I'm reading "Inspiration: Your Ultimate Calling" by Wayne Dyer too! I really, really love it and it seems to go perfectly well with the daily A Course in Miracles studies that I read each day. Things have been flowing pretty well for me since I began reading this book and actually I feel that I was guided to read it at this particular time (all books come to us at just the right times).

When Joseph in this blog says, "We are worthy of all the infinite blessings life has to offer (does that bring up any limiting beliefs about your worth?)." It does bring up some thoughts of limiting beliefs but then I realize that even my thoughts are illusions. Only the thoughts I think with God are Real.  This doesn't mean that my thoughts or beliefs in lack, unworthiness, etc do not have any effect - they create the so-called reality around me and effect the world as well. But when I choose instead to see as God Sees, to allow my True Self to see things for me instead of my "ego self", my awareness of my worthines increases. I am worthy of Infinite Blessings because I AM the Infinite Blessing.  It is my Intention to allow spirit to work through me to help me to remember the truth that I AM INFINITE BEING, the Love of God, which is the only thing that is Real. This is our essence! How Beautiful!

Love and Light to you all always,

PRINCESS ECSTACY

Hey there Joseph...

Did you hear me call in the wee hours of this morn? I saw your picture on someone's profile and thought: I hope he'll come up with a meaningful blog soon again. And lo' and behold... there it is... Great topic again.

About the SsSself and the *I*, and feeling separated from others.

The duality game.
The me vs the other.
The US vs THEM.
The eternal conflict of seeing the other as an opponent, instead of a brother. 
And indeed it's not easy to realize that when the world and people are "in my face", that we are always ONE.

I know that when I'm able and capable of looking with my heart, instead of my reasoning mind, I can stay perfectly calm and peaceful. Without feeling hurt and pain, or being offended.

But being ME and also having a volcanic temperant, this tsunami energy, I can sometimes sweep myself and others from their feet, when I feel I'm not treated well, and not being respected.
 

And you know what? Sometimes it's not bad at all, to Kick Ass and to shake my and other's people feathers, so we can bring light to friction and conflictuous relationships. Spit it out and work from there.
Far better than "swolling" it all and feeling so blown up and full of anger and pretending nothing is wrong. Whatever "wrong" may be.
I've done swallowing far too long, so now I tell and bring it into the open, so it can be healed. That is... if the other party is open-minded enough to work on it together.   
 

Very often, it's about not taking it personnal (the ego mind at work) and feeling attacked by others, or me attacking them.

I once read that all attack is self-attack.

And that each attack is a call for love.
I've come to believe this is very true.



I'm wandering again... probably totally off-topic. But this is what came "to mind".

Thanks for being back again, and sharing your loving thoughts.
As ever: Love and Peace.

The Self, the I,

I agree JOseph, sometimes positive thinking is not enough (on its own) to raise self-esteem. Over many years for many people, beginning early in their lives -  having consistent 'knocking' of self-esteem, can (and usually does) cause deep emotional issues with self-esteem either towards 'lack of it' or 'narcissism'....that can run very deep in the individual. 

For myself, where, as a child - I was taught that it was 'vain' to think 'highly of myself'...self-esteem ended up being - almost non-existant.  I automatically focused on the 'others' because  conditioning had taught me, that I did not exist, that I did not count.  I didn't feel 'bad' about it, it was just the way it was!!!  My point is, it took many years of 'emotional healing' and 'unravelling' old negative 'programmes', that no longer served me...to be able to even receive, a compliment.  Positive affirmations also helped to erase old negative thoughts and replace them with new ones. 

For most of my life until my late 20's, I felt alone, not connected to Spirit or to anything really...kind of a 'numb' existence, going through the motions.  I don't mean to go on too much here Joseph, about ME....lol, but I do so in relation to your post in so much as, my story (or similar stories) may well apply to many people - who just can't seem to get to what you're talking about here, because the unresolved origins of WHERE self-esteem issues lay, have not been addressed.  NOW, however...I can relate 100%.    Thanks for such a thought provoking Post.  Peace and Love my friend. 

Thank you for this exceptionally thoughtful and articulate piece. You make a helpful distinction between self-esteem and pride:

Whereas positive self-esteem is about knowing who / what we really are, pride is attachment to illusions about who we are.

This can be tricky when we are constantly encouraged to have dreams, goals, ambitions, etc., about who we want to be. Naturally they are illusory, but this dance between illusion and reality is seen as the mechanism of success- it fuels ambition, and allows people to realize and create something different in their lives, to progress. I suppose pride is when we are in love with what we think we've become, or want to become, but haven't gotten there yet.

But I'm just struggling with not judging myself against the illusory goals I've set for myself, those that I haven't yet achieved. For example, though I have a successful career and my professional life is in excellent shape, I still don't have children and, having just gone through a long break-up, don't see it on my near horizon. This does not fit the 'picture' of who I thought I'd be at this age, and it's particularly hard to face on Valentine's Day, the first one I'll face single in 11 years. So thanks for considering the timing of this post - it really hits home.

The more I learn, the more I find I still have more to learn... and then to remember to put it into practice.

Peace

Joseph,

Thank you for sharing your wise words.   As for your statement, "We have infinite worth by virtue of the divinity of that which gives us awareness", I believe everyone at last come to this realisation, it is only a matter of karmic potentiality.  We can bless each and every one on his way.

Love, Peace, Joy, Enlightenment

-Karen. 

All in all an excellent post, Joseph. I'm feeling inspired by it to add something to my own blog about self-esteem, but maybe I'll just add my thoughts to yours.

One mistake I see people make time and again in regards to self-esteem is they seek compliments they think feed their self-esteem, or self-worth if you prefer. Compliments feed our ego, which isn't necessarily a bad thing, but compliments don't last. If a person's sense of self-worth comes from what others feed to our ego it is fleeting at best. When the high wears off wears off, almost like an addict, some folks feel the need for an "ego fix" to feel good about themselves again. If they can't get it, many resort to drugs or alcohol, or excessive shopping, or meaningless sex, or any number of other things.

One of the best ways to build real self-esteem is to give of yourself to causes other than yourself. Become a Big Brother or Big Sister, volunteer for Meals on Wheels, get involved with and donate time to a local charity you believe in, join the reading program at your library to help teach illiterate adults to read, take a homebound elderly person shopping once a week, visit nursing homes and spread some cheer...the list and needs could go on and on, but the point is, this is the kind of worthwhile activity that helps build real self-esteem. The kind that sinks into your bones and stays there rather that the ego fluff that is easily blown away.

Dearest Joseph,

This is a wonderful blog and it has inspired a lot of interesting discussion! "In fact is not genuine humility more open to accepting compliments, because from that perspective we know that the One Life is both giver and receiver of the praise?" Beautifully said.  Yes, in oneness there is a kind of natural humility and paradoxically in separation is where we find arrogance.  more on that below.  One of the things that came up at the retreat this last weekend was a realization of the distinction between the ego's need for recognition and what might be limiting or pathological in that and a healthy desire to know out of a sense of connection whether your actions are called for, recognized or appreciated. 

You touch on aspects to this that I consider in wanting to positively reinforce what will support students in developing a healthy sense of self and self-empowerment where they learn to trust their innate creative intelligence. At the same time, I consider not wanting to reinforce a fixated ego structure that develops a dependency on an idea of itself and what others (including me) think of them.  The deep embodied awareness that we are pure potentiality arising out of emptiness and essentially no one separate from anyone or anything else is tremendously empowering, yet cannot come without first being aware of self.  Inquiring into self without being at a level of development where that can be appreciated might be sensed as very disorienting and disempowering, when we think our worth has to do with being someone distinct and separate.  Indeed, even healthy and developed ego structures would rather hold onto a negative sense of self than face their fear of being no one.  The difficulty is that in developing a healthy self-esteem we learn to take pride in our achievements to the extent that we think that we are our achievements. We begin to think of ourselves as being as good as our last achievement or as worthless as what we didn't achieve. We feel that we become our successes and our failures.  Many do not follow their creative impulses in fear of failing or becoming a failure. This hesitation and the beliefs at its core perpetuates a momentum of self-doubt.  Self-doubt is a destructive use of memory.  It is based on uninvestigated thoughts that feed into our conditional self-acceptance.   

In feeding this cultural and individually learned mind-set that says that we are only as good as our last action, we get farther and farther away from recognizing our innate worthiness... and deeper and deeper into a sense of separation either through pride and a sense of superiority or shame and a sense of inferiority.  Pride and shame are two sides of the same coin; a coin of measurement and the comparative mind; a coin of separation. There is a fear of knowing ourselves as one with God because there is a fear of arrogance. And there is a fear of not knowing because there is a fear of  being no one.  Paradoxically,  in this light, arrogance is separating oneself from God. If you think that you are above anything...you are separating yourself. If you think you are below anything, you are separating yourself. From this perspective, shame and inferiority are as arrogant as superiority. "Two sides of the same coin." 

"The whole dilemma of the human condition is a fear and avoidance of the unknown or emptiness.  It is also the habit if identifying with thoughts born in time and not allowing oneself to be here now. We identify ourselves through our effort, conflict and pain. We identify ourselves through our thoughts of the past and our dreams of the future. And we are heavily invested in these identities." - Ellen, 2001

The following is related to this and from one of my articles on my web page written around 2000:

What seeks is Itself for ItSelf. The memory of this original separation experience, and its fragmentation is at our core and seeks for what it senses it is not, in the desire for Its completion. We got caught up in the seeking and the forgetting, investing more and more in the beliefs of our limitations; the beliefs that we are not That which we seek. And these beliefs have been reinforced for millennia. And the more we have sought, the more noble have our efforts been considered. And the more our efforts have been considered noble, the more we have invested in and defined ourselves by them. And the more we have defined ourselves by them, the more we have invested in not attaining their end. How could it be so easy as just letting go? That is one reason why the realization of freedom of the unconditioned self is so rare. 

Thank you for a wonderful blog,

Love and namaste,

Ellen

"So as we focus on seeing the pure awareness in "others", rather than focusing (and passing judgement) on the individual persona they are identified with, it becomes easier to know our own true Self."

Wise words indeed Joseph, I identify with the comments about how easy it is to slip away from this awareness and lose sight of the true Self.  Old habits do not die easily and the ego does not succumb without a fight.  Friends like you, meditation, turning inward, and so much of the messages that come to me daily from MySpace help to bring me back to true knowledge of Self, of true "Self" esteem not dependent on the outside world but grounded in the spirit and remembering my connection in all that is. Thank you for this wonderful inspiration.

today i read "ring the bells that still can ring, forget your perfectt offering. there's a hole in everyting.  thats how the light comes through"

-leonard cohen

"a big trend in decorating right now is making things looked aged, worn, or imperfect. this adds a sense of history and comfort to a room. the theory is that wheneverything is new and perfect, it isn't as relaxing to be in that space. here we are, living in the space of our imperfect human form, let us ee the beauty in our imperfections, that is where our souls shine through."

-lisa coffee

i'm not sure how this relates to what you are stating above, but i somehow feels it relates. the way i see it is that if i don't focus so much on the selfesteem issue the Marie at a lower level and acknowledge the creator of me what i am made of the  true essence of  what realy is in side of me--------God.  oh how life would be much more light

question though is this easier said than done?

As you said a amount of self esteem is required if one is to find Happiness.

I may be wrong but I think true self esteem is based on one's knowledge of Principle.

When you truly know (inside) that nothing can shake you; what the outer does or say does not really matter.Not that you don't care but because you rely on a Principle that has been applied and verified many times.

Things in the end are bound to sort themselves out if we put forward our Spiritual unfoldment.

You said it : "We can try and improve self-esteem by thinking more positively about the individual self "

Abundant Thanks!