Building High Self Esteem and Learning How To Love Yourself - Lessons From the Bible

Here are some great lesson we can learn from the bible about building high self esteem and loving yourself as an individual.

In Matthew 22:39, Jesus instructs his followers to "love your neighbour as yourself" what this implies is that you need a healthy self esteem and you need to learn how to love yourself before you can be successful at loving others. In fact it will be very difficult for you to love others if you dont love yourself.

Usually when people have a low self esteem, it usually manifests itself in the way they treat others, they'll be rude, jealous, envious, and always looking for ways to put other people down and this is usually because such people are not happy with who they are, they dont love themselves and therefore have a hard time trying to love and appreciate others.

if you are envious or jealous of someone for example, it's because you see them better than you see yourself, you are not happy with who you are and what you have and therefore you find yourself being jealous of those who you feel have your ideal life - this is evidence of low self esteem.

Building high self esteem will, like Jesus Instructed his fellowers, require you to begin to love and accept yourself, be comfortable in your own skin, be happy with who you are and what you have on the way to where you want to be.

When you don't love yourself, it will be difficult to love your neighbour (other people), and when Jesus is talking about loving yourself, he is really referring to having a positive and good self esteem. Loving yourself is an issue of self-esteem, it is about building high self esteem so that you wont be threatened or intimidated by the success of others.

Self esteem is not about believing that you are better than everybody - in fact that is evidence of low self-esteem because you derive significance from putting other people down.

As a plant needs water and light to grow, so too humans need a healthy self-esteem to grow in life. if you walk around believing that other people are better and more capable than you then you will never fulfil your potential. A healthy self-esteem is built on believing that you are lovable and capable. A healthy self-esteem is built on believing what Gods word (the bible) says about you. It is not just knowing what God's word says about you but believing it. Some people know what the word of God says about them but don't believe it.

How God See' You - What the Bible says About You

If what God and the bible says about you is important in building high self esteem, then it's important to know what God says about you in his words to you as documented in the bible.

Here are just a few things from the bible that God says about you, that will help you to begin to build your self esteem and love yourself.

Psalm 139:13-14 - You are wonderfully made, you are beautiful, stop allowing the media to tell you otherwise.

Philippians 4:13 - You can do all things through Christ, never tell yourself you can't achieve, never tell yourself you can't succeed.

Jer 1:5 - Before you were formed in your mother's womb God knew you, this means that your life is purposeful, your life is meaningful, God put you here for a reason, you are not useless.

John 3:16 - God loved you so much that he sent his only son to die for you, you are deserving of love, if God loves you this much it means that you deserve to be loved.

It doesn't matter who doesn't like you - God loves you. In fact you are so precious to God he calls you the apple of his eyes (see Psalms 17:8)

Romans 12:2 in the bible, talks about transforming yourself by renewing your mind. The key to building high self esteem therefore is to change the way you see yourself by transforming your mind (your thoughts) with what God says about you in his word (the bible)

Keys to Loving Yourself

One of the books in the bible (1 Corinthians 13:4) talks about the attributes of love. If you want to know how to love yourself then you must apply these attributes of love in the way you treat yourself.

Love is patient - be patient with yourself, you might not yet be where you want to be but you will get there.

Love is Kind - be kind to yourself, think well of yourself, be positive towards yourself, treat yourself, don't harm yourself.

Dont envy others - when you envy others you are indirectly saying you are not good enough.

Other Keys to Loving Yourself and Building High Self Esteem

Be content with what you have. (1 Tim 6:6)

When you envy others you are not loving yourself.

Compliment yourself.

Look good (present yourself well, make an effort, take pride in your appearance, when you look good you feel good).

Work hard to achieve your goals.

Think of past victories - you have won before, you can win again.

Believe in yourself.

Give - giving makes you feel good, when you have done something for someone else with no strings attached.

Build positive relationships with others.

It's interesting that God made us to be a masterpiece, unique, one of a kind - Did you realise that out of almost 7 billion people in the planet no one has your fingerprint. Yet because we don't recognise our uniqueness and value we spend our lives trying to be a copy of someone else.

Like it or not, you have to live in the skin you're in so you better start loving it. :o)

Building High Self Esteem Will Require You To Have The Attitude of a Lion

The Lion is the king of the Jungle, yet...

it is not the biggest animal

it is not the fastest animal

it is not the smartest or the most intelligent animal

it is not the strongest animal

Yet the Lion is the king of the jungle. You too might not be the biggest, the best, the strongest, the smartest, the prettiest, the most qualified but you can still be the king, you can still be the leader, you can still make it, you can still succeed, you can still find the man or woman of your dreams.

What makes the Lion the king is it's attitude, the lion is not intimidated by any other animal, you too must not be intimidated by people who you feel are more beautiful or more educated or more accomplished or more wealthy - you can take them!

I recommend The Ultimate Self Esteem Formula for more great tips and advice on building a high self esteem.