Tuesday, January 15, 2008

Enhancing your self-esteem for a happier life


Self Esteem: It's All About Accepting and Forgiving Yourself

Society today has changed a lot. From the time we are born we are expected to look good and fit good in the society. If you think, you will notice that what you believe in is because of the influence of many sources. The ads always portray beautiful models wearing the latest fashion. There will be similar ads for weight loss, beauty products etc.

From the beginning itself , you believe you lack things. You think you don’t have good clothes, good money, car, property, friends – to name just a few. You are conditioned to think that nothing is right in your life and this is why most of believe that you are incomplete.

Just think about what these commercials try to do. They make us fee inadequate. By portraying beautiful people in their ads, they make us feel inadequately happy and entice us to use their products. It is this strategy of making us feel unhappy, poor, fat that they resort to make their targets meet.

Think about the intentions of the fashion magazines. They are full of ads and articles telling you about diet, health products, clothes and beauty products. They want you to believe that buying all the products will make you more beautiful and happy.

It is expected that each one us be perfect. This is what we are taught to be right from our childhood. And this is why many of us have low self esteem and this causes us to fail.

This affects those who are at a delicate stage in their life – the teenagers. The diets and models that these fashion magazines show, influence a lot of teenagers to adopt to harsh food regimes.

Marketing companies have brilliant people with them. They exactly know the pattern of what we watch, buy, what influences us, the spending patterns and more. It is through repeated ads that they make our minds attracted to them. The information that they communicate through ads forms a firm belief in our minds and we buy their products. This is how the advertising programs function as an agent to brainwash all.

The idea of fun for many is to have beer. Wrinkles make you look old, so there’s a wrinkle cream you could use. A credit card is what you have and this means that you are rich.

Is this all true? No. But the companies try their best to convince you. They are trying to push their products to you. Once you start believing in what they say, you will buy their products and get addicted to them. Thereby, you help in making advertisements successful.

The reality shows like “What you should not wear” and “20 years younger” further make us feel that unless we look young, we wont be acceptable and attractive enough.

Think deeply if you need any of those beauty products. Don’t compare yourself to those models. If you see them without makeup in real life, you would find that not all of them are actually pretty.

Having an American Express card doesn’t mean that you have lot of money. But the companies want you to believe so and thereby entice you to increase your spending patterns.

It will be very difficult to have a high self esteem when so many agents attack you repeatedly only to tell you that you are not good enough. Advertisements continuously bombard us and make us fee inadequate until we use their products. How to not get influenced by them is a big challenge.

First, see as less media as possible. When you watch keep in mind the movie of the advertiser. Many want you to be aware of the pain you till now have not felt. Hence, they will make you want their products.

Accept yourself as you are. The models you watch on TV are not perfect as they are portrayed. They are doing a job for their livelihood.
Forgive the mistakes you committed in the past. Everyone does that and it is human to err. Do not feel bad about making mistakes, learn from them and move on in life.

Do not hold grudge against society for its beliefs and lies it has thrust on you. You are the way you are and there is nothing wrong in acknowledging it. Find out what is the best for you, what suits you the most and go for it.

Measuring yourself is good, but the parameters that you use must be valid to you and not to the society only. You may be fat, but you may be ate ease with yourself because you do a lot of social work. You may not have the looks of a model, but you do a lot of good work and you are loving and caring towards your family.

Think about the factors that make people like you and praise you. See if you also see yourself as they see you. Try to acknowledge the person they look at and have a persona similar to what they expect and make an attempt to love yourself.

No comments: