Personal Development: Self-Image
Your Self-Image
Your self-image is very important. Self-image is the sum of all your thoughts, feelings and beliefs about who you really are.
You always act in accordance with your self-image. Everything you ever say, and everything you ever do, is governed by your self-image.
Your self-image is your personal identity. You never do anything that is not within your own concept of who you are. As a result, your self-image is very important.
It is important to develop a strong self-image
If your self-image is your personal identity, then it is vital that you develop a strong self-image.
Some people hold themselves in low esteem. They tell themselves that they are no good. They engage in too much self-depreciating self-talk; they say to themselves:
"I am no good at maths. I am not very intelligent. I am not very good at public speaking".
As a result of this ongoing negative self-talk, the person loses self-confidence, loses motivation to even try, and as a result, never even attempts to do any maths, or learn the material, or make the speech. As a result of never even trying, they never improve their maths, their education, nor their public speaking skills. Which renders their original self-assessment "true". But their negative truth is merely a reflection of their starting negative self-image.
On the other hand, if you have a strong self-image, then you would talk to yourself in more empowering ways. You say:
- I can do this.
- I could do that.
- If he can do it, then I am sure I could do it.
- If she can do it, then I am sure I could do it too.
- I can do anything I set my mind to do".
If you talk to yourself in such positive terms, then you will feel strong. If you feel strong, you act strong. If you act strong, then you get strong results. Your strong results are merely a reflection of your starting positive self-image.
You developed your self-image as you grew up
You developed your self-image as you were growing up. You got your self-image from the myriad influences that surrounded you. And you got your self-image from your own personal decisions about what to believe. You were influenced by your parents, your schooling, your friends, but your greatest influence was your own mind, and what you chose to accept as "true" about yourself.
You are a creature of self-made soul
As the philosopher Ayn Rand said it, "You are a creature of self-made soul. As a human being, you have no choice about the fact that you need a philosophy. Your only choice is whether you define your philosophy by a conscious, rational, disciplined process of thought and scrupulously logical deliberation-or let your subconscious accumulate a junk heap of unwarranted conclusions, false generalizations, undefined contradictions, undigested slogans, unidentified wishes, doubts and fears, thrown together by chance, but integrated by your subconscious into a kind of mongrel philosophy and fused into a single, solid weight: self-doubt, like a ball-and-chain in the place where your mind's wings should have grown."
Make your self-image to order
You have the ability to manage your own mind and make yourself into the person you want to become. By consciously working to improve your self-image, you can alter yourself and therefore alter your feelings, and therefore alter your actions and results.
As James Allen explains it, "(Your) mind may be likened to a garden, which may be intelligently cultivated or allowed to run wild; but whether cultivated or neglected, it must, and will, bring forth. If no useful seeds are put into it, then an abundance of useless weed seeds will fall therein, and will continue to produce their kind."
Use ideals as your way of creating a good self-image
In order to create a good self-image you can use your imagination to imagine 'The Perfect Person' in your own minds eye, and you use that as a template for your own actions.
You ask yourself, what would be your idealised version of the Best You possible. If you were the best version of you that could exist, what would that Best Version look like? How would that idealised "Best Version of You" act? How would the "Best You" react in various situations?
You can use your imagination to construct a mental ideal of who and what you want to be, then you try to act accordingly, even on the days that you don't feel like it.
Mental rehearsal as a means of improving performance
You use your imagination either to undermine your self-confidence, by picturing in your mind failure, or you use your imagination to build up your self-confidence by picturing success.
I recommend you do the latter.
The idea is simple but not easy:
Become very aware of how you are using your imagination and begin systematically, consciously and methodically to upgrade your own self-image, so that you move, step by step, day by day, closer and closer to the image that you have of the BEST-YOU possible.
Follow these steps
- Decide what would be the 'best you' possible, in different circumstances.
- Mentally visualise and rehearse how that Best You would walk, talk, think, feel, act and react.
- Try to walk, talk, think, feel, act and react in the same ways.
- Keep doing it until the act, becomes the real thing.
- It sounds simple, and in essence, it is.
You owe it to yourself and your family to be the best version of you that is possible
Why not become the 'Best You', you can be?
Start today upgrading your own self-image, and act accordingly.
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About the Author: Chris Farmer
Chris Farmer is the founder of the Corporate Coach Group and has many years’ experience in training leaders and managers, in both the public and private sectors, to achieve their organisational goals, especially during tough economic times. He is also well aware of the disciplines and problems associated with running a business.
Over the years, Chris has designed and delivered thousands of training programmes and has coached and motivated many management teams, groups and individuals. His training programmes are both structured and clear, designed to help delegates organise their thinking and, wherever necessary, to improve their techniques and skills.
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