Do you approve of yourself – or do you seek the approval of others? When we lack confidence and in particular have low self esteem, we find ourselves needing the approval of others to feel good about ourselves.

Unfortunately, in this day and age of being over worked and under valued, the approval of others may be slow to happen. Saying “well done” or “thank you” doesn’t seem to common language in modern society – and how often do you say such things to others?

Being self critical is an easy habit to get into, and forms the basis of our needing approval from others. The root of our self criticism is usually being at the receiving end of criticism from others as we grow up. I like the expression that “criticism is negative feedback badly delivered”. Constantly receiveing messages like “you’re too slow/stupid/bad/ugly/…” etc leads to us believing that this is a reality. [Read more…]