Components of Self-Esteem

Our relentless battering of ourselves and each other demeans God's purpose and faith in us.  Self-love gives back the message to God that we have understood this gift and will use it wisely and lovingly toward ourselves and our world.

Self-love itself can be further explained physically, mentally, spiritually and emotionally. The physical part of self-love means taking care of our bodies. Rest, proper nutrition, exercise and relaxation naturally make sense to a self-loving person. Harming oneself physically does not even enter a self-loving person's thinking, but instead preventative care is of the utmost importance because a self-loving person is grateful for this gift.

The mental part of self-love means that we cherish the miracle of our brains, another gift given to us by God. A self-loving person knows how much we can achieve if our minds are kept healthy. A self-loving person desires to know their own mind and enhance and expand their mental abilities to master their world. This is what Eve was attempting to do.

Our minds either free us or imprison us. A self-loving mind is not afraid to fail, take risks or be wrong because the safe harbour of being unconditionally loving to ourselves allows us to safely confront our fears. Any negative self-talk keeps us stuck physically and mentally and therefore unable to co-create. A self-loving person replaces the negative and limiting beliefs, attitudes and values with empowering, freeing and wise ones.

The spiritual part of self-love means finding meaning in our lives and our connection to the Universe. To do this, one must learn how to cope by understanding what we are here to do. This takes tenacity, commitment, guidance and faith.

Emotional self-love involves understanding, identifying and expressing emotions in ourselves. As Dorothy Briggs comments in "Your Child's Self-Esteem", expression of feelings must be chosen over repression for emotional well-being. However, we cannot express emotions if we do not know hot to identify them or if we have been misguided into believing that some emotions must be hidden. We often need support to achieve emotional self-love. The act of venting and gaining support, insight and feedback relieves emotional upset and toxic feelings. This frees much needed energy for self-love to be realized. Emotional self-love involves consciously understanding and accepting our vast array of emotions, especially the ones which shame or confuse us. All emotions, but especially the difficult ones, are a signal for us to find out more about ourselves. By understanding who we are and revealing this honestly and appropriately to ourselves and others, we wisely use the gifts we have been given by working on our personal growth.

Emotional and physical self-love also involve having fun, relaxation and rest. When we are physically self-loving, we tend to be more self-loving emotionally, and vice versa.

Mutual respect is built on self-love. We agonize over violence, destruction, corruption, chaos, murder and domination in our world, yet fail to connect this very basic principle: people cannot live harmoniously without inner peace first and inner peace is a result of self-love, physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually.

Excerpt from: "Eve Needed Self-Love Before Eating the Apple", 2005

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