Mayo Clinic Health Manager

Get free personalized health guidance for you and your family.

Get Started

Free

E-Newsletter

Subscribe to receive the latest updates on health topics. View sample

Self-esteem: Boost your self-image with these 5 steps

Cognitive behavior therapy techniques can help you unlearn thought patterns that contribute to low self-esteem. See examples of thoughts that can erode self-esteem and learn healthy substitutes.

By Mayo Clinic staff

Low self-esteem can negatively affect virtually every part of your life, including your relationships, your job and your health. But you can raise your self-esteem to a healthy level, even if you're an adult who's been harboring a negative self-image since childhood.

Changing the way you think about yourself and your life is essential to boosting self-esteem. Cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) techniques are especially helpful in changing unhealthy thinking and behavior patterns. These techniques are based on the idea that your feelings and behavior result from how you think about yourself and your life. CBT techniques can help you recognize, challenge and ultimately replace negative thoughts or inaccurate beliefs with more positive, realistic ones.

These five steps toward healthy self-esteem are based on cognitive behavior therapy principles. As you go through these five steps, jotting down your thoughts, experiences and observations in a journal or daily record may help you use these steps more effectively.

Step 1: Identify troubling conditions or situations

Think about what conditions or situations about your life you find troubling and that seem to deflate your self-esteem. You may wish to change aspects of your personality or behavior, such as a fear of giving a business presentation, frequently becoming angry or always expecting the worst. You may be struggling with depression, a disability or a change in life circumstances, such as the death of a loved one, a lost promotion or children leaving home. Or you may wish to improve your relationship with another person, such as a spouse, family member or co-worker.

Step 2: Become aware of beliefs and thoughts

Once you've identified troubling conditions or situations, pay attention to your thoughts related to them. This includes your self-talk — what you tell yourself — as well as your interpretation of what a situation means and your beliefs about yourself, other people and events. Your thoughts and beliefs may be positive, negative or neutral. They may be rational — based on reason or facts — or irrational — based on false ideas.

Step 3: Pinpoint negative or inaccurate thinking

Your beliefs and thoughts about a condition or situation affect your reaction to it. Inaccurate or negative thoughts and beliefs about something or someone can trigger unhealthy physical, emotional and behavioral responses, including:

  • Physical responses, such as a stiff neck, sore back, racing heart, stomach problems, sweating or change in sleeping patterns.
  • Emotional responses, such as difficulty concentrating or feeling depressed, angry, sad, nervous, guilty or worried.
  • Behavioral responses, such as eating when not hungry, avoiding tasks, working more than usual, spending increased time alone, obsessing about a situation or blaming others for your problems.
Next page
(1 of 2)

MH00129

July 24, 2007

© 1998-2009 Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research (MFMER). All rights reserved. A single copy of these materials may be reprinted for noncommercial personal use only. "Mayo," "Mayo Clinic," "MayoClinic.com," "EmbodyHealth," "Reliable tools for healthier lives," "Enhance your life," and the triple-shield Mayo Clinic logo are trademarks of Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research.

Print Share Reprints

Text Size: smaller largerlarger