If you’ve been following along, you’ve realized that you’re indecisive because you don’t trust yourself. Even self-discipline (discussed last week) can be traced back to self-trust.
Self-trust is imperative to living a long, healthy, abundant life. Lack of self-trust will harm your mental and physical well-being. Self-trust is what it sounds like, your trust in your self. It’s not trusting yourself to know everything, be everything, or do everything. It is your trust that you are enough. Period.
Lack of self-trust is a sign of low self-esteem. Self-esteem is the opinion you have yourself, your evaluation of your worth. If you don’t hold yourself in esteem, you will not trust yourself to make decisions, take action, or show up for yourself. You cannot trust yourself if you don’t respect yourself.
So how do you improve your self-esteem, to improve your self-trust, to improve your decision-making?
Here again is the guidance to notice your self-talk. Have you noticed how often this advice comes up? It’s why Thinking Into Results works!
Notice when you are talking shit to yourself about yourself. Then challenge those beliefs. Then, re-write the narrative to something more empowering.
Observe situations and people that trigger negative self-talk. Do what you can to avoid these environments, or adjust them to be less harmful to your inner voice. Find more supportive situations and people. You become who and what you are around, so choose wisely.
Make a list of your accomplishments, talents, skills, traits, things you love about yourself, anything positive about yourself that you can think of. Turn to that list when you start to criticize yourself or doubt yourself.
Lastly, think of someone you admire. Say it’s someone famous with a biography about them or interviews about their journey available. Read/listen to their journey. Most likely you will learn that they too overcame challenges, including self-doubt. Sometimes, learning that “even they” have overcome helps you do the same. For example, Michelle Obama, Maya Angelou, Albert Einstein, and many other incredible individuals have spoken about their “imposter syndrome” and self-doubts.
It may take some time for you to truly re-write your inner dialogue. But the sooner you start and the more committed you are to the process, the greater outcomes you will experience.
Finally, self-esteem can lead to clinical challenges such as depression, anxiety, substance abuse, eating disorders, and more. If you or someone you know is even potentially experiencing these please reach out for help. You can start with one of the organizations related to your specific concern, or go to the American Psychological Association’s locator page to find help near you: https://locator.apa.org/
