March 1 When money speaks, the truth keeps silent.
Money talks to all of us. Whether we admit it or not, a lot of our self-esteem is based on the amount of money we’re able to earn, hoard, or spend. How could it be otherwise? The siren of success calls out to us daily from advertisements, television shows, and newspapers: “You must have more or you are a failure.” Because we hear the message loud and clear and because we don’t want to be failures, it’s hard not to buy into the idea.
But self has to do with being, not with having. These are totally different realities. Self-esteem is an art in itself, not a work of art that can be bought or sold. To have self-esteem is to know how much is enough. It is to value friendship over things and to have the ability to relax more, worry less, and find plenty to laugh about.
Certainly everybody needs enough money to live on. Poverty can kill a spirit as quickly as riches can. But even great wealth can’t buy what isn’t for sale. Truly happy people know that their real riches reside within. I will avoid the trap of outward trappings.
March 2 Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.
The search for self-esteem is a search for truth. It involves trying to see ourselves as truly as we can—and learning to appreciate what we see. As we move along, the mirrors that reflect back our true selves often pop up in the most unlikely places!
Irritating people can be such mirrors. All of us know people we’d just as soon avoid. Somehow they just get under our skin and make us crazy. Yet if we are willing to figure out exactly what bothers us about them, we may find great insight into our own hearts.
The person who talks too much may irritate us because we miss the chance to monopolize the conversation with our own stories. The braggart may irritate us because we feel we should have accomplished more. The person who is always upbeat may make us jealous that we’re not happier ourselves. Some insights are less flattering than others but no less valuable for that. My own flaws and frailties are usually at the bottom of my trouble with other people.
March 3 When a man sells eleven ounces for twelve, he makes a compact with the devil, and sells himself for the value of an ounce.
People who worry a lot about being cheated often feel perfectly justified in taking advantage of someone else. Unlike safecracking, chiseling is more a pervasive pettiness of spirit than it is an outright crime. Yet both are dishonest. Most chiselers, as a matter of fact, don’t even know they’re chiselers. They think of themselves as shrewd, clever, and artful. Unaware of their own shabby reputation, these small-time wheeler-dealers may have no idea why other people don’t respect and admire them. Obviously, self-esteem is shaken when appreciation is denied.
Pettiness of all kinds bespeaks old grudges. Because we feel we’ve been hoodwinked, brushed off, or in some other way shortchanged in life, we may subconsciously get even by giving “them” back the same kind of treatment they gave us. To be sure we’re not giving too much away, we always hold back a little something extra for ourselves.
Chiseling is a way of thinking—a defensive, fearful betrayal of our own insecurity. It belittles us instead of protecting us. If we find ourselves counting out our gains in ill-gotten time or money, we’re chiseling ourselves out of our own integrity. My growing integrity forbids every form of pettiness.
March 4 Servitude debases people to the point where they end up liking it.
Talk about guilty pleasures! What a joy it is to learn that building self-esteem doesn’t require us to please anybody but ourselves. Can it really be? There must be a catch somewhere. It sounds too good to be true, or at least true for us.
Many of us have spent most of our lives in the service of other people. In our growing up years, we learned that that was our ticket for love and approval. Want to be loved? Make someone else happy. Want a pat on the head? Do their work for them. That’s how we learned to look outside ourselves for our self-esteem. That’s what made us virtual slaves to the wishes and needs of others.
Now that we’re adults, old knee-jerk reactions will still tempt us to reach out for that brass ring. But now that we know better, we’re going to be much less comfortable about giving away all that power. As we take it back little by little, so do we take custody of our self-esteem. My self-approval no longer depends on other people’s responses.
March 5 Any life is an unfinished story.
Some of the most popular movies and television shows have the most predictable story lines. Maybe that’s why we like them so well. Right from the start we can see the powerful forces of evil taking on the even more powerful forces of good. The plot is so familiar we can sit back, relax, watch for the thrilling close calls, and let the story unfold. No sweat.
Writing our own life stories as we do is a different proposition. For one thing, there’s plenty of sweat involved. And for another, the ending is anything but predictable. A life story in process is full of unexpected twists and turns. New characters can enter—and leave. Heroics may or may not be called for. Mistakes may be corrected immediately or just in the nick of time. Tragedy may give way to comedy. But as long as we’re alive, the story isn’t over.
In whatever predicament we find ourselves today, tomorrow can be different. The possibilities are up to us; we can write anything we want to on the new pages coming up. What will happen next? That’s entirely up to us. We are writing our own stories, and they will come out as we decide.
It’s never too late to change my own story line.
March 6 Friendly counsel cuts off many foes.
Contrary as many of us are, we crave attention but often run from it when we get it. If anyone comments on our behavior, whether they’re giving us credit or blame, we tend to squirm like a fish on a hook. Our old, unrecovering selves are too tender, too touchy, too exquisitely self-conscious for their own good. Our new, recovering selves, however, are made of much sterner stuff.
Less vulnerable now than we used to be, we are learning to take both compliments and complaints without flinching. We know we need help and we’re willing to take it when it’s offered. If it’s a pat on the back—wonderful! If it’s a legitimate criticism—that’s wonderful, too. We’re not so frail anymore that we can’t bear to hear a word to the wise.
Our new emotional sturdiness is a sign of maturity and self-confidence. For the first time in our lives, perhaps, we realize that our real self-worth is independent of what other people say of us, whether it’s good or bad. We are who we are. Comments from others may hurt us a little or help us a little—but they don’t change who we are. When I am sure of who I am, other people’s opinions will not matter so much.
March 7 Guilt always hurries toward its complement, punishment: only there does its satisfaction lie.
The most useless phrase in the English language may be “If only I had…” What’s done is done. Dwelling on past errors or missed opportunities is a terrible mistake. Some of our self-blame simply isn’t justified: What happened wasn’t our fault in the first place. And even when the failings were truly ours, the constant replay exaggerates and distorts what really happened way back then.
Guilt eats up a lot of energy that could be better used elsewhere. Most of us have already punished ourselves many times over. Isn’t it time now to climb down off the rack, step away from the whipping post, and consider the debt settled? Enough is enough. We deserve a reprieve.
Self-esteem demands that we admit our mistakes and take responsibility for them. But it also demands that we accept and forgive what can’t be relived. Endless self-recrimination has no place in recovery. As my knowledge increases, my self-recrimination decreases.
March 8 Optimism enables a man to hold his head high, to claim the future for himself and not abandon it to his enemy.
The optimist and the pessimist find different implications and portents in everything they see. To an optimist, a stubbed toe may be a small price to pay for getting turned around in the right direction. The pessimist may see the same small injury as convincing evidence that all effort is dangerous and futile.
There are disadvantages at either extreme, of course. We optimists may not always recognize real and present dangers. But we who are pessimists may well miss out on many come-from-behind victories that could have been ours if we hadn’t given up so early in the game.
A comfortable balance between the two extremes is what we want to achieve. If our nature or experience tilts us too far in either direction, we need to recognize that and begin to practice a healthier, more balanced viewpoint. Self-esteem hinges on realism—but realism and hopelessness are not the same thing. Viewpoint is critical; I tend to get what I expect.
March 9 Loneliness expresses the pain of being alone and solitude expresses the glory of being alone.
It may be said that the road between loneliness and solitude is the highway to self-esteem. As we begin our quest, most of us fear and flee loneliness. We make sure that we have plenty of company and continuous talk, lest in the silence we have to hear ourselves. When we’re alone, we may keep a radio or television going to fill the airwaves. Or we talk on the telephone.
As we come to know and become more comfortable with ourselves, however, that “noise hunger” eases up. The disappointing, inadequate self that we always avoided starts to look more interesting—perhaps like someone we’d like to spend some time with, get to know better. When they’re not interrupted, cued, or drowned out, our own thoughts become our most abiding source of challenge, comfort, encouragement, and self-respect.
The loneliness is the same whether we’re suffering loneliness or enjoying solitude. The magical difference is in our attitude toward ourselves. Getting comfortable with my own company is a sign of growth.
March 10 The remedy for wrongs is to forget them.
One of the very best ways to hang on to low self-esteem is to hang on to a resentment. Resentment is always about pain. It is about being cheated, being “done unto,” being victimized. And victimization always makes its presence felt in negative definitions of ourselves—definitions like “I don’t have any rights” or “You can’t trust anyone” or “I will never be loved.”
To foster a resentment fixates us at the point of our pain. Happiness, then, becomes like a butterfly transfixed with a pin. Because resentments and freedom are mutually exclusive, no one can have both. To insist on carrying around a resentment is to insist on retaining the source of our low self-esteem.
Often the hardest thing about giving up resentments is that we feel such a right to them. We may well have been cheated. We may well have been lied to and treated shabbily, perhaps even criminally. If that doesn’t justify resentment what does! The truth is, however, that resentment is a self-defeating entitlement. We have a right to a stomachache too, but who wants it? To harbor a resentment is to harbor an enemy.
March 11 Beware, as long as you live, of judging people by appearances.
People who struggle with low self-esteem are quick to intimidate themselves. One way to do this is to make a snap judgment based on appearances. Some of the new people who come into our self-improvement programs, for example, may hardly seem to need improving. Some are so fit and healthy looking they could probably teach the exercise classes we’re afraid to take. Some seem so intelligent they could probably find a cure for the common cold faster than we could find the mayo in the back of the refrigerator. How could they be in the same room with us? Surely they couldn’t be having the same problems we’re having!
But of course they could—and do. When we compare our insides to other people’s outsides, the only picture we can come up with is wildly distorted and inaccurate. A snapshot is not the same thing as an X-ray. When we only judge by what “shows,” we misjudge—and miss the point—every time.
Despite appearances, the people we quickly rank above ourselves are just the same as we are on the inside. They have fears, worries, hopes, and dreams, just as we do. We deny them our compassion—and deny ourselves their fellowship—when we put them up to keep ourselves down. I’m learning to compare myself with others for information rather than intimidation.
March 12 The only abnormality is the incapacity to love.
Sometimes, as we bravely but clumsily trudge the path of recovery, our priorities go out of whack. Heaven knows we are trying to touch all the bases and exercise every weak muscle. Perhaps we are trying, to do too much at the same time. We may be busily learning to play, exercise, develop a prayer life, and assert ourselves with such passion and energy that we forget why we stirred up all that activity in the first place.
We need to remember that our final goal and first priority is to become healthy enough to participate in healthy relationships. All self-improvement efforts march in that direction. Each one builds and maintains the self-esteem that makes that final goal possible. In themselves, they are less—much less—than what they add up to.
We may never be able to play as freely as we’d like to, or pray with the concentration of the saints. Our thunder thighs may not submit to the exercise machines nor our timidity ever be completely overcome. But when we are able to share in loving relationships, no matter how the rest of our projects work out, we have found the key to the golden door. All recovery roads lead to the ability to love and be loved.
March 13 A sound mind in a sound body is a short but full description of a happy state in this world.
Health is a required subject in all school districts. Who doesn’t remember grade-school classes in hygiene? That’s where we learned all about the importance of toothbrushing, fingernail cleaning, and face washing. Usually, a little first aid was taught in those classes, too. We learned what to do about common injuries like cuts and bruises and burns.
Isn’t it odd that no one ever taught us about mental hygiene? But good mental and emotional health habits were never mentioned, let alone explained. And there were no first aid lessons to show us how to take care of common emotional injuries. Surely punctured pride is more common than a nail hole in the hand. And bruised feelings must outnumber black eyes a million to one!
Thankfully, it’s never too late to learn. Here are five simple prescriptions for the maintenance of mental and emotional health:
Simple daily disciplines can protect the wealth of mental health.
March 14 He too serves a purpose who only stands and cheers.
As we think about all the different roles we have played in our lives, the tendency is to remember the times when we were up front, in the spotlight, delivering all the important lines. We’re likely to pass over or even forget the many more numerous occasions when we had supporting roles—when it was our job to keep the action moving, motivate the main characters, or even cook everybody’s lunch.
But there’s nothing insignificant or second-rate about the supporting roles we play. As the saying in the movie industry goes, there are no small parts, only small actors. It’s vain and self-defeating to make little of our opportunities to help and even enable other people to do their best work. We can’t make other people shine without shining ourselves.
Baby-sitters, den mothers, and Little League coaches, if they play their roles to the full, can make life-changing contributions to their young charges. Just as our friends, fans, and mentors can enhance our adult lives by their encouragement and appreciation, we need to lose no chance to stand up and cheer each other on. Supporting roles are often the most rich and rewarding.
March 15 Praise shames me, for I secretly beg for it.
Praise can be wonderful encouragement. Self-esteem blossoms when our brave attempts, as well as our actual successes, receive an adequate amount of notice and comment. Bravery deserves acknowledgment.
There’s another side to that equation, however. Every move we make isn’t going to make people stand up and cheer. Nor should it. Some of actually become praise junkies who measure our self-worth by compliments and pats on the back. Then if that attention is withdrawn or withheld, we feel mistreated. In our hunger for appreciation, we’ve given other people the authority to validate our worth.
Robert is only four. His father a taciturn mountain man, cuts and delivers firewood for a living. Robert works alongside his father. The father carries the larger logs from truck to wood bin. Robert carries the logs that are Robert’s size. When they are working, neither one talks. Robert neither expects nor gets a flood of compliments for doing his part. He simply does his work because it is his work, not a remarkable feat that deserves a medal. Like Robert, we mustn’t look for applause for simply doing what we’re supposed to do. Self-respect depends more on self-acknowledgment than the acknowledgment of others.
March 16 Much compliance, much craft.
Are some people “born to be boss”? Whether that’s true or not, some of us would jump at the chance to manage the world. Taking charge comes naturally and decision-making is automatic. Nothing makes us feel better than leading the pack. On the flip side, nothing so rattles our self-esteem or makes us so uncomfortable as being the rank beginner at the rear of the pack. And that’s just where we are when we born bosses first come in to any self-help program.
Struggling with unfamiliar principles and deferring to group wisdom are a baptism of fire for those who usually write the rules. It hurts to be the slow student rather than the respected teacher. It’s hard to have so many more questions than answers. But a turn at being the new kid on the block can be the best thing that ever happened to us. There are things privates learn in the trenches that the generals in the map room never know.
Compliance, or going along with the program, opens our minds to new approaches to old problems, to new sources of strength. And the fellowship of equal, striving souls is a magnificent trade-off for the loneliness that goes along with leadership. Wise is the leader who knows when to follow.
Another paradox of life: I can only take charge when I stop taking charge.
March 17 The only gift is a portion of thyself.
Some gifts only we can give to certain people. There is no other smile like ours, nobody’s touch is just the same, no one else has our thought patterns or perceptions. There are hurts in others that only we can heal, spirits that only we can lift, words that only we can say.
Self-esteem that has been chipped and weathered away by hard times robs others as well as ourselves. And always those others are the ones we love most, the very people we would least like to hurt. One of the sad implications of low self-esteem is that in devaluing who and what we are we also devalue what we have to give. So we don’t give it, and our loved ones lose out.
Putting up with low self-esteem is sad all right, but in a very real sense it’s also selfish. It isn’t honest to say “I’m only hurting myself,” when we consciously refuse to lift ourselves up out of some gutter of hopeless self-pity. If there’s even one person in the world who cares for us, who has a stake in our well-being, we are cheating that person by denying them our healthy company. Bruised and bleeding as we may be, if someone is watching for us at a window, praying for us every night, we have more on our conscience than just the crime we’re committing against ourselves. Unchallenged personal deterioration hurts the people who love me.
March 18 Beneath all depression lurks the demon anger.
Myra is as lovely as she is depressed. In spite of her many merits, she suffers from low self-esteem. With all of her heart, she’s trying to do what it takes to pull herself up. Yet a powerful, inner anchor is holding her down. The invisible but very real anchor that weighs Myra down is the anger she will not own. And because she doesn’t own it, it owns her.
Myra suffered through a painful divorce several years ago. Her husband left her for a much younger woman. Her hurt-and eventually, rage-knew no bounds. Then, like a volcano, it slowly stopped erupting. Myra decided to “put it out of her mind.” Yet it never went out. Not completely.
Today Myra is dating a wonderful man who loves her. Everything looks promising-except for that invisible anchor. Myra is often down, uneasy, and fearful, even though her new relationship is going well. The new man in her life doesn’t understand it, and neither does she. Yet it’s really no mystery. Depression, and the anger beneath it, simply can’t be dismissed. It must be faced and reckoned with if self-esteem is ever to rise. I’m no longer willing to let yesterday’s anger ruin today.
March 19 It takes twenty years to become an overnight success.
There are many kinds of success, of course-career, financial, relational, spiritual. Each brings its own reward. One kind of success gives us prestige, another intimacy, another money. What they have in common is that all are sweet and none are accidents.
Enjoying a positive self-esteem is surely one of life’s greatest successes. How could it be otherwise? The quality of our lives is dictated by the quality of our self-esteem. To succeed in this arena means that we pay the same price that is paid for any other kind of success: We must work at it.
We musn’t make quick judgments about how easy it was for others to overcome fear, doubt, complacency, and laziness. Whenever we see people who are serene and confident, we may be sure that we are looking at people who have paid their dues. Our success, as theirs was, will be won by taking each day as it comes and doing the best we can with it. Self-esteem is worth the work of building it.
March 20 Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. The fearful are caught as often as the bold.
Low self-esteem and timidity are often Siamese twins. Many of us have a long history of holding back and fading into the wallpaper. We never felt it was “our place” to get the ball rolling or to take charge in anyway. Yet building self-esteem takes boldness, at least to the extent of trying new actions that go against the grain. There is an overwhelming tendency to call passivity “patience,” and to crown inaction with virtuous justifications like “letting go” or “turning it over.”
The magic of building a healthier self-esteem is like the magic of building the great pyramid of Egypt or the medieval cathedrals of Europe. It isn’t magic at all. These wonders were created by millions of hours of work and sweat on the part of hundreds of thousands of people. Beauty came to be because the effort was made.
You don’t have to be a genius to know what it takes to build self-esteem. Most of us know darn well what it takes: enough boldness to challenge our limitations and do what it takes to get the job done. I am entitled to take my own life into my own hands.
March 21 Stupidity is the deliberate cultivation of ignorance.
Innocence and naiveté are charming and touching in the young. But there is nothing charming about adults who refuse to read the writing on the wall. This kind of blankness is called willed ignorance because it’s done on purpose, deliberately. With enough practice, willed ignorance can be indistinguishable from stupidity.
On the surface, this condition seems absurd. Who would will themselves to be ignorant? But there are many reasons for this sad tactic. If we have learned to be terribly afraid of conflict or anger, we may also have learned to ignore the red flags that signal danger. If we have learned to avoid vulnerability at all costs, we may also have learned to throw a wrench in the works if a growing relationship calls out for commitment.
If we don’t see what’s going on, don’t know what’s happening, we won’t have to deal with it. So we choose not to know. But the price of willed ignorance is always loss. When intellectual integrity goes out the window, self-esteem goes right after it. Facing the truth is not as difficult as ignoring it.
March 22 Trust men and they will be true to you; treat them greatly and they will show themselves great.
Most of us learn early on that a good offense is the best defense. In many areas of life, this is undeniably true. If we don’t keep our wits about us in this risky world, we’re sure to step in a bobby trap of one kind or another. All day long we may have to make judgments about which situations are dangerous and which are not. It becomes a habit.
But we need to be careful about making those same kind of defensive judgments about people. Especially if our judgments tend to be negative and frequent. Because people usually give us what we give them, our own suspicious, self-protecting ways are likely to come boomeranging right back at us-to the detriment of our self-esteem.
Suspecting the worst of others, not giving them the benefit of the doubt-these behaviors are usually bad habits rather than conscious decisions. If we want to, we can suspend judgment by being the first to give compliments, encouragement, and upbeat feedback. What a positive response we’ll get! And it won’t be because the other people in the world all shaped up at once.
Whatever I give out comes back to help me or hurt me.
March 23 Ride on over all obstacles, and win the race.
While life’s obstacles are irritating and frustrating, they need not defeat us. Bad luck is part of everyone’s life, after all. But some people just roll with the punches and keep on going. Their secret is that they see their own power as greater than the power of any stumbling block.
Here is a true story of someone who made the best of a bad break. A brilliant violinist had the misfortune, while he was giving a concert before a packed audience, of having the A string snap in the middle of a beautiful sonata. Everyone would have understood if he had apologized and walked off the stage. But he didn’t. Instead, he quickly transposed the selection and finished on three stings.
Wit and the will to win are invincible in overcoming any adverse circumstance. No matter what stands between us and success, we can get over, under, or through it if we have the determination.
Healthy self-esteem demands I make the least of my unlucky circumstances and the most of my ability to overcome them.
March 24 No one holds a good opinion of a man who has a low opinion of himself.
Most people would say, “Of course I like myself.” But many of those people betray the opposite in a variety of ways. Slovenly dress and grooming habits betray passive hostility to self and others. Poor health care betrays a basic lack of self-respect. Cutting, self-effacing “jokes” about ourselves are really insults that we’d rather initiate than receive.
Obviously, any form of self-hatred is poisonous to self-esteem. No matter how subtle, every attitude and behavior that diminishes self-worth must be turned around. The person who says he doesn’t care about clothes needs to buy a new shirt anyway. The person who feels she doesn’t deserve to spend money on a new hairstyle needs to get to the beauty shop now. The moment we become aware of any form of self-neglect is the very moment we need to counterattack with an act of self-love.
Without exception, the roots of self-hatred are deeply buried in the past. If today we are trying to do what is good and right, we have every reason to hold a high opinion of ourselves. One day at a time, we can learn to focus on what we are becoming rather than who we were or what we did way back then. Today is the only day I have; if I’m doing okay today, I’m doing okay.
March 25 Grown up, and that is a terribly hard thing to do. It is much easier to skip it and go from one childhood to another.
Most young children in the first few years of school struggle with self-control. Without thinking, they push and shove, squirm and wiggle. But with a little social modeling and natural maturation, most all of them develop physical control. Emotional and mental control is another matter entirely.
Many of us know some babies, bullies, show-offs, hotheads, clowns, and fawning teacher’s pets who haven’t seen a schoolroom for twenty, thirty, or forty years. Maybe we are developmentally stalled types ourselves. It’s not at all unusual for grown men and women still to be operating on the same emotional level as they did when they were twelve.
The pursuit of self-knowledge, of course, requires that we own up to our juvenile soft spots if those spots are there. If we still find ourselves striking back whenever we’re offended, laughing at people’s mistakes, or currying favor with more popular people, we’re indulging in some pretty childish behavior. It isn’t possible to be a mature adult and a tattletale at the same time. If self-esteem is our goal, we need to bring our childish ways under control.
I will practice self-control.
March 26 Why, since we are always complaining of our ills, are we constantly employed in redoubling them?
“Know your enemy” has always been sound military advice, and it’s not a bad way to safeguard self-esteem, either. All of us have enemy tendencies built right in, waiting to catch us off guard and pull us down.
To know where these pitfalls are is half the battle in staying clear of them. To understand our own personal and particular brand of self-defeating thought patterns is to be forewarned. Die-hard sentimentalists who are striving for practicality, for example, shouldn’t “entertain” themselves by watching sad movies or listening to the blues. And vacationing workaholics need to read the comics, not the stock reports. As ripped up as we’ve been-why feed the tiger?
One doom-and-gloom sort of man admitted to his group that he always listened to police calls while he was falling asleep at night. As hard as he was working to develop a positive perspective, at the same time he was tuning in to crime and violence as the day’s final lullaby! When the group laughed, he laughed, too. Then, with the sly look of someone who has just discovered a secret, he said, “I guess that’s not such a good idea.” Avoiding my personal pitfalls takes common sense, not brilliance.
March 27 We find it hard to believe that other people’s thoughts are as silly as our own, but they probably are.
What a boost our self-confidence would get if we could listen in on other people’s thoughts! Particularly those people we imagine are so much wiser, more sophisticated, or more accomplished than we. How surprised we would be-not to mention amused-to find their mental ramblings so ordinary, random, and trivial. So much like our own!
Humanity is a common bond. Both kings and servants have stomachs that get hungry, backs that sometimes itch, and minds that wander a good bit of the time. As children of God, we all have dignity and limitless potential for spiritual growth, but our feet are rooted in clay. No matter how high or low we rank on any social scale, our human foibles and frailties make us a lot more alike than different.
The wonderful Wizard of Oz, if we remember, turned out to be a nervous little man shouting through a megaphone. He wasn’t braver than the Lion or smarter than the Scarecrow or more loving than the Tin Man. He was just like them; his wizardry was all illusion. Much of the superiority we accord to others is illusion, too. I share common characteristics with every person who walks the earth.
March 28 Our costliest expenditure is time.
It seems that everyone is running at full tilt these days. We’re so busy there’s hardly time for the necessities, let alone time for play or reflection. Recovery and personal growth may well fall under the heading “If I get the time…”
But time doesn’t wait for our schedules to clear. Postponed recreation or quiet time can easily be delayed for months or even years. By waiting for the time instead of taking the time, later can become never in spite of our best intentions to the contrary.
Yet what could be more crucial or immediate or deserving of attention than well-developed self-esteem? Our appreciation of ourselves enhances or detracts from everything we do, it colors and shapes the quality of our lives. In the big picture, how much does it really matter if the house gets painted this year or if we take the vacation of our dreams? If we’re consistently too busy to take a walk, to comfortably relax away from a ringing telephone, to think our thoughts without interruption-then we’re just plain too busy. What are our priorities? If we can’t quickly say, then the chances are that we’re spending most of our time on items that shouldn’t be at the top of the list. If I want to make the most of my life, I need to start now.
March 29 Rashness succeeds often, still more often fails.
Snap judgments can get us into trouble. We don’t always know what we think we know-or even see what we think we see. If rashness is a character defect we must honestly claim, what better time than now to take a closer look at how this tendency can hurt us?
The tendency to race to negative conclusions betrays a weakness in our self-confidence. Besides causing us unnecessary pain and embarrassment, it can hurt the people we love best. We do our self-esteem a favor when we learn to back off, take a second look, and think again before we jump to conclusions. If I’m quick to take offense, I will always have plenty to be offended about.
March 30 Push a coincidence back far enough and it becomes inevitable.
Some of us who didn’t get a lot of help growing up take all the credit-or all the blame-for who and where we are now. But there’s no such thing as a self-made man or woman, proud boasts to the contrary. Whoever we are today is the product of much coaching, conditioning, and example. Many cooks had a stir at the soup, many sculptors had a turn at the clay.
From teacher after teacher, we have learned who we are, what we deserve, what to expect from life, others, and ourselves. Thousands and thousands of learning events-verbal and nonverbal, behavioral and emotional-have gone into making us who we are. Perhaps we can’t remember what we learned when and from whom, but remembered or not, our life lessons are still at work, creating the reality we call “normal.” We didn’t get to be who we are by random coincidence.
If our self-esteem tells us that all is well, we are fortunate indeed. But if it needs improvement, we have every reason to take heart: If one set of definitions and expectations can be learned, then so can another. We’ve already proved that we’re good students. And this time we can choose our own teachers. New experiences create new realities.
March 31 Some self-improvement projects are doomed before they begin. One kind is the half-hearted little effort we may make to stop other people’s nagging and get them off our backs. How could improvement come from that? Another losing venture is the search for a free lunch. In this case we try to fool ourselves that the trappings of healthy behavior can actually substitute for the behavior itself.
Let’s get serious. There’s no law that says we must improve ourselves if we don’t want to. We have every right to stay just the way we are, or even to slip backward. But there are natural laws that will ultimately come to bear. One is that pseudopromises to ourselves and others erode our self-respect. Another is that a zero investment earns a zero return.
Obviously, self-improvement must be initiated by self or it’s not going to work. There’s no dignity in lying, and no one is fooled for long. And there’s not much to admire about the expensively equipped golfer or tennis player who spends all his time in the athletic club bar. Until we actually decide to “give a damn,” we can at least salvage some integrity by being honest. Pretended self-improvement mocks my own integrity.
Money talks to all of us. Whether we admit it or not, a lot of our self-esteem is based on the amount of money we’re able to earn, hoard, or spend. How could it be otherwise? The siren of success calls out to us daily from advertisements, television shows, and newspapers: “You must have more or you are a failure.” Because we hear the message loud and clear and because we don’t want to be failures, it’s hard not to buy into the idea.
But self has to do with being, not with having. These are totally different realities. Self-esteem is an art in itself, not a work of art that can be bought or sold. To have self-esteem is to know how much is enough. It is to value friendship over things and to have the ability to relax more, worry less, and find plenty to laugh about.
Certainly everybody needs enough money to live on. Poverty can kill a spirit as quickly as riches can. But even great wealth can’t buy what isn’t for sale. Truly happy people know that their real riches reside within. I will avoid the trap of outward trappings.
March 2 Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves.
The search for self-esteem is a search for truth. It involves trying to see ourselves as truly as we can—and learning to appreciate what we see. As we move along, the mirrors that reflect back our true selves often pop up in the most unlikely places!
Irritating people can be such mirrors. All of us know people we’d just as soon avoid. Somehow they just get under our skin and make us crazy. Yet if we are willing to figure out exactly what bothers us about them, we may find great insight into our own hearts.
The person who talks too much may irritate us because we miss the chance to monopolize the conversation with our own stories. The braggart may irritate us because we feel we should have accomplished more. The person who is always upbeat may make us jealous that we’re not happier ourselves. Some insights are less flattering than others but no less valuable for that. My own flaws and frailties are usually at the bottom of my trouble with other people.
March 3 When a man sells eleven ounces for twelve, he makes a compact with the devil, and sells himself for the value of an ounce.
People who worry a lot about being cheated often feel perfectly justified in taking advantage of someone else. Unlike safecracking, chiseling is more a pervasive pettiness of spirit than it is an outright crime. Yet both are dishonest. Most chiselers, as a matter of fact, don’t even know they’re chiselers. They think of themselves as shrewd, clever, and artful. Unaware of their own shabby reputation, these small-time wheeler-dealers may have no idea why other people don’t respect and admire them. Obviously, self-esteem is shaken when appreciation is denied.
Pettiness of all kinds bespeaks old grudges. Because we feel we’ve been hoodwinked, brushed off, or in some other way shortchanged in life, we may subconsciously get even by giving “them” back the same kind of treatment they gave us. To be sure we’re not giving too much away, we always hold back a little something extra for ourselves.
Chiseling is a way of thinking—a defensive, fearful betrayal of our own insecurity. It belittles us instead of protecting us. If we find ourselves counting out our gains in ill-gotten time or money, we’re chiseling ourselves out of our own integrity. My growing integrity forbids every form of pettiness.
March 4 Servitude debases people to the point where they end up liking it.
Talk about guilty pleasures! What a joy it is to learn that building self-esteem doesn’t require us to please anybody but ourselves. Can it really be? There must be a catch somewhere. It sounds too good to be true, or at least true for us.
Many of us have spent most of our lives in the service of other people. In our growing up years, we learned that that was our ticket for love and approval. Want to be loved? Make someone else happy. Want a pat on the head? Do their work for them. That’s how we learned to look outside ourselves for our self-esteem. That’s what made us virtual slaves to the wishes and needs of others.
Now that we’re adults, old knee-jerk reactions will still tempt us to reach out for that brass ring. But now that we know better, we’re going to be much less comfortable about giving away all that power. As we take it back little by little, so do we take custody of our self-esteem. My self-approval no longer depends on other people’s responses.
March 5 Any life is an unfinished story.
Some of the most popular movies and television shows have the most predictable story lines. Maybe that’s why we like them so well. Right from the start we can see the powerful forces of evil taking on the even more powerful forces of good. The plot is so familiar we can sit back, relax, watch for the thrilling close calls, and let the story unfold. No sweat.
Writing our own life stories as we do is a different proposition. For one thing, there’s plenty of sweat involved. And for another, the ending is anything but predictable. A life story in process is full of unexpected twists and turns. New characters can enter—and leave. Heroics may or may not be called for. Mistakes may be corrected immediately or just in the nick of time. Tragedy may give way to comedy. But as long as we’re alive, the story isn’t over.
In whatever predicament we find ourselves today, tomorrow can be different. The possibilities are up to us; we can write anything we want to on the new pages coming up. What will happen next? That’s entirely up to us. We are writing our own stories, and they will come out as we decide.
It’s never too late to change my own story line.
March 6 Friendly counsel cuts off many foes.
Contrary as many of us are, we crave attention but often run from it when we get it. If anyone comments on our behavior, whether they’re giving us credit or blame, we tend to squirm like a fish on a hook. Our old, unrecovering selves are too tender, too touchy, too exquisitely self-conscious for their own good. Our new, recovering selves, however, are made of much sterner stuff.
Less vulnerable now than we used to be, we are learning to take both compliments and complaints without flinching. We know we need help and we’re willing to take it when it’s offered. If it’s a pat on the back—wonderful! If it’s a legitimate criticism—that’s wonderful, too. We’re not so frail anymore that we can’t bear to hear a word to the wise.
Our new emotional sturdiness is a sign of maturity and self-confidence. For the first time in our lives, perhaps, we realize that our real self-worth is independent of what other people say of us, whether it’s good or bad. We are who we are. Comments from others may hurt us a little or help us a little—but they don’t change who we are. When I am sure of who I am, other people’s opinions will not matter so much.
March 7 Guilt always hurries toward its complement, punishment: only there does its satisfaction lie.
The most useless phrase in the English language may be “If only I had…” What’s done is done. Dwelling on past errors or missed opportunities is a terrible mistake. Some of our self-blame simply isn’t justified: What happened wasn’t our fault in the first place. And even when the failings were truly ours, the constant replay exaggerates and distorts what really happened way back then.
Guilt eats up a lot of energy that could be better used elsewhere. Most of us have already punished ourselves many times over. Isn’t it time now to climb down off the rack, step away from the whipping post, and consider the debt settled? Enough is enough. We deserve a reprieve.
Self-esteem demands that we admit our mistakes and take responsibility for them. But it also demands that we accept and forgive what can’t be relived. Endless self-recrimination has no place in recovery. As my knowledge increases, my self-recrimination decreases.
March 8 Optimism enables a man to hold his head high, to claim the future for himself and not abandon it to his enemy.
The optimist and the pessimist find different implications and portents in everything they see. To an optimist, a stubbed toe may be a small price to pay for getting turned around in the right direction. The pessimist may see the same small injury as convincing evidence that all effort is dangerous and futile.
There are disadvantages at either extreme, of course. We optimists may not always recognize real and present dangers. But we who are pessimists may well miss out on many come-from-behind victories that could have been ours if we hadn’t given up so early in the game.
A comfortable balance between the two extremes is what we want to achieve. If our nature or experience tilts us too far in either direction, we need to recognize that and begin to practice a healthier, more balanced viewpoint. Self-esteem hinges on realism—but realism and hopelessness are not the same thing. Viewpoint is critical; I tend to get what I expect.
March 9 Loneliness expresses the pain of being alone and solitude expresses the glory of being alone.
It may be said that the road between loneliness and solitude is the highway to self-esteem. As we begin our quest, most of us fear and flee loneliness. We make sure that we have plenty of company and continuous talk, lest in the silence we have to hear ourselves. When we’re alone, we may keep a radio or television going to fill the airwaves. Or we talk on the telephone.
As we come to know and become more comfortable with ourselves, however, that “noise hunger” eases up. The disappointing, inadequate self that we always avoided starts to look more interesting—perhaps like someone we’d like to spend some time with, get to know better. When they’re not interrupted, cued, or drowned out, our own thoughts become our most abiding source of challenge, comfort, encouragement, and self-respect.
The loneliness is the same whether we’re suffering loneliness or enjoying solitude. The magical difference is in our attitude toward ourselves. Getting comfortable with my own company is a sign of growth.
March 10 The remedy for wrongs is to forget them.
One of the very best ways to hang on to low self-esteem is to hang on to a resentment. Resentment is always about pain. It is about being cheated, being “done unto,” being victimized. And victimization always makes its presence felt in negative definitions of ourselves—definitions like “I don’t have any rights” or “You can’t trust anyone” or “I will never be loved.”
To foster a resentment fixates us at the point of our pain. Happiness, then, becomes like a butterfly transfixed with a pin. Because resentments and freedom are mutually exclusive, no one can have both. To insist on carrying around a resentment is to insist on retaining the source of our low self-esteem.
Often the hardest thing about giving up resentments is that we feel such a right to them. We may well have been cheated. We may well have been lied to and treated shabbily, perhaps even criminally. If that doesn’t justify resentment what does! The truth is, however, that resentment is a self-defeating entitlement. We have a right to a stomachache too, but who wants it? To harbor a resentment is to harbor an enemy.
March 11 Beware, as long as you live, of judging people by appearances.
People who struggle with low self-esteem are quick to intimidate themselves. One way to do this is to make a snap judgment based on appearances. Some of the new people who come into our self-improvement programs, for example, may hardly seem to need improving. Some are so fit and healthy looking they could probably teach the exercise classes we’re afraid to take. Some seem so intelligent they could probably find a cure for the common cold faster than we could find the mayo in the back of the refrigerator. How could they be in the same room with us? Surely they couldn’t be having the same problems we’re having!
But of course they could—and do. When we compare our insides to other people’s outsides, the only picture we can come up with is wildly distorted and inaccurate. A snapshot is not the same thing as an X-ray. When we only judge by what “shows,” we misjudge—and miss the point—every time.
Despite appearances, the people we quickly rank above ourselves are just the same as we are on the inside. They have fears, worries, hopes, and dreams, just as we do. We deny them our compassion—and deny ourselves their fellowship—when we put them up to keep ourselves down. I’m learning to compare myself with others for information rather than intimidation.
March 12 The only abnormality is the incapacity to love.
Sometimes, as we bravely but clumsily trudge the path of recovery, our priorities go out of whack. Heaven knows we are trying to touch all the bases and exercise every weak muscle. Perhaps we are trying, to do too much at the same time. We may be busily learning to play, exercise, develop a prayer life, and assert ourselves with such passion and energy that we forget why we stirred up all that activity in the first place.
We need to remember that our final goal and first priority is to become healthy enough to participate in healthy relationships. All self-improvement efforts march in that direction. Each one builds and maintains the self-esteem that makes that final goal possible. In themselves, they are less—much less—than what they add up to.
We may never be able to play as freely as we’d like to, or pray with the concentration of the saints. Our thunder thighs may not submit to the exercise machines nor our timidity ever be completely overcome. But when we are able to share in loving relationships, no matter how the rest of our projects work out, we have found the key to the golden door. All recovery roads lead to the ability to love and be loved.
March 13 A sound mind in a sound body is a short but full description of a happy state in this world.
Health is a required subject in all school districts. Who doesn’t remember grade-school classes in hygiene? That’s where we learned all about the importance of toothbrushing, fingernail cleaning, and face washing. Usually, a little first aid was taught in those classes, too. We learned what to do about common injuries like cuts and bruises and burns.
Isn’t it odd that no one ever taught us about mental hygiene? But good mental and emotional health habits were never mentioned, let alone explained. And there were no first aid lessons to show us how to take care of common emotional injuries. Surely punctured pride is more common than a nail hole in the hand. And bruised feelings must outnumber black eyes a million to one!
Thankfully, it’s never too late to learn. Here are five simple prescriptions for the maintenance of mental and emotional health:
- Assert yourself: no one can respond to what you don’t say.
- Be teachable: The ignorance you won’t admit will catch up with you.
- Find confidants: friends double your joys and divide your sorrows.
- Contribute something: Takers end up empty-handed.
- Live today: Anyone can be strong for twenty-four hours.
Simple daily disciplines can protect the wealth of mental health.
March 14 He too serves a purpose who only stands and cheers.
As we think about all the different roles we have played in our lives, the tendency is to remember the times when we were up front, in the spotlight, delivering all the important lines. We’re likely to pass over or even forget the many more numerous occasions when we had supporting roles—when it was our job to keep the action moving, motivate the main characters, or even cook everybody’s lunch.
But there’s nothing insignificant or second-rate about the supporting roles we play. As the saying in the movie industry goes, there are no small parts, only small actors. It’s vain and self-defeating to make little of our opportunities to help and even enable other people to do their best work. We can’t make other people shine without shining ourselves.
Baby-sitters, den mothers, and Little League coaches, if they play their roles to the full, can make life-changing contributions to their young charges. Just as our friends, fans, and mentors can enhance our adult lives by their encouragement and appreciation, we need to lose no chance to stand up and cheer each other on. Supporting roles are often the most rich and rewarding.
March 15 Praise shames me, for I secretly beg for it.
Praise can be wonderful encouragement. Self-esteem blossoms when our brave attempts, as well as our actual successes, receive an adequate amount of notice and comment. Bravery deserves acknowledgment.
There’s another side to that equation, however. Every move we make isn’t going to make people stand up and cheer. Nor should it. Some of actually become praise junkies who measure our self-worth by compliments and pats on the back. Then if that attention is withdrawn or withheld, we feel mistreated. In our hunger for appreciation, we’ve given other people the authority to validate our worth.
Robert is only four. His father a taciturn mountain man, cuts and delivers firewood for a living. Robert works alongside his father. The father carries the larger logs from truck to wood bin. Robert carries the logs that are Robert’s size. When they are working, neither one talks. Robert neither expects nor gets a flood of compliments for doing his part. He simply does his work because it is his work, not a remarkable feat that deserves a medal. Like Robert, we mustn’t look for applause for simply doing what we’re supposed to do. Self-respect depends more on self-acknowledgment than the acknowledgment of others.
March 16 Much compliance, much craft.
Are some people “born to be boss”? Whether that’s true or not, some of us would jump at the chance to manage the world. Taking charge comes naturally and decision-making is automatic. Nothing makes us feel better than leading the pack. On the flip side, nothing so rattles our self-esteem or makes us so uncomfortable as being the rank beginner at the rear of the pack. And that’s just where we are when we born bosses first come in to any self-help program.
Struggling with unfamiliar principles and deferring to group wisdom are a baptism of fire for those who usually write the rules. It hurts to be the slow student rather than the respected teacher. It’s hard to have so many more questions than answers. But a turn at being the new kid on the block can be the best thing that ever happened to us. There are things privates learn in the trenches that the generals in the map room never know.
Compliance, or going along with the program, opens our minds to new approaches to old problems, to new sources of strength. And the fellowship of equal, striving souls is a magnificent trade-off for the loneliness that goes along with leadership. Wise is the leader who knows when to follow.
Another paradox of life: I can only take charge when I stop taking charge.
March 17 The only gift is a portion of thyself.
Some gifts only we can give to certain people. There is no other smile like ours, nobody’s touch is just the same, no one else has our thought patterns or perceptions. There are hurts in others that only we can heal, spirits that only we can lift, words that only we can say.
Self-esteem that has been chipped and weathered away by hard times robs others as well as ourselves. And always those others are the ones we love most, the very people we would least like to hurt. One of the sad implications of low self-esteem is that in devaluing who and what we are we also devalue what we have to give. So we don’t give it, and our loved ones lose out.
Putting up with low self-esteem is sad all right, but in a very real sense it’s also selfish. It isn’t honest to say “I’m only hurting myself,” when we consciously refuse to lift ourselves up out of some gutter of hopeless self-pity. If there’s even one person in the world who cares for us, who has a stake in our well-being, we are cheating that person by denying them our healthy company. Bruised and bleeding as we may be, if someone is watching for us at a window, praying for us every night, we have more on our conscience than just the crime we’re committing against ourselves. Unchallenged personal deterioration hurts the people who love me.
March 18 Beneath all depression lurks the demon anger.
Myra is as lovely as she is depressed. In spite of her many merits, she suffers from low self-esteem. With all of her heart, she’s trying to do what it takes to pull herself up. Yet a powerful, inner anchor is holding her down. The invisible but very real anchor that weighs Myra down is the anger she will not own. And because she doesn’t own it, it owns her.
Myra suffered through a painful divorce several years ago. Her husband left her for a much younger woman. Her hurt-and eventually, rage-knew no bounds. Then, like a volcano, it slowly stopped erupting. Myra decided to “put it out of her mind.” Yet it never went out. Not completely.
Today Myra is dating a wonderful man who loves her. Everything looks promising-except for that invisible anchor. Myra is often down, uneasy, and fearful, even though her new relationship is going well. The new man in her life doesn’t understand it, and neither does she. Yet it’s really no mystery. Depression, and the anger beneath it, simply can’t be dismissed. It must be faced and reckoned with if self-esteem is ever to rise. I’m no longer willing to let yesterday’s anger ruin today.
March 19 It takes twenty years to become an overnight success.
There are many kinds of success, of course-career, financial, relational, spiritual. Each brings its own reward. One kind of success gives us prestige, another intimacy, another money. What they have in common is that all are sweet and none are accidents.
Enjoying a positive self-esteem is surely one of life’s greatest successes. How could it be otherwise? The quality of our lives is dictated by the quality of our self-esteem. To succeed in this arena means that we pay the same price that is paid for any other kind of success: We must work at it.
We musn’t make quick judgments about how easy it was for others to overcome fear, doubt, complacency, and laziness. Whenever we see people who are serene and confident, we may be sure that we are looking at people who have paid their dues. Our success, as theirs was, will be won by taking each day as it comes and doing the best we can with it. Self-esteem is worth the work of building it.
March 20 Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. The fearful are caught as often as the bold.
Low self-esteem and timidity are often Siamese twins. Many of us have a long history of holding back and fading into the wallpaper. We never felt it was “our place” to get the ball rolling or to take charge in anyway. Yet building self-esteem takes boldness, at least to the extent of trying new actions that go against the grain. There is an overwhelming tendency to call passivity “patience,” and to crown inaction with virtuous justifications like “letting go” or “turning it over.”
The magic of building a healthier self-esteem is like the magic of building the great pyramid of Egypt or the medieval cathedrals of Europe. It isn’t magic at all. These wonders were created by millions of hours of work and sweat on the part of hundreds of thousands of people. Beauty came to be because the effort was made.
You don’t have to be a genius to know what it takes to build self-esteem. Most of us know darn well what it takes: enough boldness to challenge our limitations and do what it takes to get the job done. I am entitled to take my own life into my own hands.
March 21 Stupidity is the deliberate cultivation of ignorance.
Innocence and naiveté are charming and touching in the young. But there is nothing charming about adults who refuse to read the writing on the wall. This kind of blankness is called willed ignorance because it’s done on purpose, deliberately. With enough practice, willed ignorance can be indistinguishable from stupidity.
On the surface, this condition seems absurd. Who would will themselves to be ignorant? But there are many reasons for this sad tactic. If we have learned to be terribly afraid of conflict or anger, we may also have learned to ignore the red flags that signal danger. If we have learned to avoid vulnerability at all costs, we may also have learned to throw a wrench in the works if a growing relationship calls out for commitment.
If we don’t see what’s going on, don’t know what’s happening, we won’t have to deal with it. So we choose not to know. But the price of willed ignorance is always loss. When intellectual integrity goes out the window, self-esteem goes right after it. Facing the truth is not as difficult as ignoring it.
March 22 Trust men and they will be true to you; treat them greatly and they will show themselves great.
Most of us learn early on that a good offense is the best defense. In many areas of life, this is undeniably true. If we don’t keep our wits about us in this risky world, we’re sure to step in a bobby trap of one kind or another. All day long we may have to make judgments about which situations are dangerous and which are not. It becomes a habit.
But we need to be careful about making those same kind of defensive judgments about people. Especially if our judgments tend to be negative and frequent. Because people usually give us what we give them, our own suspicious, self-protecting ways are likely to come boomeranging right back at us-to the detriment of our self-esteem.
Suspecting the worst of others, not giving them the benefit of the doubt-these behaviors are usually bad habits rather than conscious decisions. If we want to, we can suspend judgment by being the first to give compliments, encouragement, and upbeat feedback. What a positive response we’ll get! And it won’t be because the other people in the world all shaped up at once.
Whatever I give out comes back to help me or hurt me.
March 23 Ride on over all obstacles, and win the race.
While life’s obstacles are irritating and frustrating, they need not defeat us. Bad luck is part of everyone’s life, after all. But some people just roll with the punches and keep on going. Their secret is that they see their own power as greater than the power of any stumbling block.
Here is a true story of someone who made the best of a bad break. A brilliant violinist had the misfortune, while he was giving a concert before a packed audience, of having the A string snap in the middle of a beautiful sonata. Everyone would have understood if he had apologized and walked off the stage. But he didn’t. Instead, he quickly transposed the selection and finished on three stings.
Wit and the will to win are invincible in overcoming any adverse circumstance. No matter what stands between us and success, we can get over, under, or through it if we have the determination.
Healthy self-esteem demands I make the least of my unlucky circumstances and the most of my ability to overcome them.
March 24 No one holds a good opinion of a man who has a low opinion of himself.
Most people would say, “Of course I like myself.” But many of those people betray the opposite in a variety of ways. Slovenly dress and grooming habits betray passive hostility to self and others. Poor health care betrays a basic lack of self-respect. Cutting, self-effacing “jokes” about ourselves are really insults that we’d rather initiate than receive.
Obviously, any form of self-hatred is poisonous to self-esteem. No matter how subtle, every attitude and behavior that diminishes self-worth must be turned around. The person who says he doesn’t care about clothes needs to buy a new shirt anyway. The person who feels she doesn’t deserve to spend money on a new hairstyle needs to get to the beauty shop now. The moment we become aware of any form of self-neglect is the very moment we need to counterattack with an act of self-love.
Without exception, the roots of self-hatred are deeply buried in the past. If today we are trying to do what is good and right, we have every reason to hold a high opinion of ourselves. One day at a time, we can learn to focus on what we are becoming rather than who we were or what we did way back then. Today is the only day I have; if I’m doing okay today, I’m doing okay.
March 25 Grown up, and that is a terribly hard thing to do. It is much easier to skip it and go from one childhood to another.
Most young children in the first few years of school struggle with self-control. Without thinking, they push and shove, squirm and wiggle. But with a little social modeling and natural maturation, most all of them develop physical control. Emotional and mental control is another matter entirely.
Many of us know some babies, bullies, show-offs, hotheads, clowns, and fawning teacher’s pets who haven’t seen a schoolroom for twenty, thirty, or forty years. Maybe we are developmentally stalled types ourselves. It’s not at all unusual for grown men and women still to be operating on the same emotional level as they did when they were twelve.
The pursuit of self-knowledge, of course, requires that we own up to our juvenile soft spots if those spots are there. If we still find ourselves striking back whenever we’re offended, laughing at people’s mistakes, or currying favor with more popular people, we’re indulging in some pretty childish behavior. It isn’t possible to be a mature adult and a tattletale at the same time. If self-esteem is our goal, we need to bring our childish ways under control.
I will practice self-control.
March 26 Why, since we are always complaining of our ills, are we constantly employed in redoubling them?
“Know your enemy” has always been sound military advice, and it’s not a bad way to safeguard self-esteem, either. All of us have enemy tendencies built right in, waiting to catch us off guard and pull us down.
To know where these pitfalls are is half the battle in staying clear of them. To understand our own personal and particular brand of self-defeating thought patterns is to be forewarned. Die-hard sentimentalists who are striving for practicality, for example, shouldn’t “entertain” themselves by watching sad movies or listening to the blues. And vacationing workaholics need to read the comics, not the stock reports. As ripped up as we’ve been-why feed the tiger?
One doom-and-gloom sort of man admitted to his group that he always listened to police calls while he was falling asleep at night. As hard as he was working to develop a positive perspective, at the same time he was tuning in to crime and violence as the day’s final lullaby! When the group laughed, he laughed, too. Then, with the sly look of someone who has just discovered a secret, he said, “I guess that’s not such a good idea.” Avoiding my personal pitfalls takes common sense, not brilliance.
March 27 We find it hard to believe that other people’s thoughts are as silly as our own, but they probably are.
What a boost our self-confidence would get if we could listen in on other people’s thoughts! Particularly those people we imagine are so much wiser, more sophisticated, or more accomplished than we. How surprised we would be-not to mention amused-to find their mental ramblings so ordinary, random, and trivial. So much like our own!
Humanity is a common bond. Both kings and servants have stomachs that get hungry, backs that sometimes itch, and minds that wander a good bit of the time. As children of God, we all have dignity and limitless potential for spiritual growth, but our feet are rooted in clay. No matter how high or low we rank on any social scale, our human foibles and frailties make us a lot more alike than different.
The wonderful Wizard of Oz, if we remember, turned out to be a nervous little man shouting through a megaphone. He wasn’t braver than the Lion or smarter than the Scarecrow or more loving than the Tin Man. He was just like them; his wizardry was all illusion. Much of the superiority we accord to others is illusion, too. I share common characteristics with every person who walks the earth.
March 28 Our costliest expenditure is time.
It seems that everyone is running at full tilt these days. We’re so busy there’s hardly time for the necessities, let alone time for play or reflection. Recovery and personal growth may well fall under the heading “If I get the time…”
But time doesn’t wait for our schedules to clear. Postponed recreation or quiet time can easily be delayed for months or even years. By waiting for the time instead of taking the time, later can become never in spite of our best intentions to the contrary.
Yet what could be more crucial or immediate or deserving of attention than well-developed self-esteem? Our appreciation of ourselves enhances or detracts from everything we do, it colors and shapes the quality of our lives. In the big picture, how much does it really matter if the house gets painted this year or if we take the vacation of our dreams? If we’re consistently too busy to take a walk, to comfortably relax away from a ringing telephone, to think our thoughts without interruption-then we’re just plain too busy. What are our priorities? If we can’t quickly say, then the chances are that we’re spending most of our time on items that shouldn’t be at the top of the list. If I want to make the most of my life, I need to start now.
March 29 Rashness succeeds often, still more often fails.
Snap judgments can get us into trouble. We don’t always know what we think we know-or even see what we think we see. If rashness is a character defect we must honestly claim, what better time than now to take a closer look at how this tendency can hurt us?
- A mother was sure she put change for the parking meter on the corner of the table. When it was gone she rashly accused her young son of taking it. Later, when she found the coins still in her purse, she apologized. But now, years later, the son still remembers his hurt.
- A man sees his fiancée having an intimate lunch with another man. After an afternoon of miserable anxiety, he confronts and accuses her with his eyewitness account. The fiancée’s luncheon companion turns out to be a fellow worker whose mother had recently died.
The tendency to race to negative conclusions betrays a weakness in our self-confidence. Besides causing us unnecessary pain and embarrassment, it can hurt the people we love best. We do our self-esteem a favor when we learn to back off, take a second look, and think again before we jump to conclusions. If I’m quick to take offense, I will always have plenty to be offended about.
March 30 Push a coincidence back far enough and it becomes inevitable.
Some of us who didn’t get a lot of help growing up take all the credit-or all the blame-for who and where we are now. But there’s no such thing as a self-made man or woman, proud boasts to the contrary. Whoever we are today is the product of much coaching, conditioning, and example. Many cooks had a stir at the soup, many sculptors had a turn at the clay.
From teacher after teacher, we have learned who we are, what we deserve, what to expect from life, others, and ourselves. Thousands and thousands of learning events-verbal and nonverbal, behavioral and emotional-have gone into making us who we are. Perhaps we can’t remember what we learned when and from whom, but remembered or not, our life lessons are still at work, creating the reality we call “normal.” We didn’t get to be who we are by random coincidence.
If our self-esteem tells us that all is well, we are fortunate indeed. But if it needs improvement, we have every reason to take heart: If one set of definitions and expectations can be learned, then so can another. We’ve already proved that we’re good students. And this time we can choose our own teachers. New experiences create new realities.
March 31 Some self-improvement projects are doomed before they begin. One kind is the half-hearted little effort we may make to stop other people’s nagging and get them off our backs. How could improvement come from that? Another losing venture is the search for a free lunch. In this case we try to fool ourselves that the trappings of healthy behavior can actually substitute for the behavior itself.
Let’s get serious. There’s no law that says we must improve ourselves if we don’t want to. We have every right to stay just the way we are, or even to slip backward. But there are natural laws that will ultimately come to bear. One is that pseudopromises to ourselves and others erode our self-respect. Another is that a zero investment earns a zero return.
Obviously, self-improvement must be initiated by self or it’s not going to work. There’s no dignity in lying, and no one is fooled for long. And there’s not much to admire about the expensively equipped golfer or tennis player who spends all his time in the athletic club bar. Until we actually decide to “give a damn,” we can at least salvage some integrity by being honest. Pretended self-improvement mocks my own integrity.
