“Hello and Welcome to Episode 18 of ‘Tuesday Choose Day’, my inspirational weekly post.
My aim here is to inspire you to feel more positive and more confident within yourself to create the change you want to happen in your life.” I’m offering you here empowering strategies to help you to take control, feel better and feel good every Tuesday straight to your inbox.
Today’s Inspiration To Brighten Your Day…
When you feel the need to compare yourself to others, consider this…
Do you ever get hung up on what other people think of you? If your self esteem and self confidence is low just now, I’m betting you are nodding as you read this – “All the time!” I can hear you say…
When you don’t feel great about yourself it’s easy to assume that others judge you harshly, to assume that they see what you are choosing to see in yourself right now. That just makes you feel a whole lot worse because you are validating your belief that you’re not a good person to know, you’re not capable and so on. Perhaps you feel yourself shrink more inside yourself which gives others even more reason to judge you – right?!
Of course the flip of this is that you see them as damn near perfect – they are just so confident, just so happy, just so set up in their life, things are just so rosy for them. When you do this, you can’t help but lose out…
So how about if you do yourself a favour this New Year and just stop comparing? It’s easier said than done I know and we can all get caught up in it. Consider this… I learned once that ‘if you’re gonna compare, then you might as well compare everything’ because being human means we all have flaws and no-one’s life is as rosy as it seems from the outside. On the surface of things, it’s true you might lose but if you dig deeper you may win on some other counts too!
Be a friend to yourself and focus on what’s good about you and tell the truth to yourself. Turn it into a game for yourself and find a reason every day to acknowledge something good that you’ve done, a quality you’ve noticed in yourself and those many things you can be grateful for in your life if you only choose to look..
That way when you go to compare, you’ll be better placed to catch yourself in the act of assassinating your self esteem and instead, choose to remind yourself of what’s good about you… so you might say something like – “Ok so I’m not as successful in my career as she is, but I am blessed with children I adore” or… “I don’t have a loving supportive mum in my life but I have fantastic friends” or… “She’s a much better tennis player than me but I can swim really well.”
Something else worthwhile is to sit with the emotion that ‘comparing’ creates in you – turn jealousy into envy and get curious. I wonder if there’s an opportunity for you to develop in yourself a quality or a skill that the other person already owns? Choose to see an opportunity to compare yourself to others as a way for you to question how you might choose to grow. Get to know them more. We only become bitter when we give in to a powerlessness that we have a raw deal and that we can’t change it – but that’s just a belief, isn’t it?!
Until next time
With love and light x
Do you feel powerless, anxious and overwhelmed to make change happen in your life? I’d like to offer you an immediate opportunity to take a break from your stresses and anxieties. CLICK TO DOWNLOAD my FREE De-Stress Audio.
From the Wobbles and Worries Mailbox…
“I am constantly worrying my partner will leave me for someone else. I got cheated on badly in a past relationship by my best friend. As a result I don’t trust women easily now.
My husband and I married in the summer. I really love him and I do trust him but I worry that I won’t be enough for him and that he will tempted by someone better. He is good looking and always popular. I’ve been told by friends that I’m lucky to have him. It feels like I’m becoming obsessed with this insecurity. I don’t want to cause problems for us so early in our marriage and drive him away. How can I get my feelings under control?”
A summary of my advice…
What happened to you was horrible and hurtful and I’m delighted that you found your way to believe in love again. Your worries that you won’t be enough for him are shouting to me that perhaps you don’t think enough of yourself because you worry he will stop loving you and fall for someone else. It is understandable that you would have that doubt based on past hurt but it is also possible that the past betrayal was compounding doubts about yourself that were already there.
Feelings of low self worth are often as a result of messages you absorbed whilst growing up either by what you heard or what you experienced. How your mother felt about herself can impact you significantly too. The past does not equal the future and just because you were betrayed before, does not mean it will happen again. You create your future and you have a new beginning now with your new husband. If you take steps to learn to feel better about yourself in the present, you will become less focused on the attributes of other women. It sounds like you find your husband attractive and look up to him. Consider the fact that other women find him attractive as a compliment to you in confirming your good judgment! Take time to compliment each other and allow yourself to absorb what he loves about you. You would certainly benefit from some one2one therapy to boost your self esteem which will help you to feel more secure within yourself. You will also find helpful Episode 11 of Tuesday ChooseDay on ‘how to let your inner confidence shine’. Here’s the link www.lisaskeffington.com/how-to-let-your-inner-confidence-shine
If you’d like my advice with your particular wobble or worry, simply click on the link here
https://lisaskeffington.com/fees-and-booking-2/wobbles-and-worries/
Lisa Skeffington, Anxiety Expert – Anxiety Help Bournemouth