A person with low self-esteem will find it extremely difficult to be motivated (except
though fear) about any projects they take on. When you have low self-esteem you
don’t really believe in yourself. When you feel unworthy, stupid and worthless, how
can you possibly hope to feel enthusiastic and motivated about anything?
Practice
When you find that you’re beating yourself up mentally, immediately
say, “I don’t need these thoughts!” Consciously replace them with
more empowering ones. If you battle with this, pretend you are
talking to your best friend. What would you say to him/her? Some
examples:
Replace “you’re so useless” with “you handled that one
aspect very well”.
Replace “I can’t believe you actually said that” with
“you started the conversation off very well”.
Replace “you’re so useless with your eating” with “you
looked after yourself when you ate that orange this
morning”.This practice makes a HUGE difference to how you can be in the world. I’ve been
doing it for years. When I started, I had to do it many times a day. I would sometimes
go off track for a few days and forget to do it. As soon as I realised I had forgotten,
I’d simply decide to start doing it again. I made a decision to come back to supportive
self-talk and my self-talk is far more constructive these days. Every now and again, I
do still beat myself up. I am sure this will continue to happen for the rest of my life.
These days, however, when I become conscious that I am beating myself up, I stop
and look at the situation differently. I’m also at a stage where I can constructively
deal with the mistakes I make. Hey, I’m human, I still make mistakes. Although I
don’t beat myself up for long, I don’t just let myself off the hook either. Remember
that taking accountability for your actions empowers you. Being accountable for my
actions is the magic part that builds on my successes. I look at what didn’t work; I
find the lesson in that and decide what I can do differently next time.
When your self-talk is constructive and supportive, you open a space in your being
that allows motivation to flow freely. What I find now is that I still have unmotivated
moments, but as soon as I decide to sit down and do the work, the motivation
almost immediately arrives. How I love those magic, motivated moments that turn
into hours – certainly makes writing a book more pleasurable!