The Fallacy of Self-esteem

When I was in middle school, we had assemblies on "creating good self-esteem". We would get worksheets where we listed what we liked about ourselves. They would send us home with handouts for the parents that listed things to say to your children like "You're terrific!" and "Great job!". It was all an effort to make us feel good about ourselves. Despite these assemblies and handouts, I had peers committing suicide, getting pregnant in high school, and abusing drugs. I remember talking to my mom about having low self-esteem and she SHOCKED me by basically saying that self-esteem wasn't important...She said that as far as she could tell, it was CONTRARY to God's plan that we have good self-esteem.

She didn't mean we shouldn't love ourselves or anything like that. I have thought about this a lot and she was SO RIGHT! Christ teaches us that the first commandment is to love God and the second is to love our fellow man. Never does he mention self-esteem except to say that we should love others as ourselves. Oh how tricky is Satan and his philosophies of men. While we were all trying to develop good self-esteem, we were neglecting higher priorities like service to others and obedience to God's commandments. Things that naturally lead to good self-esteem...because we then understand that we are God's children and that we can do all things in Christ. We were being taught that self-esteem can be created through pretty words and that EVERYONE was "thumb-body". Everyone is valued, but we need to live our lives with PURPOSE. We have work to do. And that work will bring value and confidence to ourselves and our children.

Now that my daughter is in middle school, I find myself worrying about her self-esteem...but I shouldn't. I should worry about how she esteems God and others. If she esteems them as high or higher than herself, she will NATURALLY have good self-esteem. She will know that she is a daughter of God and she will work hard because of the love she feels for Him and her fellow man. And it won't matter that someone in class teased her or she doesn't have the right shoes or the designer blue jeans.

What do you think? Does self-esteem seem contrary to happiness?

I just found this very interesting post on a similar train of thought here. Interestingly, it was written about a week after I first penned my post...Great minds think alike. Ha ha. J/K. That was just my narcissism talking from all those years of self-esteem training.

Insufficiency and Faith

Rachel and I and her twins back at Christmas time.

T gave a great talk on the atonement this past Sunday. It's really had me thinking this week. One of her main points was that many LDS women suffer from feelings of inadequacy and compare themselves to others to the point that they really don't believe they are good enough for the atonement to truly apply to them. This has been one of my greatest struggles as well. I wish we wouldn't compare our weaknesses to the strengths of others!!! We should not get discouraged at our inability to save ourselves...it's a universal truth that we cannot do it! It was part of our Heavenly Father's plan from the very beginning. It is the reason we needed a Savior. To ignore our need for the Savior by attempting to perfect ourselves will only drive a wedge between us and God!

It is simple for me to spout off words of wisdom when listening to the problems of others, but I am incapable of seeing the solutions to my own problems clearly. I remind myself of the cartoon verson of Alice in Wonderland when she said, "I often give myself very good advice, but I very seldom follow it." I cannot seem to help being emotionally connected to every decision I try to make. I ignore logic. I am plagued by fears that I refuse to give up. My pet fears. For example, I have a completely irrational fear of calling people on the phone.

"Feed your faith and your fears will starve to death." I am not sure who said that, but I believe it. "And if ye believe these things, see that ye do them." (That was King Benjamin in the book of Mosiah) So why is it so hard to do the things that we believe? That would be workings of the father of all lies, Satan himself. He feeds us little lies and half-truths such as "you are lazy" or "you lack self-discipline" or "you aren't as good as s0-and-so" or "you can never change" or "you aren't worth it." And he has plenty of reasons to work against my family right now. For starters, Paul and I are in the process of getting all our paperwork in order so we can be sealed together. For seconders (yes, I made that word up), we are exploring the ever-so-emotionally-draining world of adoption. For thirders (that one, too), we are STILL hashing out a new visitation order with Ellie's dad. Combined with taking a major leap of faith and trying AGAIN to get Paul self-employed, I am in constant need of spiritual nourishment.


The past few months, I have been listening to my Book of Mormon on the I-pod while getting ready for work. It's made a tremendous difference in my days. Yesterday the outlet in my bathroom died so I didn't get to listen to the scriptures(or blowdry my hair, for that matter, but that's a different problem). Anyway, I had a big fight with Paul last night (don't worry, we made up) and I am certain that the two are related (neglecting my scriptures, not my hair)! My point is, what was my point? Oh yeah, I am in constant need of spiritual nourishment! And I cannot save myself. I can't and you can't. We are like small children to our Father in Heaven. And just like children, we try to "do it myself!!". We are commanded to be like a little child, but it is the asking for help and the meekness that we should strive for, not the throwing of tantrums and pouting and whining.

Doing our best really is good enough. And our best doesn't look anything like our neighbor's best. Let's all remember that and allow the Atonement of Christ to bring us peace and joy even in the simple problems of our lives!