Last month, we discussed The Importance of Positive Self-Talk and how vital it is with your job search. This month we’re continuing on the self-talk topic, providing excellent insight and great tips to keep your positivity beaming. When your performance or life in general does not live up to your expectations, instead of criticizing yourself and diminishing your self-image, you need to take negative self-talk and turn it into positive affirmations.
“That’ not like me, the next time I’ll …. ” & “That’ not like me, I intend to … “
What you are doing with these statements is providing positive and immediate feedback to your subconscious. Instead of a negative picture, you trigger the picture of the desired performance you want. The key to reinforcing a good self-image or modifying a self-image for the better is to picture what you want your life to be. Stop picturing what you don’t want or are trying to avoid. Never complete a negative statement or thought – always reverse them and put them in a positive self-talk statement.
Individuals who want to lose weight need to focus on their healthy lifestyle versus focusing on the fear of gaining weight. Individuals who are ill need to focus on being healthy versus focusing on the fear of getting sicker or death. Individuals, who want to gain wealth, need to focus on money coming into their life easy versus focusing on the fear of poverty. In your job search, you need to focus on working in your dream job versus focusing on the fear of rejection.
When your performance or life pleases you and you feel good about it, you should use positive self-talk to reinforce this positive picture. You should affirm to yourself:
“I did that very well…” or “I’m proud I was able to accomplish that…”
Positive self-talk statements are the best way to either maintain or build-up your own self-esteem. They deliberately lock-out the negative put-downs that we and other people try to make us accept.
Although our attitudes cannot be totally erased because they are stored in the sub-conscience, they can be displaced or substituted through our self-talk. You can displace old negative attitudes with new success attitudes by consciously controlling your self-talk and not accepting the negative opinions and attitudes of those around us. You need to build your own self-image with your own self-talk. You must deliberately control your self-talk or it will control you.
List how you will displace some of your old negative attitudes with success attitudes through positive self-talk.
SELF ESTEEM EVALUATION
Score as follows: 3. TRUE. 2. LARGELY TRUE, 1. SOMEWHAT TRUE, 0. NOT TRUE
| POINTS | STATEMENT OF YOUR PRESENT ACTIONS |
| 1. I do my own thinking and make my own decisions. 2. I often justify or rationalize my mistake. 3. I rarely experience envy, jealousy or suspicion. 4. Losing causes me to feel “less than.” 5. I normally let others be “wrong” without attempting to correct them. 6. I am overly concerned about what others think of me. 7. I am free of guilt, shame or remorse. 8. I feel vulnerable to others’ opinions, attitudes and comments. 9. I am not prejudice toward religious, racial or ethnic groups. 10. I tend to downplay my own achievements and talents. 11. I willingly accept consequence of my actions. 12. I often exaggerate and lie to maintain a desired image. 13. I normally feel warm and friendly toward people. 14. I usually feel inadequate to handle a new or changing situation. 15. I freely express love, hostility or anger. 16. I am very often critical of others. 17. I am normally poised and comfortable when meeting new people. 18. I try hard to please people. 19. I speak up for my own convictions. 20. I have a strong need for recognition and approval. 21. I anticipate new endeavors with a positive expectancy and confidence. 22. I often brag about my achievements and myself. 23. I accept my own authority and do what I think is right. 24. I am often embarrassed by the actions of my family or friends. |
TO SCORE THE SELF-ESTEEM EVALUATION
1. Add up the total number of points for the ODD numbered questions.
2. Do the same for the EVEN numbered questions.
3. Subtract the EVEN total from the ODD total.
4. Your score could range from (minus) -36 to (plus) +39.
5. Perfect self-esteem would mean straight 3’s on the odd and straight 0’s on the even.
Your score is not as important as your awareness of areas that may need growth:
Review the ODD questions where you scored 0 or 1.
Review the EVEN questions where you scored 2 or 3. (These are the areas you need to improve.)
If you evaluate your current level of self-esteem and work to improve areas that need attention, you will present yourself much more effectively in an interview. Improved self-esteem means an improved job search!
ABOUT THE AUTHOR, Ingrid Moore
Ingrid Moore is the Founder and CEO of Corporate Resources of Illinois, an employment & staffing agency with over 20+years’ experience located in Schaumburg, IL. Ingrid and her team assist employers with finding the right hire for their business. For more info, follow us on our LinkedIn Company Page, or follow us Corporate Resources of Illinois‘s Google+ page.
