How does low self esteem affect the lives of people on Twitter?  I’ve been paying some attention to that and was wide eyed at the results.  Even over a few days trends seem to be emerging.  Look at these tweets:

Anonymous Tweets

• Doesn’t your self-esteem take a hit when an attractive person tells you they look bad today, yet they still look better than you?
• why do us girls have to have low self esteem even beyonce doesnt think she is hot lol
• watching britains next top model does little for self esteem when feeling like 5 lots of s***
• #BeforeWeGetMarried ima [I'm going to need you to]  need you to lose all yo low self esteem friends..
• I am the girl that is born with low self esteem
• For some reason, all artists have self-esteem issues. -Whoopi Goldberg
• My self-esteem too… I feel like no one cares. Emo!!!
• Dont Get How People Let Others Lower There Self-Esteem ! !
• People with low self-esteem degrade others to make themselves feel better.
• My new hair is totally different from my usual “thang” but already has two good reviews. Self esteem is on the rise!
• The foundation of lasting self-confidence and self esteem is excellence, mastery of your work. ~Brian Tracy (see my other blog message for my coments on this one).
• A woman with self esteem is dynamic, attractive, and inviting. Men love women who are confident and secure.

It seems to affect relationships, career, finances, friends, beauty and the fundamental way people see themselves.  It’s not just a feeling, a passing bad thought.

What kind of issue is low self-esteem for you?  Why not take a moment to consider that.  ….So if that’s the way it is, what happens next?  When you start to notice that you have low self-esteem, what usually happens next?

• Do you dismiss the thought , telling yourself  you can’t do anything about it?
• Do you throw yourself into your next task of the day?
• Do you tidy your room, check your hair or just distract yourself?

I’m not trying to be mean or unhelpful by reminding you of awkward thoughts and feelings.  My message to you is that this is a choice; your choice.  When you realise you have low self-esteem, you choose what happens next.

You could:

• do nothing.  If you fall in a puddle, you have the right to sit and stay in the puddle.  If I was coaching you, all I’d say to you is “You’re in a puddle, what happens next?”.  It’s worth noting my question.  No agenda, no rescuing you.  You can act as a child, adult, hero, victim or whatever.  But sooner or later you’ll realise what you’re doing and you’ll face the question “If that’s what you are doing, what would you like to do?”.  Yes, most people move to the next option.
• accept your situation.  This is the “I accept I’m the puddle and I won’t complain about it”.  Again, I’d let you sit there, but I’ll ask you about what’s around the puddle and you’ll realise what other things you can do that are more rewarding/ fun/ satisfying.  I don’t sound that helpful do I?  If we sing “If you’re happy and you know it, clap you’re hands”, you might hit me or skip to the end of the street.  If I tune in to what’s happening to you and all your choices, it can take a bit more time, but we’ll discover some sort of solution for every problem.
• deal with it yourself.  This might work and yet be realistic with yourself.  Has it worked before or does everything go around in a loop?
• read some self-improvement books, get some CDs etc.  They can be inspiring, educational and give some tools.  They are also easily avoided and may miss the mark.  How many books do you have that you haven’t read? Is it just SHELF -improvement?
• take up a hobby, relax more etc.  This can help your environment and the context.  That may be enough for you.  If it’s not, you’re back to a choice on which of these options to take.
• ask friends and family for help.  This option has a whole range of possibilities.  You may have someone who cares and is skilled.  It may be getting you down that they are neither caring nor skilled at helping you.  It can help a relationship to support each other and it can lead to frustration on both sides.  I’m pretty demanding if I do ask for help, and if I ask for too much, I then end up thinking about the feeling of the other person, which defeats the original point of the exercise.
• ask for help from a skilled person; a coach, a therapist, a priest etc.  Someone trained to listen, hold the space and help you get to solutions if and when you want to.  Careful here too, because they may be skilled but have their own agenda (religious), their own assumptions (people need daily achievements or deep enlightenment) and methods (focus on breathing, improve your environment).  NLP and Cognitive Behavioural Therapy can offer useful models to understand what might be going on.  Their structured approach can feel a bit restrictive and won’t flex to match what’s happening for you at each moment.  Someone once asked me to tell her 100 options for what I could do in a situation.  We had a fight when I refuse to produce more than 30 pointless options.  She thought it’d be creative and then I asked her how she knew how my creativity worked?  Her assumptions and rigid structure got in the way of my support.

• ask for help from a skilled person who will work with your unique patterns, your sequences of thoughts and feelings and use metaphors to work with some of the things that may be hard to express.  I’m proud to say this is what I do.  I’ll keep with you as you discover your situation and the associated feelings, thoughts, bodily sensations and metaphors.  We’ll discover blocks, impasses and then new experiences, hidden help and resources.  For me, when I get coached in this work, the end result is like a weight being lifted, walls being broken down, being a giant or having unlimited energy like the sun.  I love the metaphors and the feelings associated with them.  I’m certified in this technique, attend practice groups and get supervised to continually build my skill.  Clients have talked about entering a new garden, shining sunshine where there was cold shadow and a beautiful calm lake.  You’ll discover your own metaphors.  All I’ll assume is that you’d like something new to happen and that’s it’s okay to work with simple questions so I can follow what’s going on for you.  We will agree how to work together and how not to; what my role needs to be and what you need to be like.  It all begins with “What would you like to have happen?”.

Please contact me to move a step closer to what you’d like to have happen.

Brian Birch
My phone numbers are 020 8816 7343 or 07703 176167 (UK)
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Melanie Fennell, in her book “Overcoming low self-esteem” provides a useful diagram on the sequence of thoughts, beliefs and emotions of self-esteem.

The diagram talks about how early childhood experiences may lead on to an assessment of our own value. We may then have guidelines to live by and experience situations that trigger negative feelings. Then there may be a cycle of negative predictions, anxiety, unhelpful behaviour, depression, self-critical thoughts and confirmation of our low self-worth.

Now I had some challenges setting up this coaching business, so I’d like to use those to try out this diagram.

I can find a trigger point when I couldn’t get the video to appear on the blog. And some rules for living that I could improve – not just settling for one result when I know I can do better.

But I don’t think I have a fundamentally poor view of myself; in fact I can always distinguish between things not going well and me being pathetic.
I’m missing a part of the model. So does that mean I’ve broken the CBT model? What if I don’t work that way? Am I not normal?

Stepping back from that, I like to coach people by finding out the model that exists for them. Listen to the beat of their drum if you like, rather than the tune they are being told to play.

I do this by asking open questions that help the client and I both discover the dance movements, the rhythm and the flow. We find out what the current situation is, what the client wants and how to get that. If we worked together, you’d never have to look for a piece of a jigsaw I was giving you; there is only what you notice and what you want.

So in my example, by expressing the difficulties of website and business, it allowed me to get if off my chest and then notice the good things. Like spring cleaning, I was able to wipe away the dust and let my enthusiasm come out. And that’s a useful metaphor for me to explore further some time.

Do you know of any metaphors you use in overcoming low self-esteem?

One client felt that overcoming low self esteem was like trying to deal with the choppy waters of her life. Her aim was to stay afloat emotionally and reach a calm area where she could relax. We worked together and she learned a lot about what needs to happen to have that calm and the benefits it creates in her personal life and relationships.

Linguists, such as Harvard’s Steven Pinker, and scientists are realising the natural uses of metaphor to understand complex issues in our lives. We might use a metaphor to summarise a situation rather than get overloaded with all the emotional, intellectual and social aspects to it.
I’m a life coach who realises it’s not always helpful to lay down the path for a client to follow. The client may want to find your own way and method of travel. I focus on the client’s goals but use very open questions to make sure I’m not making too many assumptions about their metaphor or what will happen next.
I’m interested in reviewing that “choppy water” session with my client. To like and learn from a metaphor is good, but real benefits are more likely when she learns how to use that knowledge and apply in to her life. That’s something we’ll explore if she chooses to revisit that metaphor.

Contact Brian Birch on phone number is 020 8816 7343 or 07703 176167 (UK).