How do you stay calm and maintain your self-esteem in a tough environment? Here are some tips you may want to consider as a starter guide to self improvement.

Imagine yourself as a giant Dartboard. Everything and everyone else around you are Darts. These darts can destroy your self-esteem and pull you down in ways you will not even remember.

The trick is not to let these darts destroy you or get the best of you. So which darts should you avoid?

Dart #1: Negative Work Environment

Beware of the “dog-eat-dog” theory, which states that everyone is fighting just to get ahead. This is where non-appreciative people usually thrive.

No one will appreciate your contributions even if you miss lunch and dinner and stay up late. Often, you work too much without getting help from other people. Stay out of this trap for it will ruin your self-esteem. Be healthy enough to compete, but be sure to engage in a healthy competition.

Dart #2: Other People’s Behavior

Bulldozers, brown nosers, gossipmongers, whiners, backstabbers, snipers, the walking wounded, controllers, naggers, complainers, exploders, patronizers, sluffers -- these kinds of people draw in bad vibes for your self-esteem, as well as to your self-improvement scheme. Stay away from them!

Dart #3: Complacent Environment

You cannot be a green bug in a brown field. A change presents a challenge to your paradigms. It tests your flexibility and alters the way you think. Change will make your life difficult for a while, but it will help you find ways to improve yourself. The only thing that is constant in this world is change.

Dart #4: Fear of Experience

It is normal to cry “ouch!” when you experience pain. However, do not let pain transform into fear. It might grab you by the tail and swing you around. Treat each failure and mistake as a source of a life.

Dart #5: Negative Worldview

Look at what you focus on. Don't focus on the negativity of the world. In building self-esteem, you must learn how to make the best out of worst situations.

Dart #6: Determination Theory

Your behavior and attitude are products of your inherited traits (genetics), upbringing (experience), and environmental surroundings such as your spouse, company, or circle of friends. You have your own identity. If your father is a failure, it does not mean you have to be a failure too. Learn from other people’s experience, so you will never have to encounter the same mistakes.

Sometimes, people argue that some individuals are born leaders or positive thinkers. Being positive and staying positive is a choice. Building self-esteem and drawing lines for self-improvement is a choice, not a talent. God would not come down from heaven and tell you, “George, I now give you the permission to build self-esteem and improve yourself.”  

The decision to change comes from within. It is a choice. In making choices, the three important things to consider are attitude, behavior, and way of thinking.

Building self-esteem will eventually lead to self-improvement as you more become responsible about who you are, what you have, and what you do.

How do you start putting up the building blocks of self-esteem? Be positive. Be content and happy. Be appreciative. Never miss an opportunity to compliment. A positive way of living builds your self-esteem, which is your starter guide to self-improvement.

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