In life, its hard to stay tough specially when things and people around you keep pulling you down. When we get to the battle field, we should choose the right luggage to bring and armors to use, and pick those that are bullet proof.

Life’s options give us arrays of more options. Along the battle, we will get hit and bruised. And wearing a bullet proof armor ideally means ‘self change’. The kind of change which comes from within. Voluntarily. Armor or Self Change changes 3 things: our attitude, our behavior and our way of thinking.

If you put a small value on yourself, rest assured that the world will not raise your price.

Low self esteem doesn’t see race, sex, age, religion, martial status, height, weight, or any other label or category you could possibly attach yourself to. Unfortunately, low self esteem isn’t something you can plan for, either. But low self esteem is something you can change – with a bit of hard work and patience.

You are what you think. You are what you go for. You are what you do.

Sometimes, you may want to wonder if some people are born leaders or positive thinkers. NO. Being positive, and staying positive is a choice. Building self esteem and drawing lines for self improvement is a choice, not a rule or a talent. God wouldn’t come down from heaven and tell you – “Juliet, you may now have the permission to build self esteem and improve your self.”

Self-pity gets you nowhere. One must have the adventurous daring to accept oneself as a bundle of possibilities and undertake the most interesting game in the world making the most of one’s best.

In general terms, people who suffer from low self esteem may feel or behave in some of the following ways:

# Practice a larger-than-normal amount of negative self talk, such as, “Why would anyone ever want to date me?” or, “I don’t deserve a loving partner”;

# Act destructively towards oneself and/or others, such as self-sabotaging behaviors or being overly critical;

# Apologize frequently and/or exhibit self-doubting behaviors;

* Need constant feedback from outside sources;

* Unable to receive or accept compliments;

* Focus on one’s perceived flaws; and

* Become so much of a perfectionist that basic tasks don’t get finished for fear of failure.

Did you recognize yourself in any of those points? Its nothing to be ashamed of. In fact, many people suffer from periodic bouts of low self esteem. Recognizing that you may be on a bit of a downswing is ok, because at least you can see there is an issue and work towards doing something about it.

How Low Self Esteem Affects Relationships

In a nutshell, when you think poorly of yourself, it shows. Like a bad stain smack in the middle of a white t-shirt, low self esteem is hard to miss, offputing, and ultimately detrimental to any and all relationships, dating or otherwise. So trying to attract a loving, beneficial partner when suffering from low self esteem is an uphill battle, at best.

As well, a nasty side effect of having low self esteem is the uncanny ability to find love in all the wrong ways and places. Think about it: how many times have you given parts of yourself to another in the hopes that they’d love you in return? Unfortunately, many people with low self esteem admit that they have.

In a way, low self esteem in a dating relationship becomes a sort of a push-pull: the person suffering from low self esteem has convinced themselves that they aren’t lovable, yet attempts are made to get the person they are dating to try and prove otherwise. This is a potentially self-defeating, demoralizing and damaging state of affairs, and one that may repeat until the person afflicted chooses to do something about it.

Imagine yourself as a Dart Board. Everything and everyone else around you may become Dart Pins, at one point or another. These dart pins will tear down your self esteem and pull you down in ways you won’t even remember. Don’t let them destroy you, or get the best of you. So which dart pins should you dodge?

Dart Pin #1 : Negative Work Environment
Beware of “dog eat dog” theory where everyone else is fighting just to get ahead. This is where non-appreciative people usually thrive. No one will be grateful for your contributions even if you miss lunch and dinner, and stay up late. Most of the time you work too much without getting help from people concerned. Stay out of this; it will ruin your self esteem. Competition is at stake anywhere. Be healthy enough to compete, but in a healthy competition that is.

Dart Pin #2: Other People’s Behavior
Bulldozers, brown nosers, gossipmongers, whiners, backstabbers, snipers, people walking wounded, controllers, naggers, complainers, exploders, patronizers, sluffers… all these kinds of people will pose bad vibes for your self esteem, as well as to your self improvement scheme.

Dart Pin #3: Changing Environment
You can’t be a green bug on a brown field. Changes challenge our paradigms. It tests our flexibility, adaptability and alters the way we think. Changes will make life difficult for awhile, it may cause stress but it will help us find ways to improve our selves. Change will be there forever, we must be susceptible to it.

Dart Pin #4: Past Experience
It’s okay to cry and say “ouch!” when we experience pain. But don’t let pain transform itself into fear. It might grab you by the tail and swing you around. Treat each failure and mistake as a lesson.

Dart Pin #5: Negative World View
Look at what you’re looking at. Don’t wrap yourself up with all the negativities of the world. In building self esteem, we must learn how to make the best out of worst situations.

Dart Pin #6: Determination Theory
The way you are and your behavioral traits is said to be a mixed end product of your inherited traits (genetics), your upbringing (psychic), and your environmental surroundings such as your spouse, the company, the economy or your circle of friends. You have your own identity. If your father is a failure, it doesn’t mean you have to be a failure too. Learn from other people’s experience, so you’ll never have to encounter the same mistakes.

Building self esteem will eventually lead to self improvement if we start to become responsible for who we are, what we have and what we do. Its like a flame that should gradually spread like a brush fire from inside and out. When we develop self esteem, we take control of our mission, values and discipline. Self esteem brings about self improvement, true assessment, and determination. So how do you start putting up the building blocks of self esteem? Be positive. Be contented and happy. Be appreciative. Never miss an opportunity to compliment. A positive way of living will help you build self esteem, your starter guide to self improvement.

A person’s worth in this world is estimated according to the value they put on themselves.

A person with a low self-esteem, does not mean you can not become a self-esteem person, that is a personality type of confident, warm, optimistic. Of course you can with a strong desire, to open yourself in the community, read a lot to widen your knowledge

# Face your fear. All things that are not we know it makes us afraid and feel inferior. But trust me, fear is only there in our thoughts and reflection. Basically, will not as bad as we think.

# Don’t drown in your failure. Before reach success must have through a failure. Failure of the past, therefore don’t drown in your failure, but avoid making the same mistake, then you will become wiser and stronger.

Know what you want. Whatever you want you must clearly know. So its clear how well the efforts that you can do to reach it. Knowledge about what you want to achieve, to make you believe more that it can be achieved.

Speak, do not assumes. We often make an assumption that a person or situation is really bad. The wrong assumption will make you fell. To speak and get the answers will make you calm.

Failure? The most important do not feel lose. Failure is normal. The most important is how we do not feel defeated, but just learn to reverse the situation.

Appreciate your self if you reach success. Many people forget to appreciate their self, because of feel inferior, or because not grateful, both leave a negative aura on yourself. Appreciate what you have achieve will make other people appreciate it too, and you certainly more motivated to reach what was better.