The three simple rules to increase self esteem

The three simple rules to increase self esteem


Dr. Alan Zimmerman an admired colleague has inspired me to write this article. Some of the concepts are his and I believe you will find them very useful as I did.

"You are what you repeatedly do. Excellence is not an event - it is a habit."Aristotle, 4th Century BC Greek philosopherA while ago, Dr. Zimmerman heard a speech by Lou Holtz, one of the most successful football coaches of all time. He was speaking to a large audience on the topics of success and performance, and during his speech, he said something very important: "The most important thing I can tell you is to believe in you. Have faith in yourself." In fact, he said the secret to his success as a coach ... and the secret to his teams' winning many games ... was self-esteem. The more he built the players' self-esteem, the better they did. The better they did, the happier they were. And that makes total sense to me. For years, I've made it a point to talk about this topic: "You act on a daily basis exactly as you see yourself." If you see yourself as mediocre, you'll do mediocre work. But if you see yourself as gifted and confident, you will do good or excellent work day after day.

During a meeting with the employees of a client company, the subject of self esteem came up.
We asked the positive employees to adopt a negative employee, so that change could come from within. We made clear, though, that before you can adopt a negative person, you first have to look at yourself in a mirror and you must work with the person in the mirror.
And managers must concentrate in building self esteem in their employees, rather than destroying their self esteem with destructive criticism or with feedback given the wrong way.
So how can you see yourself more positively? Or how can you raise your self-esteem ... and thereby your effectiveness in every part of your life? For starters, you have to follow 3 simple rules for your life, your work, and your relationships. Follow these 3 simple rules and you will have a strong, powerful, positive self-esteem. 1. Do the right thing.Your self-esteem grows when you know in your heart what is right and DO it. As Lou Holtz would say, "This first rule is not real complicated. Do what's right. Don't do what's wrong. And if you have any questions, ask yourself, "what would my mother think if she read in tomorrow's newspaper how I handled this situation"
It doesn't matter if you call it business ethics or personal values; you've got to do what is right. There is no way you can feel good about yourself if you do what you know is wrong. It's a simple rule ... even though it may not always be an easy rule. As the saying goes, "Opportunity may knock once, but temptation bangs on your front door forever." So choose your actions wisely.2. Do the best you can.Don't accept anything less than the best from yourself. Like rule #1, there is no way you can feel good about yourself if you only the minimum or turn in work that is barely good enough to meet the expectations and standards of your industry. You've got to do the best you can. When you do that, you reap all the benefits of peace, joy, and self-esteem. As author Pearl S. Buck noted almost a century ago, "The secret of joy in work is contained in one word -- excellence. To know how to do something well is to enjoy it."And the great American President Abraham Lincoln lived by that principle. He said, "I do the very best I know how ... the very best I can; and I mean to keep doing so until the end. Do the best you can ... even though you are bound to face obstacles. People with high self-esteem ... or people trying to build their self-esteem ... find a way to work around those obstacles. They do what they have to do, one way or another. They don’t find an excuse every day. Such was the case with Peter Falk. At the age of 3, he lost an eye as the result of a grave medical condition, and from there on out, he wore a glass eye. But he didn't walk around the back corridors of his school, with his hand over his eye, hoping no one would see him. No, he became president of his senior class and one of the school's outstanding baseball players. In fact, one time when he slid into third base and the umpire called him out, Falk took out his glass eye and said, "Here, you can use another eye." That was very funny indeed. After high school, Falk went on to acting in a local community theatre. But his really "big break" came when he got a call from Columbia Pictures, asking him to come to Hollywood for a screen test. It was very exciting, but he didn’t make it. An executive said, "For his price, I can get can actor with two eyes." The strange thing is ... no one remembers which two-eyed actor Columbia Pictures signed instead. But millions remember Peter Falk from Broadway, TV, and the movies, for which he received two Oscar nominations. I also think of him often since Colombo was one of my favorite shows when I was growing up. Despite his so-called "obstacles," Falk always lived by this second rule. He did the best he could ... making his success a foregone conclusion. And the same rule applies to you. 3. Treat other people the way they would like to be treated.
Notice that I said treat other people the way they would like to be treated. I didn't say treat other people the way you like to be treated. The former is called the golden rule and I have always thought that rule is wrong. The rule I am recommending here is the platinum rule. You might have masochistic tendencies and love for people to treat you badly and because of that, you have no right to treat others as you would like to be treated. So, the golden rule is no good. The platinum rule is the one that works. You show me a person who treats others badly, and I'll show you an insecure, unproductive person with poor self-esteem. You cannot treat anybody ... and I do mean anybody ... badly and feel good about yourself.As someone once said, "The way we treat people we think can't help or hurt us (like housekeepers, waiters, and secretaries), tells more about our character than how we treat people we think are important. People who are honest, kind, and fair only when there's something to gain shouldn't be confused with people of real character who demonstrate these qualities habitually, under all circumstances. Character is not a fancy coat we put on for show. It's who we really are."I agree. Treat people with respect, and you will respect yourself. George Washington Carver knew about that. Despite all the racial hatred that surrounded him, he became one of the world's foremost botanical researchers in the 1900's as well as one of the most respected men of his time. His moral philosophy was all about this third rule of self-esteem. He said, "No individual has any right to come into this world and go out of it without leaving behind him distinct and legitimate reasons for having passed through it. How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving, and tolerant of the weak and strong. Because someday in life you will have been all of these."Live by these 3 rules. Work by these 3 rules. And you will have a strong self-esteem. Guaranteed. And you will see your personal productivity increase, maybe even double or triple.