Do you even know how to improve your self-esteem as a woman? I’m guessing you’re probably working on that since you’re here reading this article. I commend you for working on your self esteem because I believe you can’t truly be happy without first having a positive image of yourself.

Learning how to improve your self esteem as a woman has never been more important in society than it is today. With all the noise on social media, in music, movies, and magazines,  women are now realizing that even the very people we look up to have their own struggle and rely heavily on different strategies to improve their self esteem.

This is a guest post from Alicia F. Gow. Author of Don’t Die Broke: Your Step-by-Step Guide to the Life Your Desire, and creator of the Expressions of Growth blog.

Why do we struggle with self-esteem issues?

First of all, we are not born with low self-esteem. In fact, we are born ready to learn and explore. We were filled with self-confidence as toddlers when we tried something new for the first time. And when it didn’t work, we just tried again until it did.

We loved our bodies, we loved our skin and we didn’t want to be like anyone else. We spoke from our hearts and said what we were feeling.

As we grew older and started becoming more self aware, we began to realize that the world doesn’t always see us the way we see ourselves. We saw people around us fearing for us and trying to protect us from getting hurt.

We were taught how to be more careful and more socially conscious. All good things of course but over time, that led to us questioning our own abilities, because what a lot of us weren’t taught was how to have a positive self image. 

Once we began questioning our abilities, our approach to life changed too. We became more cautious, took less chances, started seeking approval from others and worst of all, we began comparing ourselves to others.

Thankfully though, you are now looking for ways to improve your self-esteem because you want a better quality of life. In today’s article I’ll share with you, 7 Practical Tips

Tips To Improve Your Self Esteem As A Woman

1. Wear clothes that make you feel good

Listen, we can’t deny that the way we dress affects how we feel. Don’t believe me? Read this article on how clothes change the way you think.

How many times have you been in a foul mood and just by getting dressed and putting on your favorite outfit, your spirits are lifted? When I started my self-love journey, one rule I had was that if I’m having a bad day, I needed to dress opposite to how I felt. That did wonders for me. 

The simple fact is this: if you feel good about the clothes you’re wearing, you feel good about your body. If you feel good about your body, you feel good about yourself. If you feel good about yourself, your self-esteem as a woman goes through the roof!

It’s not enough to only wear pretty or trendy clothes though. It is actually more important for you to dress for your lifestyle and body type than it is to wear the latest trends.

Focusing only on wearing the latest trends will surely get you caught up in self-comparison. It’s a terrible strategy to build your self-esteem! Regardless of what the Instagram Baddies tell you.

Dressing for your body type ensures you’re wearing clothes that flatter you. Dressing for your lifestyle ensures your clothes are also practical and you don’t end up in a situation where your outfit is cute but you feel totally uncomfortable in it.

2. Start showing up as the ideal version of yourself

You’ll have to do a lot of self-reflection to know the answers to these questions but if you follow my content you’ll know I’m very big on self-reflection. Self-reflection is the key to unlocking yourself. It’s the only way to identify how you limit yourself and hold yourself back from living your true potential.

I love to reflect by journaling almost every day. Transcribe your thoughts into paper so you can understand them and make better decisions. Check out Promptly Journals to get started.

You can’t show up as your ideal self without knowing who she is. What is she like? Is she confident? Classy? Well dressed? Assertive? Brave? Well read? Attractive? Write it all down. 

Write down all the qualities of your ideal self. The person you dream of being. The version of yourself you are working on becoming. 

Now ladies please remember that improving your self-esteem as a woman is not about being perfect, so I don’t want you to write perfectionism. I want you to think about traits you want to improve and traits you want to develop. Habits you want to cease. Habits you want to develop.

Then start showing up as that person. For example, if your best self is well dressed, get dressed every morning. You don’t have to do a full glam face of makeup but you can take care of your skin so you feel beautiful in your natural skin.

3. Stop procrastinating

This one doesn’t get talked about enough but I promise you. If you are looking to improve your self esteem as a woman you seriously need to stop procrastinating. 

Studies have shown that there is a direct link between low self-esteem and chronic procrastination. There have been tons of scientific research into this so you can check some of them out if you like.

One that really makes it simple to understand was done by Joseph R.Ferrari from the Department of Psychology, DePaul University, 2219 North Kenmore Avenue, Chicago, IL 60619, U.S.A and his team.

Young adults (202 women, 61 men: M = 20.9) completed measures of decisional and behavioral procrastination, self-esteem, interpersonal dependency, and self-defeating behavior. Correlational analysis indicated that both procrastination types separately and combined were significantly related to low self-esteem, dependency on others, and defeating behaviors. Among specific self-defeating behaviors, decisional procrastination was related to failing to complete crucial tasks, inciting anger in others, and rejecting good-spirited others. Behavioral procrastination was related to failing task completion, rejecting well-minded others, feeling guilty after a positive event, and choosing handicapping situations.”

Read the full article here.

In layman’s terms: the more you procrastinate, the more you destroy your self-esteem and that leads to a plethora of other self-defeating behaviors that further destroy your self-esteem even more. It’s a sad spiral. It`s time to break it.

4. Learn to speak up for yourself

The more you speak up for yourself, the more confident you feel about yourself. The more you start trusting yourself to protect your own mental wellbeing. I’m not talking about going around just directly being toxic.

There’s a lot of that going around in society being masqueraded as strength. Don’t be fooled by that, lovely lady.

What I’m talking about is simple: Stop trying to please people. Not everyone is going to like you and that’s okay. Learn to say no. No to things that destroy you. Say no to things that don’t make you a better person. If it feels wrong, don’t do it.

Trust your instinct. Learn to tell the difference between what feels uncomfortable and what feels wrong. Sometimes growth is uncomfortable but wrong is always wrong.

Speaking up for yourself is not about being toxic. It’s about setting and enforcing healthy boundaries. In many cases, this makes your relationships better. In some cases, it means letting go of some relationships but that’s okay. 

5. You need to stop accepting mediocrity

One of the reasons you have low self-esteem as a woman is because you have gotten into the habit of accepting mediocrity in your life. You don’t push yourself enough and you don’t expect the best from the people in your life.

You’ve gotten used to accepting whatever comes along as “this is just how life is”. You’ve bought into the lie that if you have no expectations you can’t be disappointed.

But that’s not true. If you are born in a country where you have freedom of choice, then life is what you make it. There will be many cases where you don’t actually have many choices. That’s true.

However, in my experience, most of the time you ARE choosing to just accept whatever gets thrown your way.

I always like this quote by Tony Robbins “anytime you seriously want to make a change, you must first raise your standards”. This goes a long way. When you make up your mind to stop accepting mediocrity in your life, the game changes.

If you are looking for ways to improve your self esteem I suggest starting with what you accept in your life. What you accept from yourself and what you accept from others in your life. Set high expectations for yourself, push yourself, and write it all down. 

What kind of person do you want to become? What kind of lifestyle do you want to have? What do you need to do to achieve this goal? What do you need to change? What must you stop accepting?

Stop quitting and giving up on your goals when you fail at something. Change your mindset and realize that there are no real failures in life.

There is always a lesson to be learned. You will be amazed at what you attract into your life when you expect it to happen because you believe you deserve it.

6. Stop comparing yourself to others

Did you know that comparison is one of the biggest self-esteem killers out there? Well,, it is. One sure way to make yourself feel about yourself and life, in general, is to indulge in chronic self comparison.

Stop it! I’m being really serious here. If you want to improve your self-esteem as a woman you seriously need to learn how to stop comparing yourself to others.

Comparison steals your joy and it steals your ability to focus on yourself, your own goals, and your own journey. At the end of the day, we must remember that everyone’s journey is different.

We are at different stages in our lives and at different points in our journeys. The lessons we need to learn are different so there’s really no point in measuring yourself up to someone else’s ruler.

Your life looks different because you are a unique individual. The path you took is different because the way you perceive the world is different. Your unique circumstances have created the beautiful woman reading this article. 

Want to improve your self-esteem as a woman? Stop comparing yourself to others.

7. Take care of yourself

Well, it’s not the “final” way. There are a plethora of ways to improve your self-esteem but this is the final one I’ll touch on today.

I want to emphasize that when I say “take care of yourself” I mean your total self. While it’s perfectly fine to focus on the material things (money, house, cars, etc) you must remember not to neglect your soul as well.

Taking care of yourself means, eating right, exercising, developing a positive mindset, limiting negativity in your life, avoiding drama, connecting with God, discovering your purpose, taking care of your personal hygiene, taking care of your mind and mental health, developing positive habits and hobbies. You get where I’m going with this right?

It’s not a shallow one-sided thing. It’s multifaceted. At different stages in your life, you may need to focus more on one or more of these areas. But taking care of yourself means you take care of your total self.

When you take care of yourself, you feel good about yourself. When you feel good about yourself, your self-esteem is positively affected. So start taking care of yourself if you want to improve your self-esteem.

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OVER TO YOU

Your actions directly affect your self-esteem. You must become intentional about the life you live. If you haven’t yet, be sure to read 20 LIFESTYLE CHANGES TO IMPROVE YOUR LIFE. Your self-esteem and self-image will thank you for it. Stay inspired and motivated.

About the Author

Well, first, you need to know… I don’t enjoy talking about myself. It feels too… spotlight-y (that’s not a word), but alas, I must do this thing in order to introduce myself to others, so here goes. I’m Alicia F. Gow, but I’m more commonly known as Lis Gow all over social media. I’m a mom of three amazing boys, wife to a wonderful husband, certified Jesus girl, and co-founder of Docski Games Studio (an indie video game studio based in Jamaica, serving just under half a million monthly players). I’m also the author of Don’t Die Broke: Your Step-by-Step Guide to the Life You Desire. I live by one very simple mantra: where you start doesn’t have to determine your future. You can learn more about me by visiting https://lisgow.com/about/.

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