Self Esteem and Financial Crisis
Low self-esteem can be the hardest thing in the world to repair, because it is so difficult and painful to acknowledge, and the easiest thing to mask. And when we experience a huge crisis, if we are fortunate we get the opportunity to face the truth and do something about it. The whole world has faced a massive crisis - a financial one - and although many believe it is just about money, some think differently.
"It's not about the money" - most of us know that that means money or lack of it is not the source of our problems. It certainly can seem that way if we lose our job or career or go bankrupt, but when we have money difficulties it is always a sign of a deeper underlying conflict. If we pay attention to it, the money sorts itself out.
Even though money can cause such distress, it really is not the main problem. The main problem always lies in self-esteem issues. Trying to just fix the money is like taking a pill, and as one psychologist in "Numb3rs" said "if you want to feel better, take a pill. If you want to get right, face the truth"! Hard advice to follow, but it is true. And if we face the truth it can be painful at the time, but it leads us to a better place, one of knowing our worth, claiming what we deserve, living the life we have always dreamed of.
When we face a financial crisis - or worse, go through it and lose everything, our instinctive reaction is to believe that our life is over, that everything has gone wrong, and that we will never be able to recover. We also either blame everybody else, or we blame ourselves - or do both! We can become afraid of the world, and see life as a punitive thing. Hope can dim for us, and our dreams can seem wasted. We can believe we were fools for daring to dream, for letting ourselves hope that we could make something of our lives. We can be consumed with anger at the unfairness of it all, especially if we were betrayed by somebody or a group of people who got away without being accountable, leaving us to take the fall. If the mistake was solely ours, we load all that anger and blame onto ourselves.
It is a natural part of loss. There is probably no easy way out of financial crisis, just as there is no easy way to deal with the death of a loved one. But if we let ourselves reach out for help, we can be gradually and gently led to understand that nothing actually went wrong, that everything had and has a purpose, and that far from being over, our lives are just beginning.
Although it does not seem possible at first, a financial crisis has the potential to teach us the truth of what we believe about ourselves and our worth - a truth that perhaps we have been running from all our lives because it is so painful to acknowledge. We can have buried so much shame, and fear that we are unworthy, undesirable, ugly, stupid. Having no money makes that fear and shame so powerful that we cannot hide from it.
Then when we face it, we find out - most miraculously, it seems - that none of our fears are true, and our shame is undeserved, even if we made terrible mistakes. We can come to see how much we long for unconditional love, and to reach out for it to repair our ravaged self-esteem.
In the end, the crisis, no matter what it was, will have been the window of opportunity to change our lives for the better.
"It's not about the money" - most of us know that that means money or lack of it is not the source of our problems. It certainly can seem that way if we lose our job or career or go bankrupt, but when we have money difficulties it is always a sign of a deeper underlying conflict. If we pay attention to it, the money sorts itself out.
Even though money can cause such distress, it really is not the main problem. The main problem always lies in self-esteem issues. Trying to just fix the money is like taking a pill, and as one psychologist in "Numb3rs" said "if you want to feel better, take a pill. If you want to get right, face the truth"! Hard advice to follow, but it is true. And if we face the truth it can be painful at the time, but it leads us to a better place, one of knowing our worth, claiming what we deserve, living the life we have always dreamed of.
When we face a financial crisis - or worse, go through it and lose everything, our instinctive reaction is to believe that our life is over, that everything has gone wrong, and that we will never be able to recover. We also either blame everybody else, or we blame ourselves - or do both! We can become afraid of the world, and see life as a punitive thing. Hope can dim for us, and our dreams can seem wasted. We can believe we were fools for daring to dream, for letting ourselves hope that we could make something of our lives. We can be consumed with anger at the unfairness of it all, especially if we were betrayed by somebody or a group of people who got away without being accountable, leaving us to take the fall. If the mistake was solely ours, we load all that anger and blame onto ourselves.
It is a natural part of loss. There is probably no easy way out of financial crisis, just as there is no easy way to deal with the death of a loved one. But if we let ourselves reach out for help, we can be gradually and gently led to understand that nothing actually went wrong, that everything had and has a purpose, and that far from being over, our lives are just beginning.
Although it does not seem possible at first, a financial crisis has the potential to teach us the truth of what we believe about ourselves and our worth - a truth that perhaps we have been running from all our lives because it is so painful to acknowledge. We can have buried so much shame, and fear that we are unworthy, undesirable, ugly, stupid. Having no money makes that fear and shame so powerful that we cannot hide from it.
Then when we face it, we find out - most miraculously, it seems - that none of our fears are true, and our shame is undeserved, even if we made terrible mistakes. We can come to see how much we long for unconditional love, and to reach out for it to repair our ravaged self-esteem.
In the end, the crisis, no matter what it was, will have been the window of opportunity to change our lives for the better.
