One of the most fascinating things about Self-Esteem is that there is a group of people – usually very successful – who do have a Self-Esteem problem, but don’t recognise it.

Then there are the people who know very definitely that they struggle in this arena.

Regarding the former group who are very successful, I see these people in my office all the time.

They are fulfilled and successful in their work and they are making money and they have immense skills in this area but the skills and the success and the confidence that they have at many levels masks the lack of Self-Esteem underlying the success.

They come out of the meeting or a conflict situation or a negotiation that has been difficult and they’ve handled it well but there is a tightness and an anxiety and a noticing of aspects where they weren’t particularly skilful. The anxiety and the tension and the perfectionism reflects a lack of Self-Esteem. What further reflects this are the ruminations about what just happened.

You know those dialogues in your head, “I should have said this, I missed that, damn I could have said that better…”

This reflects a debilitating perfectionism, always having to be better. What you have just done is not good enough. [Read more…]