Self-Esteem - The Most Important Thing You Need To Know

All right, men, welcome back to the mantalk show. Connor Beaton here and today I am going to be sharing with you the single most important thing that you need to understand in order to improve your sense of self worth and your self esteem. Now, I've worked with a lot of men over the years who have lacked self esteem and there are some very real things that can go into not having self esteem, which is going to be a separate conversation. But for today, I want to talk about the single most important thing that you need to know in order to improve your self esteem and help you understand why your self esteem hasn't shifted through all the work that maybe you've done, all the books that you've read, all the programs and courses that maybe you've embarked on. I want to talk about one of the things that is at the very foundation of it that will help you make progress quickly. Before we dive into that, don't forget to hit subscribe to this channel if you are not already subscribed and hit the bell notification so that you get notified when these videos drop and and you can dive into them. All right, with that said, let's talk about the one thing that I think most people don't understand or talk about, which is that when you lack self worth or lacking self worth and lacking self esteem, it actually requires reinforcement. It is not a state that is just consistent and stationary. Right? It actually requires reinforcement. So when you lack a sense of self worth or self esteem and you're like, I'm questioning whether or not I have value in this relationship relationship or whether I'm contributing to my work environment or I don't feel confident about myself, all of that is not.

A consistent state. It's not like you're in this low shitty place all the time lacking self esteem. It's actually that you lack self esteem because of the reinforcement mechanism that creates this lack of self esteem. So let me explain. The reinforcement that happens that continues to reinforce that you don't have very good self esteem or that you lack value or a sense of worth is making decisions and choices that you know are not good for you. That is the mechanism that reinforces a lack of self esteem, a lack of self worth. Again, it is making decisions and choices that you know are not good for you. Every single man that I have ever worked with who lacks self esteem, who lacks a sense of self worth, and this is me included, by the way, when I did not have a very good sense of self esteem and I didn't have a very good sense of self worth. I made terrible decisions. And those terrible decisions reinforced there's something wrong with me. I'm broken. I'm not worthy of this relationship. I'm not good enough. I'm not smart enough. I'm not whatever it is that caused me to lack a sense of self esteem. So that simple mechanism. Because here's the thing that I maybe should just add as like a caveat. Every man that I've ever worked with, he knows the decision that's going to reinforce I don't have good self esteem. I lack confidence, I lack value, I lack worth. And the decision that's going to propel him in a different direction. And so when we make that bad choice, it reinforces the lack of self esteem. And the crazy thing is that every person.

This is the like mind boggling part, okay? And if you're listening to this, I really want you to just like get this part, okay? Every person who lacks self esteem and lacks self worth makes these terrible decisions, Makes these bad decisions. I'm gonna text that woman, I'm gonna spend that money, even though it's gonna stress me out. I'm gonna eat that junk food even though it's gonna make me feel like shit. Every person that lacks worth, lacks self esteem. They, they make these decisions, these poor decisions that reinforce the self esteem with the hope that when they get found out for making that bad decision, that reinforces their self esteem. When they get on the other side of that terrible decision and it's like, oh, catastrophic, right? And you feel terrible again. They are hoping that on the other side of that decision things will be bad enough that you'll finally create the change that you've been looking for. After you get caught, after you get found out, after you've made the bad choice, there's a hope that maybe when it's bad enough, then I'll change. This is the notorious insidious mechanism of self esteem. Not only does it reinforce itself, but it convinces you that the way to change is to make things bad enough that you are forced to do so, right? To make things bad enough that you are forced to change. So there's no way out of that cycle until you realize that it's a choice. Until you realize that making the, you know, making the decision to eat the terrible food, making the decision to text the, you know, the woman that you know you shouldn't be texting, making the decision to act out of integrity, making the decision that erodes your sense of self esteem, making the decision that erodes your sense of worth that that is never going to be a recipe that pulls you in the direction of developing self esteem and value and worth. And so it's in these moments where you have a decision, you have a choice. This is the really important piece about self esteem and self worth that I want you to know. It is predicated off of your choices. Men that have exceptional self esteem, it's not there's anything special about them. It's not that they are better than you, it's not that they're smarter than you. I mean, you know, maybe there's some men with great self esteem that are smarter than us, right? We can definitely. I know that there's dudes that are out there that are smarter than me that have self esteem, but it's not that there's anything unique or special about them. It's simply that when they're faced with that decision, that sort of do I continue to make the decision that reinforces that I lack value and self esteem or do I make the decision that reinforces that I actually appreciate myself, that I like myself, that I have a sense of self worth enough to say no to this thing that I know is bad for me. And I'll give you an example. I was working with a client a couple years ago and he was dating this woman and we were on a call and he had admitted in the past that this relationship and that this woman was not good for him. It was not good for him in any way, shape or form. And I said to him, well, why do you think that you continued to go back to that person? Like, obviously, you know, it's like we can put the obvious things out there, right? The sex was great for them and you know, he was having a good time and you know, they had some closeness and connection. But the reality was, was that she was a tool to reinforce his lack of self esteem, his lack of self worth. And he said, you know, if I really valued myself, I would break up with this person. And I said, okay, great. You just admitted to the thing that you need to do in order to start developing that self worth and self esteem. So self esteem and self worth are predicated and built on the back of decisions that you make that you know are good for you. And it is that simple and it is that freaking hard because when you come up to that inflection point where you can go back to the bad decisions that are going to reinforce that you don't have worth, you don't like yourself, and you're such a piece of garbage and blah, blah, Blah. There's going to be massive resistance towards making the decision that says I am going to choose what I already know is right for me. And so my question for you today is, can you make the choice? Can you make the decision or will you make the decision? Not can you, because I know you can, but will you make the decision that you are already know is good for you? And the question that I want you to write down and do some journaling on in case this is still vague is what decisions and choices do I already know I need to make that are in my best interest that will reinforce my worth, my value and my self esteem? What choices and decisions do I already know I need to make that will reinforce my worth, my value and my sense of self esteem? And I want you to find one or two or three choices and decisions that you have been avoiding and ignoring that you can go and execute on today, tomorrow, this week, immediately that are going to bolster and reinforce your sense of self esteem and self worth. Because those things again, just to really drive this home. Self worth and self esteem are the byproduct of multiple choices that you know are going to lead to better outcomes for you. When you make choices and that reinforce I'm not worthy, I'm not valuable, there's something wrong with me that erodes your self esteem, right? So basically what I'm saying is that your level of self esteem and self worth is predicated off of your choices. And this is hard for a lot of men who feel like they don't have worth or value or self esteem because they have convinced themselves that they are out of control. They're the victim, they can't do anything about it. That's what lacking self esteem does. But when you really start to realize that it is as simple and as complicated as the decisions and the choices that you are making, then you have a battle to wage. Then you have a war to fight. So this is your war ground. This is the battle that you are going to fight. You show up in your decisions and you take a stand and you really say, I know that this is the decision that I should make for me. I know I should put the weed down, put the drink down, not have another drink, not text that woman, not open up the porn tab and you take a stand in that moment. And when you do that, it reinforces self esteem, confidence, worth, value. So comment below, let me know how you enjoyed this one. What would you add to it? Don't forget to man it forward. I know that there is somebody in your life who could use this video. So man it forward, share it with them. And until next week, this is Connor Beaton signing off.