Mental Health and Self-Esteem

Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs:

1. Self-actualization: The achievement of the best a person can be. 2. Esteem stage: The need to achieve goals and have self-respect. 3. Social stage: The need for acceptance, affection, and love.

4. Safety stage: The need for protection and shelter from danger. 5. Physical stage: The need for exercise, food, sleep, and water.

Defense mechanism: An unconscious behaviour used to avoid experiencing negative emotions. Compensation: Making up for a weakness in one area by excelling in another. Daydreaming: Imaging pleasant things that take your mind off of an unpleasant reality. Denial: Refusing to accept reality.

Displacement: Shifting feelings about one person to another. Idealization: Copying someone you think highly of.

Projection: Seeing your own faults in someone else. Rationalization: Making excuses for your behaviour.

Regression: Reacting to emotions in an immature fashion. Repression: Blocking out painful feelings or thoughts.

Sublimation: Redirecting negative impulses into positive behaviour.

Emotion: The feeling that is produced in response to life experiences.

Mental health: The state of mental well-being in which one can cope with the demands of daily life.

Characteristics of a mentally healthy person include: ability to endure failure and frustration, ability to express emotions in a healthy way, ability to see events positively, a sense of control, and self-actualization.

Integrity: The characteristic of doing what you know is right. Self-concept: A measure of how you view yourself.

 Self-esteem: A measure of how confident you are and how much you respect and value yourself.

If you have confidence in yourself, you are more likely to set realistic goals for yourself and stick

with those goals until they are reached. If you respect yourself, you would not criticize or put yourself down or do anything to harm yourself. If you value yourself, you will feel like a valuable part of your community, family, and school.

Risks of low self-esteem include: behaving destructively, being vulnerable to peer pressure, disrespecting others and yourself, fearing failure, feeling depressed or insecure, feeling pessimistic, not attempting new things, or possibly even turning to alcohol or drugs.

To develop and improve self-esteem:

Accept yourself: Individuals who accept themselves celebrate their strengths and concentrate on what they do well. They also strive to improve their weaknesses by setting short-term goals.

Act with integrity: When you have integrity you respect others, yourself, and your values. You do not let others pressure you into going against what is important to you.

Choose supportive friends: Avoid critical or disrespectful people.

How you interpret messages from others about yourself, both negative and positive, will determine the positivity of your self-esteem.

Use positive self-talk: The messages you send to yourself will strongly influence your self-esteem. Self-talk is a technique used to coach yourself about your own self worth.

Ways to manage emotions:

Be creative! Drawing, painting, playing a musical instrument, singing, and writing are all creative ways to manage emotions.

Blow off steam! When emotions become bottled up inside you, releasing that energy in some positive way often helps. Activities such as building, exercising, and playing a sport are all positive ways to blow off steam.

Talk it out! Have a conversation with someone you trust.