The other day, I caught up with a friend that I used to work with who I haven’t talked to for almost a year. We caught up about our current jobs and how life is going for both of us before we got onto the topic of some of the people we used to work with. I found myself telling her a story of a mutual friend and how that mutual friend had hurt my feelings this past summer. It felt good to talk about it with someone who knew the situation, but I found myself halfway through feeling guilty that I was gossiping about my friend instead of talking directly to her about the challenges I have with our friendship.
I don’t strive to be someone who talks about my friends behind their backs, or who deals with frustrating situations by venting to other people, and as I hung up the phone I found myself immediately feeling down. Acting against what I believe to be integral caused a hit to my self-esteem that impacted the rest of my evening, and left me with a really bad taste in my mouth.
Since that point, I’ve begun to analyze the way my actions impact my overall self-esteem, how I feel about myself, and how my decisions impact my day as a whole.
I think about self-esteem like a cup of water that you can easily fill up, but that you can also easily drain, and there are certain things in your day-to-day life that can have an impact on how full the cup is.
Things like waking up without snoozing, eating a healthy breakfast, having a productive day at work, setting a goal and completing it, and exercising even when you didn’t really feel like it can all fill up the cup. Living with integrity and following through with things that you say you’re going do are also ways to add to your self-esteem cup.
On the other hand, things like ignoring your mom’s phone call, not responding to a friend’s text or an important email will cause your self-esteem cup to slowly drain. Showing up late for a meeting or to meet a friend, and talking about someone behind their back will also act as a drain on your self-esteem.
Each decision you make, every conversation you have, and every piece of food you put in your mouth will all affect your self-esteem in big or small ways throughout your day, leading to how you feel about yourself and your day as a whole.
I think it’s easy to justify doing something like gossiping because everyone does it. If other people are doing it, I can do it too.
I’ve justified my actions, like gossiping, time and time again with this mindset. So and so was doing it, so I did it too. No big deal.
Sure, I can, but at what expense?
The answer is self-esteem.
Of course you can gossip or ignore phone calls or show up late for meetings, but is that who you want to be or how you want to live your life? If the answer is no, you will most certainly feel a drain on your self-esteem from these actions, just like I did after my Skype call with my friend.
The next time you are making a choice between doing something that feels un-integral to who you are as a person and making a decision (potentially the harder decision) that is in line with what you believe in, don’t choose what is easier or more enjoyable in that moment, choose what will fill your self-esteem cup full to the brim!