourself, your actions, decisions).
8. Stop competing with others on every issue. Sometimes it looks extremely stupid.
9. Stick out your merits as little as possible, thereby underestimating others. The objective merits of a person do not need to be clearly demonstrated - they are seen through actions.

There is one law that helps me a lot in life and in working with clients:

Be.Do. Have.

What does it mean?

“To have” is a goal, a desire, a dream. This is the result you want to see in your life.

“Doing” means strategies, tasks, behavior, actions. These are the actions that lead to the desired result.

“Be” is your sense of yourself. Who are you inside yourself, for real, and not for others? Who do you feel like?

In my practice, I like to work with the “being of a person,” with what happens inside him. Then “to do” and “to have” will come by themselves, organically forming into the picture that a person wants to see, into the life that satisfies him and allows him to feel happy. Where work more efficiently with cause, not effect. Eliminating the root of the problem, what creates and attracts such problems, rather than alleviating the current condition, allows you to truly improve the situation.

In addition, the problem is not always and not everyone is aware of; it can sit deep in the unconscious. Working in this way is necessary in order to return a person to himself, to his unique values ​​and resources, his strength, his own life path and understanding of this path. Without this, self-realization in society and in the family is impossible. For this reason, I believe that the optimal way for a person to interact with himself is “being” therapy, not “doing”. This is not only effective, but also the safest, shortest path.

You were given two options: “do” and “be”, and everyone has the right to choose which way to go. Find a way to yourself. Not what society dictates to you, but to yourself - unique, real, holistic. How you will do this, I don’t know. But I am sure that you will find a way that will be better in your case. I found this in personal therapy and successfully apply it in certain therapeutic techniques for rapid personality change and transformation. Thanks to this, I found myself, my path, my calling.

Good luck in your endeavors!

(method by S.A. Budassi)

Let's consider four blocks of qualities, each of which reflects one of the levels of personality activity:

1. self-esteem in the field of communication.

2. self-assessment of behavior.

3. self-esteem in the field of activity.

4. self-assessment of one’s own emotional manifestations.

Here are four sets of positive qualities in people. You need to select from the list and circle the personality traits that you think are most significant to you personally.

List of qualities:

Are you done? Now find in the qualities you have chosen those that you actually possess, put a tick next to them, and also find their percentage.

RESULTS.

1. Count the number of ideal qualities.
2. Count the number of real qualities that are included in the list of ideal qualities.
3. Calculate their percentage:

Self-esteem=Nreal*100%

Nreal – the number of real qualities;

Nid – the number of ideal qualities.

Table of standard values

Personal self-esteem can be adequate, overestimated or underestimated.

Adequate self-esteem corresponds to two positions: “average”, “above average”. A person with adequate self-esteem correctly correlates his capabilities and abilities, is quite critical of himself, sets realistic goals for himself, and knows how to predict the adequate attitude of others to the results of his activities. The behavior of such a person is basically non-conflict; in conflict, he behaves constructively.

When self-assessing " high level", "above average": a person deservedly values ​​and respects himself, is satisfied with himself, and has a developed sense of self-esteem. When self-assessing " average level": a person respects himself, but knows his weaknesses and strives for self-improvement and self-development.

Heightened self-esteem corresponds to the level of “inadequately high” in the psychodiagnostic scale. With high self-esteem, a person develops an idealized image of his personality. He overestimates his capabilities, is focused only on success, and ignores failures.

His perception of reality is often emotional; he regards failure or failure as a consequence of someone else’s mistakes or unfavorable circumstances. He perceives fair criticism addressed to him as nit-picking. Such a person is conflicted and prone to inflating his image. conflict situation, behaves actively in a conflict, betting on victory.

Low self-esteem corresponds to the positions: “low” and “below average”. With low self-esteem, a person has an inferiority complex. He is unsure of himself, timid and passive. Such people are characterized by excessive demands on themselves and even greater demands on others. They are boring, whiners, and see only shortcomings in themselves and others.

Such people are conflictual. The causes of conflicts often arise from their intolerance towards other people. Self-esteem can be positive (high) and negative (low), as well as optimal and suboptimal.

With optimal self-esteem a person correctly correlates it with his capabilities and abilities, is quite critical of himself, strives to realistically look at his successes and failures, and sets achievable goals. He approaches the assessment of what has been achieved not only with his own personal standards, but tries to anticipate how other people will react to it.

But self-esteem can also be suboptimal - too high or too low.

Based on inflated self-esteem, a person develops a misconception about himself. In such cases, a person ignores failures for the sake of maintaining the usual and high appreciation of his loved one. There is an acute emotional “repulsion” of everything that violates the ideal idea of ​​oneself.

A person with inflated and inadequate self-esteem does not want to admit that all his failures are a consequence of his own mistakes, laziness, lack of knowledge, abilities or incorrect behavior. A clear overestimation of one's capabilities is very often accompanied by internal self-doubt. All this leads to increased impressionability and chronic helplessness.

If high self-esteem is plastic, changes in accordance with the real state of affairs - increases with success and decreases with failures, then this can contribute to the development of personality, set goals, and develop one’s abilities and will.

Self-esteem may be low. This usually leads to self-doubt, timidity and lack of initiative, and the inability to realize one’s inclinations and abilities. Such people limit themselves to solving ordinary problems and are too critical of themselves. Low self-esteem destroys a person’s hopes for good attitude to him, and he perceives his real achievements and the positive assessment of others as accidental and temporary.

As a result of their high vulnerability, the mood of such people is subject to frequent fluctuations. They react extremely sharply to criticism and reproach, biasedly interpret the laughter of others, turn out to be suspicious and, as a result, more dependent on the assessments and opinions of other people, or retire, but then suffer from loneliness.

Underestimating one's usefulness reduces social activity, reduces initiative and willingness to compete.

Self-esteem can be adequate or not. Adequacy is meeting the requirements of the situation and people's expectations. If people believe that a person can cope with tasks, but he does not believe in his own strength, they speak of low self-esteem. If a person declares unrealistic plans, they speak of his inflated self-esteem. The most important criterion for the adequacy of self-esteem is the feasibility of a person’s plans.

Adequacy of private and specific situational self-esteem

Specific situational self-esteem can be fairly objectively assessed as adequate or, for example, underestimated: if experience shows that a person actually copes with tasks that he internally could not solve for a long time, it means that his self-esteem is objectively underestimated. As a rule, the adequacy of self-esteem is confirmed not only by practice (the results of which can be interpreted in different ways), but also by the opinion of authorities: specialists in the field where a person declares his claims. The adequacy of specific situational self-esteem is usually aligned with experience. See→

How to assess the adequacy of personal self-esteem?

Adequate personal self-esteem - corresponding to real results and facts, the expectations of the reference group of people, not an overestimated or underestimated assessment of one’s capabilities, one’s limitations and one’s place among people (more broadly, one’s place in life). The self-esteem of an immature personality usually depends on the assessments of others, who themselves are not always adequate. The more mature a person is, the more adequate his personal self-esteem is. And vice versa, the more adequate a person’s self-esteem is, the more this indicates his maturity. See→

Inadequate self-esteem as a work task and as a psychotherapeutic problem

Inadequate self-esteem may need to be changed (for example, made more adequate), but a particular person can treat this both as a work task and as a personal, psychotherapeutic problem. He will solve the problem (he defined the context, specified the goal, formed the points of the plan, began to work), more often people worry about the problem. And they turn to psychologists and psychotherapists.

Specific situational self-esteem is more often posed as a work task, personal self-esteem is more often experienced as a personal, psychotherapeutic problem. See Translating a problem into a task

Why do you need to figure out whether your self-esteem is adequate or not?

Determining the adequacy of self-esteem makes it possible to: