Season 2, Episode 6: The Building Blocks Towards Healthy Self-Esteem
Self-esteem is essential for your mental health. The way you think and feel about yourself affects all aspects of your life. It plays a role in your relationships, your work, and how you approach your goals. When you feel good about yourself, you’re more confident in your relationships and have the passion and motivation to work towards your future. But there are many factors that can affect your self-esteem, and if you’re struggling with low self-esteem, it can be hard to know how to improve it.
On this episode of Living Fully, our host Katherine Hurtig talks with Maggie Jiang, a registered psychologist, about the correlation of self-esteem and mental health. They explore the many factors that influence how you feel about yourself, how having good relationships with friends and family can protect your self-esteem, and much more.
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Katherine Hurtig
Welcome to Living Fully, a podcast dedicated to enhancing your mental well-being. Each episode explores valuable insights and practical strategies to help you lead a more fulfilling life. I'm your host. Katherine Hurtig.
The way we think and feel about ourselves affects all aspects of our lives. It impacts our relationships, our work, and how we approach our goals.
In this episode, I talk with Maggie Jiang about self-esteem. We get into the many factors that influence how we feel about ourselves, and how good self-esteem starts in childhood. How having healthy relationships with friends and family can protect ourself-esteem and so much more. Thank you, Maggie, for being here with me today to chat about self-esteem.
Maggie Jiang
Yes, I'm glad to be here.
Katherine Hurtig
To start off , tell our listeners a bit about yourself and your background as a counsellor.
Maggie Jiang
I am a registered psychologist and I've been with the center since 2016.
Katherine Hurtig
2016 wow.
Maggie Jiang
So I've been working with many different kinds of clients, families and couples. But in my work, I found that a lot of clients dealing with self-esteem issues.
Katherine Hurtig
For sure, yeah.
Maggie Jiang
Even when their presenting problems might be anxiety or depression, other issues, but if we dig deep, usually self-esteem is one of the underlying issues.
Katherine Hurtig
Totally. I mean, I can relate. I've found that with myself, like in my experience with depression and anxiety, I think my level of self-esteem kind of wove into that and yeah, so I mean, personally I'm interested in this topic as well. So I'm excited to talk to you.
Maggie Jiang
Great.
Katherine Hurtig
So the first question I have is if you can kind of start by explaining what this concept of self-esteem is and how it plays a part in our mental health.
Maggie Jiang
I think that's a great, great question and so big, right? How self-esteem actually plays a part in that, you know, mental health struggles, right? So I think let's start with this concept, and give a quick definition of it.
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah.
Maggie Jiang
So self-esteem obviously is a self-evaluation of your own worth.
Katherine Hurtig
Of your own worth?
Maggie Jiang
Yeah. But then the question is how you evaluate your own worth. What is the method? In my experience, or in my understanding, two factors are the key. One is how realistically you've evaluated yourself. Are you honest? Is your method accurate about self-worth. A lot of people feel so bad, even from other people's perspective they might be really good, but they don't see themselves in that way.
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah. Yeah, we don't see ourselves the way others see us.
Maggie Jiang
But also another one is appreciative. How appreciative of yourself, your opinions, your opinions of yourself. Do you like yourself? Do you see yourself in a positive light? Because if you are using those languages that's really showing that dislike, self-dislike, self-hatred, self-defeating. That is not going to help you with your self-esteem. You're not going to feel good about yourself, right, so very important evaluation method whatever you use you based on how realistic.
Katherine Hurtig
So maybe I'm really simplifying this, but would you say people who have lower self-esteem, struggle more with their mental health versus someone you know with a higher self-esteem.
Maggie Jiang
Yeah, a lot of time its subjective evaluation, right? Is the method looking at on what basis you look at yourself? Right. Based on the opinions of others or based on a realistically unique you know person, you have unique qualities, your unique strengths and gifts. You are irreplaceable in that sense. Of course, you know looking at self-esteem, that relationship between self-esteem and mental health. Those general agreement, good self-esteem is essential to good mental health. Self-esteem, low self-esteem, in terms of self-dislike, self-hatred, self-defeating.
Katherine Hurtig
Talking to ourselves in a negative way.
Maggie Jiang
In a negative way it really degrades your mental health. Another thing is that I did some, you know, digging, research. Very interesting. You know, a lot of common sense. Yes, they're correlated, right? It's just, you know, some findings really are forming about in my understanding that self-esteem is highly correlated to overall life satisfaction and happiness around the world. Right. High self-esteem, you feel good about yourself, you're happy, your life, you feel good about life. Of course, right? Overall, life satisfaction is better.
Katherine Hurtig
Right, you'd have a better outlook on other aspects.
Maggie Jiang
Right, another area is self-esteem is the most important motivator for us to work hard to succeed in life. Is that a surprise?
Katherine Hurtig
No, no. It makes a lot of sense. I think it's just we think of it like it's in this box. Like self-esteem is how I think about myself, how I view my self-worth. But then you don't always think it’s gonna touch all these other areas of your life.
Maggie Jiang
Yeah, right. So this seems like a self-esteem is not a new topic. It’s an old topic. A lot of research is already done. So it's so interesting. Self-esteem is an essential foundation for human growth.
Katherine Hurtig
Human growth? In what sense?
Maggie Jiang
In a sense that you know a lot of time we have low self-esteem, a lot of times we are not focusing on our goals or you know future lots of time is about the past and rumination. You know dwelling in the past, our energy, our time is consumed in the sense that we have no control of. But if you feel good about yourself, you know you have goals, passions. You are working towards something that is essentially your goal as a human being.
Katherine Hurtig
So Maggie, what are some common factors that influence someone’s self-esteem? Relationships, external factors, internal factors, what influences it?
Maggie Jiang
That's another good question. We can look at common factors from different lens. But today, I'm thinking from a nature and nurture perspective. A nature perspective, like the factors like genetics, biological factors, chronic medical or mental health conditions, disabilities, the people, if you have a disability or chronic medical conditions and usually they don't feel good about themselves.
Katherine Hurtig
Right.
Maggie Jiang
Or maybe you know personalities, right? So we're looking at something internal, you know, maybe we're born with or maybe, present in our critical or sensitive developmental periods, right? Those could really affect our sense of self.
Katherine Hurtig
Like times of our life when we are kids?
Maggie Jiang
Yeah, well, kids, or maybe, you know, doing this even adult, right? That’s a stressful time. Like a traumatic event.
Katherine Hurtig
Right. That's going to affect it?
Maggie Jiang
Yeah, right. So we're talking about that is the nature, right? It's a lot of nature factors that we're born with in a family environment system. Factors like nurture, our parents, our caregivers, their mental conditions, their financial situations. Maybe they are preoccupied with life challenges. Maybe they struggle with marriage, right? Maybe they just, you know, so busy, you know, mentally dealing with addiction, dealing with, you know, other substance abuse.
Katherine Hurtig
Right. Yeah. So a lot of things are really out of our control.
Maggie Jiang
Yeah, out of control. Others like maybe significant others, teachers, mentors. Right. If we had unfortunate childhood experiences. But if we have met a teacher or you know a few others if they could help us. You know I leave it those like you know the sense of like you know we're not supported and we're not cared for. And then we still can have a good outcome, right?
Katherine Hurtig
Right If we surround ourselves with positive people.
Maggie Jiang
Positive people, supporting others, societal and cultural factors.
Katherine Hurtig
Of course, yeah.
Maggie Jiang
Think about kids who are born in the pandemic, right? Parents are struggling with all those pressures, all those things we never encountered before. Right. But the kids are affected, right? Parents may not have enough attention for their kids. But some families could do really well, shield the child and come together to protect the child, the nurture factor that parents can do. Sometimes wellness can help. Other nurture factors like the traumatic event, right, or you know, traumas sometimes bullying, bullying, school bullying, right? Maybe there's sexual abuse. Maybe that's, you know, an Indian residential school. Remember, those kids are taken away from their parents, right? So. And they never, never experience that security they need to develop a sense of security and safety, right. So I worked with some clients from indigenous communities and they had such difficulty with their own parenting. Because they never experienced parenting. No modelling, no direct experience.
Katherine Hurtig
Right. Yeah, it's hard to do something when it hasn't been shown to you.
Maggie Jiang
Exactly. So you only have like, some people even don't have this abstract concept about how, they never see it, right? And that is devastating. That's why that leads to intergenerational trauma. It's not just affecting this generation. You are going to affect the next.
Katherine Hurtig
Right. So we've talked about a lot of factors that would contribute to poor or lower self-esteem. But could these nature and nurture factors that you're talking about, also contribute to positive higher self-esteem?
Maggie Jiang
It could be. Many research is showing why similar people going through the same pandemic or traumatic social events. And some people come out with a great sense of resilience, right?
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah, It affects everyone differently.
Maggie Jiang
Yeah, very differently. Right. So I think a lot of time we have to kind of look at how you know this really affects us as individuals, what individual factors, how we evaluate the support system? Have you heard of A.C.E.S.? Adverse childhood experience.
Katherine Hurtig
Oh yes, yes, kind of. Sorry. Can you explain it again? It's like if you experience these different things as a child, you're more.
Maggie Jiang
Yeah. You're more at risk.
Katherine Hurtig
Right. You're more at risk.
Maggie Jiang
doesn't mean that it directly affects you, some people with that childhood experience still come with greater outcome. But 10 areas, those 10 areas like a child, physical abuse, emotional abuse, emotional neglect or those like parents, if they are dealing with this incarceration of family members, that's gonna really affect them. Parents dealing with mental health issues, or maybe addictions. all those points, but that does not mean necessarily they will just have the risk, but that is the risk interaction to their development. Yeah, right. So today, actually research also shows there are some protective factors along the way. Parents in our society can be more aware, to alleviate those negative effects.
Katherine Hurtig
What is the protective factor? What does that mean?
Maggie Jiang
Protective factor. Those factors can prevent or mitigate some of the negative factors. Yeah. If the child has difficulties, you know, experience a lot of this poverty, a lot of this adverse experience.
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah, these challenges.
Maggie Jiang
Yeah. Challenges. But if someone is showing their support, providing a safe space for them to talk about their feelings, make them feel like they're supported. They're not alone. That could make a huge difference. That's a protective factor, Right. So one of them. There are many, seven protective factors that have been identified by research.
Katherine Hurtig
What are some other protective factors? And are we when we talk about that is that just in children, does it apply to everybody?
Maggie Jiang
Apply to everybody.
Katherine Hurtig
OK.
Maggie Jiang
So remember, if this traumatic event or stressful event happened, if we got timely support and resources and within six months. That's the period we used to diagnose PTSD.
Katherine Hurtig
OK.
Maggie Jiang
Timely help, timely support would make a huge difference. Timely attention. Those protective factors, the ability to talk with family members about feelings, it's very important, right? We never thought a lot of time talking about feelings because you have to have a sense of safety. Are you willing to open up talking about feelings?
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah, safe to be vulnerable.
Maggie Jiang
To be vulnerable, right, and fail to experience their families support in difficult times. So that's why creating this sense of society comes together in one family experience, trauma, other people from the community come together to support. Done well.
Katherine Hurtig
Right, so you know you have a support system.
Maggie Jiang
The support system. You're not alone. it's even. It's hard. But there’s other people working alongside me and that would make a huge difference. Another factor is very interesting enjoyment and participation in community traditions.
Katherine Hurtig
OK.
Maggie Jiang
Right. So you have that sense you can participate in, you develop that sense or I have a community. I have a sense of belonging.
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah, you want to feel like you fit in.
Maggie Jiang
You are fitting in. You're not just struggling along. A few others like feeling of belonging in high school. if you have early adverse childhood experiences. And that's gonna affect you, but you can pick up. If you are in high school. If you feel you sense of belongings and, currently I have three clients, actually, they're young adults, but they have a toxic environment early on.
Katherine Hurtig
Like a friend group, yeah.
Maggie Jiang
A friend group, a girl group, is very toxic in elementary school. But come to High School, they go to different schools. They meet different friends, they have better social friends. They feel like I have a sense of belonging that really helps their self-esteem.
Katherine Hurtig
I could see that. I was fortunate to have a really great high school experience with a great group of people. Yeah, and I'm still very close with some of them today, so.
Maggie Jiang
Wow. Yeah, and that is a huge protective factor. Others like, have at least two non-parent adults who genuinely care, that will make a difference. Even your family environment is very unfortunate, you know, sometimes parents may have passed away or absent. But at least those two non-parent adults taking care of you, showing compassion, love, and support you, and that will make a huge difference. So the feeling of being supported by friends is also important. A lot of time it's about support.
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah, it sounds like it's really a lot about these relationships with other people. That they're gonna help you in the long run and gives you a better sense of your own well-being.
Maggie Jiang
Yes, right. So I think just be aware of that. You know how that support system, how we perceive that support system, is also important. Sometimes low self-esteem would lead us to interpret that support very differently. So we have to challenge ourselves, whether that is true.
Katherine Hurtig
What do you mean by that? Interpret it differently?
Maggie Jiang
Yeah, because when you have this low self-esteem, you kind of view things, view others, view yourself in a very negative light, OK, right?
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah.
Maggie Jiang
Even people providing that, but maybe you have this, we call that distortions. Your way of thinking is all or nothing, black or white, right? Whether their friends are, you know, supportive or whether maybe they do something different, but you feel like, OK, they're not supportive, right? So all or nothing.
Katherine Hurtig
I can be guilty of that. It's something I need to work on. Like I, you know, whether it's with my friends or my husband or whatever. I often interpret their behaviour as a reflection of how they feel about me. Yeah, and I know that's logically not the case, so.
Maggie Jiang
I think we all do as human beings sometimes we all do use that little behavior. We are making something very personal, right? Then we feel like, OK, maybe they don't want to be friends. Then you withdraw, but actually, that's nothing to do with them. It's all in perception. Yeah.
Katherine Hurtig
Exactly, yeah. Yeah, I know. I try to remind myself that – I’ve heard this somewhere - that people think about you way less than you think they do. And it sounds bad, but it's kind of comforting at the same time.
So we've established that having good self-esteem is really important for well-being and mental health. So what are some practical, actionable steps that we can take to build our self-esteem?
Maggie Jiang
Action steps. I would say, first of all, just self-reflect on how you evaluate yourself.
Katherine Hurtig
And what does that mean - how we evaluate ourselves?
Maggie Jiang
Yeah, right. Do you know what method you use? On what basis? You kind of evaluate yourself, are you evaluating yourself based on your look, your performance, your productivity, or your circumstance or maybe the opinions of others?
Katherine Hurtig
MHM.
Maggie Jiang
Right, others say you're great, you feel great. Others say this is not good, then you feel bad. Yeah, right. So that's, that's the evaluation, right? So we're talking about looking at the externals and the internals. Self-evaluation I think a lot of people use their externals, like how people look at me, what are my abilities.
Katherine Hurtig
And that's really hard not to do that, to not take into consideration what other people think.
Maggie Jiang
Yes, well, you have to put it in a perspective.
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah.
Maggie Jiang
And knowing that a lot of times we compare with others is the tangible part, the visible part, right? This person, the body size, the beauty and that you know things that we can see that you only know how much that you do not call being that other people don't see right so we cannot just based on the cover of our book we need to look into the chapters and what they are, right. So make a holistic evaluation.
Katherine Hurtig
We'll probably get into this later, but I think social media has really touched on that exact idea. Like a lot of stuff that we see on social media, it's very curated. It's only what people want to put out there. It's only the highlights. And so when we compare ourselves to what we see online, we're never going to live up to that standard.
Maggie Jiang
You never feel good about yourself because people put out there. I have clients telling me on the TikTok they see these beautiful bodies, beautiful lives, beautiful images. The beauty standards are so high when they look at themselves. They are just, you know, so here, you know, so low. And they feel so inadequate.
Katherine Hurtig
It's heartbreaking, yeah.
Maggie Jiang
And that is going to be devastating for that self-esteem. So how can we look at, not just by the externals, but looking at what we have internally, right? So I would say, you know the actionable step would be I would encourage my client to do some self-discovery. Who you really are, maybe you have things in the qualities, the gifts that your friends don't have. Even if they have something else. But you have something, something unique, something really, they don't have. Be proud. Give yourself that. OK, that's unique. Also, surround yourself with some people, friends, people, they make you feel good about yourself. They have done themselves, personal work. They have good self-esteem, right? They are not gonna judge you just on behavior. They look at you as a person, they show appreciation, showing that gratitude for who you are. Others like, maybe stop comparison.
Katherine Hurtig
Right.
Maggie Jiang
Comparison a lot of the time is negative. In a way that it could be positive, when we're in a negative situation, maybe understand the common humanity. We all make mistakes. Even I'm making mistakes, right? It’s hard for other people. In this situation, they might make a mistake too.
Katherine Hurtig
Right. Yeah. And literally, everyone does like everyone you see online, everyone.
Maggie Jiang
Hey. From doctors and ministers, you know, we make mistakes, right?
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah. Yes, yeah, this whole comparison thing, so. Over the past few years, I've really gotten into running like I love it, and I mean beyond the physical aspect of it. It's taught me so much about my mental health and the comparison has been a big thing like it's so hard to not compare myself like I feel I'm so much slower than all the runners out there. And so that's been some work too. Just realizing that that may be true. Maybe I am quite a bit slower, but it doesn't matter.
Maggie Jiang
It doesn't matter! Yes.
Katherine Hurtig
I don't know if I'm doing it the right way or a great job, so I have a stepson, and I try to tell him those kinds of things too like there's nothing wrong with this, but he really wants to be the best at everything he does. And when you know he falls short, he's hard on himself. But in the end that doesn't matter. You know, it doesn't matter that it's, you know, you didn't make that goal in your water polo game. It doesn't matter that you didn't get 100% on the spelling test. Like you are excelling in a lot of other things and it's more important just to be a kind person, I don't know.
Maggie Jiang
Yes, great. Great. So I’m glad you know you have someone you can teach?
Katherine Hurtig
I'm trying, yes.
Maggie Jiang
And also you're living by that example, right? You know, this is a human struggle. We all have that. But I think in that case it's almost like showing the process is important. Maybe you didn't get that goal. You learn something in the process. You can use those lessons for other tasks, other things, right? And you are way bigger. So another thing I think, I feel like we're easy to judge by just a little failure. Little mistakes, right? But knowing that those are the behaviours of this core person, the whole person is good. You are making the effort you have to cheer this person on, separate those behaviours from your person.
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah. For who you are
Maggie Jiang
Yeah, from you are.
Katherine Hurtig
Exactly. Yeah. We aren't as a person. Like, we aren't our mistakes.
Maggie Jiang
Yeah. And also if we can own those mistakes and learn from them. And understand, we all work in progress.
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah, another thing I've definitely worked on is that idea for sure or not viewing failure or mistakes in such a catastrophic light? Yeah, it is. It's like it's just an opportunity to learn.
Maggie Jiang
Yes, I think that's it. Sometimes maybe we need to forgive ourselves. Right. Yeah. And another day I talked to you about a friend who actually talked this, you know, their insightful way. And she said we need to forgive ourselves every day, daily because we make, you know, not great choices. You know, doing things that make us feel upset, but we need to forgive us, you know, because we are. As long as we make an effort, we actually learn from our mistakes, right? Yeah. We are moving forward. Yeah.
Katherine Hurtig
Maggie, have you run into any kind of misconceptions about self-esteem that you encounter in your work? Like, do clients have an idea about the concept of self-esteem that isn't quite accurate? Yeah. And how do you address that? With your clients.
Maggie Jiang
It's very common that you know people come with. With this low self-esteem or, I was just looking at the form that the way they evaluate themselves, right, a lot of time clients feel like, OK, my friends have that, you know, I work hard. I didn't get that right. So they compare, yeah. Kind of know on what basis they compare themselves to others. They judge themselves by the method, so that's why I think it's very important to kind of look at whether that's external or internal. The intrinsic value and extrinsic value, I don't know. Have you heard of this concept?
Katherine Hurtig
I've heard of it, but I don’t know if I fully understand it.
Maggie Jiang
Yeah, intrinsic value is something you're born with, right? The potential. It's independent of others, the society, other people's opinions. So things like maybe your gifts, your unique qualities, your strengths, something that's characteristic right? That stays with you wherever you go, you have that. External is like, you know maybe your marriage, if you have a good marriage. A lot of people are just so proud of it. Yes, that is good, but knowing that marriage, jobs or maybe, productivities, those are externals. I have a client who is actually a principal engineer. When he had a job, everything was great and he made great money. But because his self-esteem is based on that job status. In Calgary oil and gas, we have these downturns and he got laid off then he felt like he was worthless.
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah, that’s so tough to tie your self-esteem to just one part of who you are.
Maggie Jiang
Exactly.
Katherine Hurtig
Because, yeah, if you lose that, that can be devastating. I mean, I could see that in lots of areas like if you tie yourself to your relationship like “I feel great about myself because I'm in this marriage.” Well, what if the marriage ends, you know?
Maggie Jiang
Yes. Exactly right. You know, jobs, we all retire. We're going to retire after retirement. What you're going to use to evaluate yourself.? Are you an appreciated person? Are you still gonna have good self-esteem and that is the question, right, yeah.
Katherine Hurtig
So how do we kind of spread that out? And still hold these things valuable, like feel pride and a connection to our jobs, relationships, whatever it is that we identify with, but also not rely on that to have good self-esteem. How do we do that?
Maggie Jiang
Yeah. I think that's a good question. So you kind of looking at the external/internal, it really helps us to look at what conditions we put on our worth. Unconditional self-worth, unconditional human worth is the best. But a lot of time we put a lot of these conditions. The conditions are changing.
Katherine Hurtig
When we put those conditions on ourselves.
Maggie Jiang
On ourselves. When we evaluate, maybe that comes from society, that’s from our internalized standards from society or culture, mandate or others. We need to be aware of those actually changing based on our self-esteem or something changing always like ups and downs. Your self-esteem is going up and down, so that's why I only think that it's important to look back. What you have is intrinsic that's independent of the external conditions. Your condition of self-esteem is very stable. You don't rely on others. Because we strive for growth, we can always have goals and want to be better, but those are the growth mindset. Remember, the growth in human growth? But that's not really affecting. That can enhance our self-esteem but should not be that. Just the base.
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah, that makes sense, yeah. We've talked about how self-esteem it can be influenced a lot by experiences in our lives, particularly in these developmental stages. You know, as we were younger. So what advice Maggie, would you give to parents in terms of fostering a healthy sense of self-esteem in their children?
Maggie Jiang
Mm-hmm. Great way to look at it. Right. So because the parents really, the family is central for children's development for the healthy sense of self, right? So I would say really take care of yourself, parents. If you mentally, you're modelling kids look at you a lot of time. You know, I think we learn by code, not by words. Right.
Katherine Hurtig
It's true. Yeah, for sure.
Maggie Jiang
How you handle life and stress, how you manage yourself, how you treat yourself right. Do you have a positive attitude? Do you have self-care strategies?
Katherine Hurtig
I think that's so important. I think, I mean, I'm not a biological parent. So I feel when I say that I feel like I don't have a lot of authority in terms of parenting, but I just, I have my own ideas around it like I think, yeah, parents or kids need to see their parents make themselves happy, if that makes sense. I think some parents, they just try to be completely selfless and put 110% in their parenting and being there for the kids. But I think there needs to be boundaries there too. I think it's healthy for kids to see their parents take care of themselves. Like you said, yeah.
Maggie Jiang
Yes. And you know, in the family it is so interesting that some of the articles I read, right. The best way to help your kids is to help them enjoy the relationship. Because if you are in a good relationship with your partner. That's the best security. You can see the kids don’t worry about whether they’re going to separate, whether they're gonna leave them alone, right? So they know it's safe. They can come to you. So building that healthy relationship is able to enjoy yourself. That tells more than your words.
Katherine Hurtig
Yes. Right.
Maggie Jiang
Right. And yeah, so I think also for parents from attachment, I use a lot of attachment how you build securely attached kids is through that secure base and safe haven. You enjoy your kids, you help your kids with exploration. If your kids encounter some of the threats or challenges because you know, challenges may be just a little, but you know from an adult perspective, maybe nothing. But for kids, that's a big issue. So we have to kind of turn ourselves into kids you know perspective, what is that we need to provide the help. Enjoy with them. If they make mistakes. OK, let's talk about it. That's not a big deal. You can learn, right? If they have some success. Let's celebrate, right, because this is great, affirming that effort. Right, so the kids feel like I can make mistakes. It's OK.
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah, that's huge!
Maggie Jiang
They still love me because yes, you showing that unconditionally. You love that person. But you know, maybe you don't like the behaviour. That's OK. Let's talk about it. That's not you. That's just a little part of you. So make this a safe haven for the kids to come to you and talk to you and you can set up their boundaries because kids, you know, they don't know what is normal, what is healthy and sometimes right when they're developing gradually you help them, right? So you really scaffolding, like scaffolding. You help the kids. Gradually, develop that normal sense.
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah. So they can take risks and make those mistakes, but you're kind of like the safety net, yeah.
Maggie Jiang
Yes, right. Yes, I think there are different things we can talk about, but you know this is what comes to my mind first, yeah.
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah. Yeah. So last question, Maggie, what kind of ongoing support or resources or practices do you recommend for people who are actively working on improving their self-esteem? Kind of outside of counselling?
Maggie Jiang
In addition to those things we already talk about, actionable, practical steps, I think you should also practice some self-compassion. It's huge. I think a lot of the time we are our own worst critics.
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah, it's true.
Maggie Jiang
Right. But you know, we know that we all make mistakes, but when we make mistakes can we acknowledge that and also show some compassion. Like normally if your friends make mistakes, what would you say to your friends.
Katherine Hurtig
That's an important practice to kind of do if you make like if you're being critical with yourself, turn it around. Like if my good friend did the same thing, what would I think, how would I talk to them?
Maggie Jiang
Exactly because you're treating yourself with double standards.
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah, totally.
Maggie Jiang
So how can we, just ask yourself what could we need in that moment to stand up, moving forward. Right. When you say things like very hard, very critical, is that going to help you?
Katherine Hurtig
No!
Maggie Jiang
No! Yeah so practice some compassion. Be kind to yourself and understand that we all make mistakes. We are a work in progress but you know we can continue because we learn the lessons. You know, this mistake might be just a stepping stone.
Katherine Hurtig
Exactly, yeah.
Maggie Jiang
Right. We can make better choices in the future if we learn something here. So that's why I think there's many, self-forgiveness is also important. I found a lot of time in my early years I held grudges on myself. Through the language I use, I just don't feel like I'm the best person. And then that is really going to help me because you accumulate a lot of this negative emotion here. You don't listen every time you think about yourself, you know that feeling, you know, it's not great, right? How can you feel good about yourself?
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah it’s heavy for sure.
Maggie Jiang
It's heavy. Right. So you know, I think just practice that self-forgiveness knowing that you know I'm making mistakes. But I want it to be better. And I learned lessons you know, turn the little mistakes into lessons learned in the future, and we can make better choices, right?
Katherine Hurtig
That's awesome.
Maggie Jiang
Yeah, of course. The others you know, as you know, you mentioned that you’re doing exercise physically. If you are physically lousy you're not going to feel good about yourself.
Katherine Hurtig
No, totally. Yeah, it always comes back to the basics of treating your body well too, you know, sleeping.
Maggie Jiang
Yeah, it's a good sleep, right?
Katherine Hurtig
Yeah, eating well.
Maggie Jiang
Eating well, eating healthy and also having an exercise active routine I think is super important.
Katherine Hurtig
Thank you so much, Maggie. I've really learned a lot today, thank you so much for your insight on self-esteem.
Maggie Jiang
Right. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you for having me and it's great. You know, through this process, I learned something that I maybe need to practice more. You know, I know sometimes life gets busy, right?
Katherine Hurtig
Totally.
Maggie Jiang
Yeah, we just, we forget to, you know, the things we have, the routines we have. We need to pick up.
Katherine Hurtig
Oh, this is great.
Katherine Hurtig
You've been listening to Living Fully, a Calgary Counselling Centre podcast. Thank you for tuning in.
This episode was produced by Luiza Campos, and by me, Katherine Hurtig. A special thanks to Maggie Jiang.
To stay up to date on our latest episodes be sure to subscribe. We're available in your favourite podcast app. Living Fully is a production of Calgary Counselling Centre and recorded in Calgary on Treaty 7 territory.
Living Fully podcast is not a substitute or alternative for professional care or treatment. Calgary Counselling Centre and Counselling Alberta provide effective counselling for anyone in Alberta with no wait list and no financial barriers. Find us online at calgarycounselling.com or counsellingalberta.com. For help across Canada and the United States call 211. If you are outside of Canada and the US seek help from your general medical practitioner.