Cut out the things that lower your self-esteem today

When was the last time you did something that made you feel worse about yourself for having done it?

You keep saying you’ll stop smoking, but you do it, and you always feel awful when you do. You can smell it on your fingers.

Perhaps, you’re super-sensitive to caffeine like me, and yet you still continue to drink coffee, even though it makes you grouchy and angry and anxious.

We’re human. We do things that we rationalise as good or pleasurable in the short-term, but that make us feel worse overall.

We do things that lower our self-esteem.

And then we’re sad and anxious, and the first thing we do is ruminate on what’s wrong with us. Or we see Mr Therapist. Or we do more of the very thing that makes us feel worse.

My point here is simple, and, most of all, it’s a message for me.

Do you want the best for yourself?

Are you sure?

You know, with all your vices, and short-term little pleasures, and confused little luxuries, the impression I get is that right now, you don’t.

You do not want the best for yourself.

That’s pretty normal. You’re human, and humans get lost. We forget that we deserve to want — and have — the best. We often need to be reminded that we must be aware, continually, of what is for the best.

This starts with cutting out those things that lower your self-esteem.

You know what they are.

What makes you feel crappy after you do them?

What brings you shame, even if it’s just a twinge?

What makes you more anxious, jittery, sweaty, or avoidant of others?

Yes. That thing. That pernicious little thing that’s 30% pleasure and 70% tragedy.

Then stop.

Stop.

If you can’t stomach total abstinence, treat yourself here and there. But if that leads to the same old habits again, you will need to quit entirely.

There is no more time for excuses. By then you’ll be on your death bed. Complaining and regretting about how you should have lived.

And then you’ll be dead.

Use every trick you can to boost your self-esteem. It starts here.

Take the advantage.

Don’t try and ‘fix’ or ‘accept’ your low sense of self. You don’t need to read another book or meditate three hours-a-day.

You do need to change what you do.

And you need to do it while you turn your attention to achieving incredible things. To your version of tremendous success.

Start with the low-hanging fruit. Then move on to those things that are affecting your well-being the most. Cut out what isn’t good for you. It’s as simple as that.

Quit cold turkey. All of them. Withdrawals? You’re worried about withdrawals when the alternative is feeling continually awful?

You’re going to have to suck it up and quit.

For many of us, we’ve been wrapped up in these habits for so long, we don’t even know what it’s like to feel truly alive, free and happy.

We can be there tomorrow.

Annoyed that Frank seems to get no hangovers, and yet you feel like a horse’s arse for several days?

You can’t compare yourself to others like that. You need to do what’s best for you. Why?

Because you care, don’t you?

You want the very best for yourself, and you want it in abundance.

It’s not about what your friends do. Your friends are not friends who can’t accept your need to improve.

What’s better, short-term pleasure and impressing your friends followed by low self-esteem, or long-term happiness and abundance, but forsaking those little hits of pleasure and losing a couple of friends?

Be real here.

Quit what isn’t needed.

Yes, that thing. Those things.

Make a list right now and knock them off this week.

Focus next on what’s even better.

Feeling calm, proud, alive, excited and present.

That’s the foundation on which to build something incredible.

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What makes you come alive?