Self-esteem and Balance

I say, that it is impossible to have balance if you have low self-esteem. The scale is always going to tip your life towards extremes.

My grandmother said to me one time when I was 10 years old, "if you lie, you'll steal".  She ran a nursery school and I was hungry one day, so I went into the kitchen and took some crackers off of the shelf and stuffed them in my mouth.  When she asked me if I had taken any,  I said, "No". At that age, I didn't really understand the full context of what she was saying...or that the statement also applied to her as well. I don't think she understood that either.

But, I guess, the phrase could apply to anything in life.  Dishonesty, skews your view of the world so that your ability to gauge what is correct and incorrect becomes blurry.

I know that growing up with a father who drank and a mother who was once impaired by prescription drugs, has had much to do with how I see the world.  Although, I can say it may have had much to do with many of the choices that  I've made in life,  it doesn't have to continue to negatively impact my life.  My life experiences have given me a new knowledge base to work from.  I've grown.

Low self esteem causes me to disregard myself, to lie to myself.  It tells me to remind myself that I'm not important, that I must cater to the needs and desires of the world and the my needs come last.  Because it has scrambled the picture of myself image it has indeed --as my grandmother warned-- caused me to steal.  I have stolen time from my children and from work, wasted opportunities. And sequestered, it seems, anything that I could get to feed my hungry and distorted self image. I've often molded myself to fit into places and situations that I did not belong, to feed (not nurture- there is a difference) relationships that, i did not belong in or --if I had been honest with myself-- did not truly want to be in. 

My self esteem has suffered along with everyone around me. (Just like any miserable person, I was determined that if I was going to hell in a hand basket, everyone else was coming along for the ride).

My self-esteem was relegated to arrogance.  I had the two mixed up and have just recently have begun to develop my ability to distinguish between them.

I practiced people pleasing religiously as if my life depended on it.  It did...then. I've often found myself doing things for people in the name of kindness, committing myself out of guilt and then finding myself angry and resentful not only at myself, but at the person that I committed to. How crazy is that?

For instance, last week I told my supervisor, with guilt standing in the background,  that I would work on this Thursday and realized over the weekend that I would not be able to meet that commitment.  All weekend I drove around thinking about how horrible my "higher ups" at work are and complaining to myself about how they use intimidation to manipulate you into doing their bidding.  But that's not the real problem... Not my issue.

My issue, the real problem is that if  I am not sensitive enough to my own needs;  if I am not in touch with my own motives and what I'm about; if I'm not compassionate enough towards myself to do what is good for me, then I'm going to suffer. And I don't have to...

If I'm honest with myself about what my needs are-- which is difficult for me. Then I don't feel the need to take anything from anyone else.