Does Your Low Self Esteem Make Dating Difficult?

Having good self-esteem is oftentimes much more difficult than it seems. With media pressures and the consistently busy flow of life, working on achieving great self-esteem can appear to be impossible.

This article examines the causes of poor self-esteem, why women have low self esteem in particular, how to combat it and how to look after your relationship when you are suffering with self esteem issues.

The Top 5 Causes of Poor Self Esteem

5 – Childhood bullies. When you’re a child, habits and attitudes that you begin to develop tend to stick for your lifetime (though they can be changed). Like learning how to tie your shoes, repetitive behaviors ultimately embed themselves into your mind. In the same way, these bullies’ negative impressions of you cement themselves into your psyche and contribute to the demise of your self esteem.

4 – Being directionless. Having a lack of personal goals in your life can be a major factor in one’s complete lack of or poor self esteem. With nothing to aim for you have not set yourself achievable ambitions to enable you to congratulate and reward yourself.

3 – Negative attitudes. If you constantly maintain a negative attitude in your day to day life, then it is no wonder how you can develop a low self esteem. Negativity is contagious and will linger for a lifetime. Similarly to having been bullied, negative attitudes can become a constant state if you just reiterate them.

2 – Dysfunctional relationships. If you are in a relationship that is wacky and rocky, then this can produce really negative effects on your self esteem. Nasty comments from fights or cheating can knock you down and keep you down if you stay with someone who doesn’t treat you well.

And the biggest factor responsible for producing low self esteem is…

1 – Social media. This internet culture and that of the wealthy celebrity lifestyle is all over our social media pages which can often come with a variety of complications. With influencers everywhere we turn, promoting their products, wealth, health and beauty we are constantly reminded of how our lives should be through a rose-tinted phone screen.

Why do women, in particular, suffer from low self-esteem?

Thinking about what I noted just above, many women would agree that societal pressures dictating that they must look, dress and act a certain way is the fundamental reason why they suffer from low self esteem. If you are in a relationship with a woman (and ladies if you’re reading this you need to go ahead and tell your partner) then you need to be reassuring, empowering and respectful. The differences you see between where you are and where famous person may be reinforcing many a negative outlook on one’s own life. But a woman’s potential should never be hindered despite their size, income or lifestyle.

How to Combat Poor Self Esteem

The haters going to hate. Seriously, they are, no matter how hard you try to fight against them. But the first step to becoming more positive about yourself and maintaining good self esteem is to ignore them. Those bullies that I mentioned before have nothing to hurt you with if you no longer listen or care about their comments. Remaining upbeat can be tricky but once mastered can have some amazing benefits. Becoming unapologetically you and forgetting about what others think or say can help you focus on what is really important to you.

How to Look After Your Relationship When You are Suffering from Self Esteem Issues

Relationships can really suffer when one of the two people has low self esteem. With low self esteem comes low self worth and with little self worth comes paranoia. No partner wants to have their electronic devices checked for illicit messages implicating them as a cheat but most certainly not when they are innocent. Being aware of this path to paranoia is critical if you have low self esteem and are in a relationship. Ensuring that you work towards valuing yourself more is the best way to maintain your relationship while combating any negativity that is thrown your way.

Remembering that how you view yourself plays a large factor into how you construct notions of your own self esteem. Good or bad self esteem begins life from within yourself and if you want to start being more positive, you’ve got to put the effort in and you have to want to make a change. No matter how many nice comments someone can give you, poor self esteem will always fester within unless you opt to change it. Giving into the vice of feeling sorry for yourself will only ever end up destroying your relationships and ultimately making your self esteem even lower. Though it works to support developments in your self esteem, you cannot only rely on your partner to get your self esteem up with flowers, smiles and compliments.