Learn how to stop getting darts thrown at you everyday
So how do you stay calm, composed and maintain your self-esteem when everyone around you is fire fighting?
Article by Diane Shawe MEd
Here are six tips you may wish to consider as a starting point.
Imagine yourself standing around as a Dart Board.
Now take a look around and see who has most recently thrown their dart at you. What would you actually do if you saw a dart coming towards you? Would you just stand there and take the hit, run for cover or protect yourself whilst your on the move? Without protection these dart will destroy your self-esteem and pull you down. So which dart pins should you avoid?
Dart Pin 1: Negative Work Environment
Beware of “dog eat dog” theory where everyone else is fighting just to get ahead. This is where non-appreciative people usually thrive. No one will appreciate your contributions even if you miss lunch and dinner, and stay up late. Most of the time you get to work too much without getting help from people concerned. Stay out of this, it will ruin your self-esteem. Competition is at stake anywhere. Be healthy enough to compete, but in a healthy competition that is.
Dart Pin 2: Other People’s Behaviour
Bulldozers, gossipmongers, whiners, backstabbers, snipers, people walking wounded, controllers, naggers, complainers, exploders, patronisers, jealousy… all these kinds of people will pose bad vibes for your self-esteem, as well as to your self-improvement scheme.
Dart Pin 3: Stale or Stagnant Environment
You can’t be a green bug on a brown field. Changes challenge our paradigms. It tests our flexibility, adaptability and alters the way we think. Change can either inspire, motivate or be stressful when we resist but, only for a while. It is said that a change is as good as a rest, it will help you find ways to improve your self. The world has changed right in front of our eyes, we must be susceptible to it.
Dart Pin 4: Past Experience
It’s okay to cry and say “ouch!” when we experience pain. But don’t let pain transform itself into fear, spite or vengeance. It might grab you by the tail and swing you around. Treat each painful experience, failure and mistake as a lesson. Stop and reflect and see what message you have been given or taught. Decide how you can best use that experience to help you grow.
Dart Pin 5: Negative Biosphere
Look at what you’re looking at, absorbing and ingesting daily. Self-reflection. Don’t wrap yourself up with all the negativeness of the world. In building self-esteem, you must learn how to make the best out of most situations. How to separate who and what you are and how to repair and protect your self-esteem. If you cut yourself, you would normally seek to clean the wound, cover it with a plaster until it heals, check it and then when it is much better remove the plaster. If it’s a serious cut you would normally seek professional help. Seek out the tools that can help lift you out of a negative mind set.
Dart Pin 6: Fait accompli
It’s not always your fault. It does not always happen to you. The way you are and your behavioral traits is said to be a mixture of your inherited traits (genetics), your upbringing (learnt), and your environmental surroundings such as your family, spouse, your job, the economy or your circle of friends. You have your own identity. If your father was a failure, it doesn’t mean you have to believe that your going to be a failure too. Learn from other people’s experience, so you can avoid or recognise mistakes and old patterns in advance.
In life, it’s hard to stay tough or unscathed especially when things and people around you keep pulling you down. Constantly firefighting without the right tools means you could continuously become burnt out.
There are three tools you need to keep polished:
Nothing like a good dose of positive attitude
a) Your attitude,
b) Your behaviour
c) Your way of thinking.
Building self-esteem means we take responsibility for who we are, what we have and what we do. We become clear about our mission, values all of which aids self-discipline. You can start right away by thinking more positively, look for more things to be appreciative about and never miss an opportunity to compliment either yourself or others.
Building your self-esteem is essential for confidence and success and it all begins with you. Of all the judgments you make in life, none is as important as the one you make about yourself. Without some measure of self-worth life can be enormously painful. If you want to discover some simple techniques that will dramatically change how you feel about yourself such as how to recognise the importance of learning self-acceptance and nurturing your sense of self, take a look at our On Demand Course Directory and how you can start your own Private Tutors Business or create your own Directory. Click here for more information.
Diane previously spent six years working for the Department of Trade and Industry working with bodies that award funding to business start-ups. In this presentation she will share six ways to raise finance for your company without resorting to banks – important guidance in this period of economic constraint.
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