How taking the right actions increases your self-esteem…

Whatever actions we take in our day-to-day lives have subtle messages attached to them. These messages are not often perceived consciously, and yet they are of great importance because they are messages that we send to ourselves.

For example, when you see an attractive woman woman who you feel compelled to speak to but resist approaching out of fear, you are sending a clear message to yourself that you do not have the courage to take the actions you desire.

Equally, if you start a conversation with a woman you’re attracted to but you skirt around the issue of being attracted to her rather than being upfront and honest about it, you’re telling yourself that you don’t have the balls to say exactly what’s on your mind.

Consistently taking the actions that you perceive to be ‘safe’ rather than acting in alignment with your desires is actually an act of self-sabotage. Again and again you are telling yourself on a subtle level, ‘I’m not good enough,’ and soon enough you’ll start to feel it, whether it’s true or not.

You might not walk around thinking to yourself ‘I’m not good enough,’ you might even carry the thought ‘I am good enough.’ But just below the surface there is a feeling of low self-worth, a not-so-great feeling that’s with you most of the time. The more you take actions that are out of alignment with what you truly desire the more you solidify this feeling and the more you become rooted in low self-esteem.

What on a surface level appears to be protective is on a deeper level fundamentally corrosive.

You don’t approach the woman or express how you really feel as a protection mechanism to keep yourself safe from rejection, not realising that in doing so you’re condemning yourself to failure every time. And worse still, you’re condemning yourself to feelings of low self-esteem, as determined by your own choice not to act.

What other people say about you and even what you say about yourself will never have the same impact on your self-esteem as the choices you make and the actions you take. Thoughts and words just represent theories, but the decisions you take give you your direct experience of reality. If the decisions you make tell you every time that ‘you’re not good enough,’ you have no choice but to feel it’s true.

If you see this clearly you should also see that the opposite also applies. Just as opting out of acting in alignment with your desires inflicts upon you feelings of low self-worth, so too does opting to act in alignment with your desires create feelings of high self-worth.

What’s more, consistent actions that are in alignment with your desires create high self-esteem regardless of the outcomes of those actions. Just acting in alignment with your desires once isn’t enough, it needs to be consistent.

For example, if on just one occasion you decide to approach the woman you’re attracted to but the rest of the time you ignore your feelings out of fear, you are still sending yourself the wrong message the majority of the time. Furthermore, on just one occasion the cost of dealing with a ‘negative’ response to your action might outweigh the benefit of taking that action.

However, if you decide that you are going to take the action consistently, you will be consistently sending yourself such positive feedback about how you feel about yourself that any negative responses you get will be wholly insignificant. As mentioned previously, what others say about you or what you say about yourself can never have as big an impact on your self-esteem as the messages that you send back to yourself through your decisions and actions.

Opting to act in alignment with your desires consistently means consistently affirming that ‘you are good enough’ through your actions. This creates a tidal wave of good feelings about yourself that is lived and felt experientially.

The massive and overwhelming impact of acting in alignment with your desires consistently will dramatically outweigh any occasional ‘negative’ outcomes that can arise as a result of your actions. The odd rejection here and there will do nothing to detract from your self-esteem in the face of sending yourself the right message again and again by taking consistent action.

If you recognise this clearly, the idea of acting in alignment with your desires no longer becomes a choice, instead it becomes what you must do. For inaction is nothing more than a never-ending spiral downward, and acting upon your desires consistently has such an overwhelmingly positive impact on your self-esteem that it overrides the currents of fear and perceived failure for good.

It’s a no-brainer, act upon your desires and create higher and higher levels of self-esteem.

As a new years resolution, why not pick three desires that you’re going to act upon consistently for 2013? By the end of the year you’ll be a changed man!

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