Self-esteem is a general sense of well-being that arises when we have healthy levels of self-respect (feeling good about our purpose), self-esteem (feeling good about ourselves), and self-confidence (feeling good about our abilities).
This sense of well-being that comes with high levels of self-esteem is a rare experience for many of us. Perhaps this sense of well-being is rare even among psychologists and perhaps that is why we don’t hear much about it.
An easy way to see self-esteem
We could think of self-esteem as a three-legged stool. Self esteem is the top of the stool. One ‘leg’ of the stool would be Self Respect, another would be Self Esteem and the third would be Self Confidence.
The top of a three-legged stool holds it all together, but it also needs strong legs to be functional. Self-esteem is a bit like that, for us to be resilient and handle the different weight situations to come, the top of the stool and the legs must be strong.
If a three-legged stool is very weak on one leg, it can tend to collapse easily, especially if pressure is applied especially to that area. Similarly, if life challenges, say, our self-confidence and we are weak in that area, the stool is more likely to collapse than if the challenge elsewhere.
Self-esteem is a verb and a noun
Self-esteem is not only our general sense of well-being, but also our awareness of our sense of well-being and our ability to act if we become unbalanced.
In other words, esteem is not just a “thing”, it is also an “action.” We can have esteem; and we can estimate someone. If we “esteem” someone, we “highly praise them.” In other words, we are doing something that generates esteem.
Likewise, self-esteem is not just a thing, it is also an action. Self esteem is something we do for ourselves and it is also something we have. As we become more adept at self-esteem as action (perhaps we could call this “self-esteem”) we can better manage our sense of well-being. This makes us more resilient and able to bounce back from challenges and painful experiences.
Self-esteem also arises from estimating others, as long as we do it with a sense of respect or affection and not out of fear or necessity. Thinking well of others is good for self-esteem. Helping others and living up to our high standards of behavior does too (Self respect).
Returning to Self Esteem’s three-legged stool model: if we strengthen one of the ‘legs’ that in turn reinforces the entire ‘stool’. If we strengthen a part of ourselves where we feel weak (that is, we become more confident in our abilities in something important to us), that in turn can strengthen our self-esteem and adds to our overall sense of well-being.
Balance and self-esteem
To have healthy self-esteem, each of the three ‘legs’ must develop in balance. If we have a lot of confidence in ourselves, but we have little self-esteem or self-respect, then our self-esteem will be fragile. Similarly, if we have a high level of self-esteem but little self-confidence, our self-esteem will be fragile.
Healthy self-esteem is really about developing a well-balanced sense of self with includes; feel good about our purpose in life (Self-Respect), feel good about who we are (Self-esteem) and feel capable of reaching our goals (Self-confidence).
If any of these are missing and we don’t have a real sense of purpose, or we’re haunted by feelings of unworthiness, or we feel like we’re unable to do what we really want to do, then our Self-Esteem will always be fragile no matter how strong it is. we get into the other areas. In a sense, the three-legged stool of our self-esteem will wobble because one leg is weak and making the other legs even stronger (which many people tend to do) will not fix the problem.
Self-esteem is what we have when we have a stable and resilient sense of well-being that arises naturally when we have a good balance between self-respect (feeling determined), self-esteem (feeling worthy) and self-confidence (feeling capable) . We can only have a healthy and resilient sense of self-worth when the ‘three-log stool’, which constitutes our self, is stable and secure and the different parts of us develop roughly the same.
