Self-Esteem & Making Peace With Yourself

Until you make peace with who you are, you’ll never be content with what you have. -- Doris Mortman

Doris Mortman hits the nail on the head. How can we be happy or content with what we have if we are unhappy or dissatisfied with ourselves? Time and again it has been proven that money does not buy happiness. A big house, fancy car, luxurious furnishings cannot fill a void that is inside of us due to not being at peace with ourselves. If I am not happy with what I see in the mirror each morning and there are things I can do – actions I can take – to improve my opinion of myself then I need to do those things. Equally important is accepting the limitations and being at peace with what you cannot change. We all cannot be a size 4, or have beautiful wrinkle-free skin, or have the resilient 25 year old bodies of our past when we are say 45 and beyond. If I could will away the grey hairs and crow’s feet I would but I can’t. Mona, my hairdresser, takes care of the gray hairs – that’s how I deal with those pesky fellows. But the crow’s feet I have just learned to accept. I am at peace with them and as they increase in number I will have to keep that peace – or drink more wine until they blur together into smoothness. No, no, just kidding. But honestly, I have to decide what is important to me in order for me to be at peace. If I want to feel better about myself physically or emotionally – if I want to improve my self-confidence and opinion of myself it is within myself that I have to search and where I have to find that happy balance. No thing is going to make that happen.

Sitting in a nice, comfy chair in my family room watching a movie on a high definition television isn’t going to fix something that is off-balance inside of me. It may distract me from it for a bit but it will still be there waiting when the credits run across the screen at the end. Jetting off on a vacation to the tropics will be a nice escape for a week and might even be a great time but the escape is only temporary – you can’t run from your problems. If you don’t like how you look or the way you interact with others – if you are physically or emotionally deficient or unhappy you need to fix from the inside what can be fixed or improved upon and accept or come to terms with those things you may not have control over.

We often seek comfort in things – a good book, a movie, a nap on the couch, a trip away, a shopping spree at the mall. All of these things can be fun, comforting and good things but they are not solutions or substitutes for what is lacking or hurting or incomplete inside of us. If we don’t feel good about ourselves the answer is not in the cookie jar or the movie theater or a glass of wine. It is inside our souls – and a good look at why we are lacking in self-esteem is required to get to that feel-good feeling again.

When I look in the mirror I am at peace with myself. My face wears the battle scars of age and too much sun - the uneven skin tone, the age spots, the occasional blemish that I thought I left behind in my teens and the fine and not so fine lines that I like to say give me character. I am certainly thankful for products that help mask these imperfections but I am also at peace with them. They are reminders of a life lived. That little bit of extra skin on my tummy that I can’t seem to firm up no matter what I do I look at as a gift – okay, that’s a bit of a stretch, it is not a gift – but it is sort of a souvenir of my two pregnancies. How’s that for finding peace? That silver lining? Really, that smushy little spot is worth it – I’ve got two incredible kids. I often joke that I’m a Picasso painting (from his cubism days) for my eyes are truly two different sizes (subtle but ‘tis true), my ears are at different heights on my head (those sunglass frames weren’t bent like I thought), my nose has a noticeable bump in the middle – a result of a childhood accident playing tag and my hair, well, it kind of does whatever it wants once I put the curl into it. I do my best with what I’ve got and am at peace – even on the ‘bad’ days. A little self-deprecation can go a long way. I don’t worry when I walk into a room at a party or step up onto a platform to speak that someone is whispering about how I look for that does not define who I am. All that superficial stuff is of little importance to who we are although we do need to be comfortable in our own skin – whether it’s tight and supple or a little saggy and in need of some moisturizer. Whether we choose to look like we stepped out of a magazine every day or make people wonder if we even showered that day. However and whoever you choose to be you need to be comfortable and happy with yourself in every way possible.

When I feel good about myself I smile more, I laugh more, I look people in the eye, I am more confident in my speech and with my presence. I project a good feeling, a positive attitude. It is so much easier to face my day when I do so liking myself - what I look like, who I am, where I am on a given day, how I feel inside. I feel it is my responsibility to find my own happiness, to make a good life for me and those I love and I can’t imagine being able to do that if I didn’t first feel good about myself.

How good do you feel about yourself? How do you express that?