How to learn to accept yourself? 8 tips

As you look? How do you feel about yourself? What do you think others think of you? Do you think you are capable of achieving what you set out to do? Do you think you love yourself enough?

If the answers to these questions have been in the negative, we may need to develop healthy self-esteem, which is nothing more than a positive and constructive assessment of ourselves.

Having good self-esteem is the foundation of self-confidence. This will allow us to face challenges with greater security, adopt a happier attitude towards life and will make us develop in a more adaptive way in our day to day life. So what can we do to learn to accept ourselves?

• Related article: "Low selfsteem? When you become your worst enemy"

Building self-esteem

Self-esteem is built from an early age based on the affirmation and assessment that we receive from authority figures, such as our parents, teachers or leaders; and its development will influence our way of facing situations during adult life: in our social relationships, in facing challenges, etc.

It is likely that in times of confusion and adversity, such as a failure in a relationship or the loss of a job, leads us to doubt our ability to reestablish ourselves and emerge afloat, and therefore, may be affected.

However, and despite the fact that self-esteem is built from childhood, we can work on it in adulthood to get to love each other and feel better about ourselves.

• You may be interested: "How to increase your self-confidence in 6 steps"

What to do to accept yourself?

When self-esteem is not worked, conditions such as depressive symptoms, eating disorders, anxiety and social phobia, among others, can appear. Do you want to start training her? If so, take note and continue reading ...

1. know yourself

Do a mental and behavioral scan to identify your skills and efforts and value them. Make a list of everything you've accomplished and make yourself proud. Keep that list close by for moments of self-questioning. In addition to that, recognize your main weaknesses and challenge yourself to work on them.

We all have it even if we don't show it to others. However, don't become obsessed with achieving perfection; your search is nothing but lack of acceptance.

2. Challenge your concerns and make your dreams come true

We have seen that validation is important when building healthy self-esteem and accepting yourself. We all have dreams, so challenge yourself and work daily to achieve them.

When you feel that little by little you are achieving them, you will feel that you are surpassing yourself with effort and you will have a great reason to validate yourself. Make things happen and do not get carried away by "what is happening", much less by what you think around you, even family or friends. Remember that phrase of Will Smith in his movie In Pursuit of Happiness: “Never let anyone tell you that you can't do something. If you have a dream, keep it".

3. Don't compare yourself to others, compare yourself

Do not try to copy a life that is not yours or a person that is not you. You are you, and the other is the other; you have your times and the other has his. We are all born and built from a different mold and with different circumstances; the person you have to compare yourself to is yourself. To do this, always look back on your life line and remember all the progress that you have been building.

4. Take care of your internal dialogue

People with low self-esteem tend to carry an enemy inside that does not stop sabotaging it with verbalizations such as "you are not capable", "you cannot", "you will do it wrong, do not try"... Put your thoughts in your favor and build an ally who will tell you “you are capable”, “try it and if it doesn't work out, nothing happens, you will learn and end up succeeding”.

Control the way you talk to yourself, generating a more positive and adaptive speech so that your emotions are more pleasant and you achieve the goals you set for yourself.

5. Praise yourself and ask others for praise too

Reinforce yourself positively when you achieve your proposed goals, however minimal. Choose some people from your circle of trust and ask them for feedback on your projects and challenges. As we have said, to build self-esteem it is also important that important people in our environment validate us.

6. Boost your talent

If we put a bird in a cage for its entire life, do you think that if we release it, it will know how to fly? Therefore, develop what works for you. It does not mean that you do not dedicate yourself to what you like or that you stop doing things that you like just because "you are not good at it."

However, it is important that when we identify skills in ourselves, either practicing a certain sport or cooking, it is important to dedicate time to this activity to develop it and feel good when it is let's perform.

7. Take care of the environment you surround yourself with

Try to reach out to people who have confidence in themselves. and have achieved their goals. Observe their language, their way of communicating and their behavior and try to make them a role model for you. Stay away or try to limit certain conversations with people who don't value you and are a bad influence. Remember the post

8. give yourself time

The process of developing healthy self-esteem takes time and patience. Don't despair or throw in the towel when you make mistakes: learn to see failure as an opportunity for growth and not as a failure. We are human beings and we all err. When people succeed we only see their success; however the effort, dedication and failures are also there but are not so easily observable.

Feeling strong in the face of adversity or the achievement of our goals?

Self-esteem is like a muscle: if we don't exercise it, it can atrophy. Do we want our abs to be our only strong muscle? Having esteem for us should be the greatest strength we haveIt will be our ally to feel happier with ourselves and, in general, with the life that we have built thanks to it. Love yourself