In modern times, most of us believe that improving our self-esteem is essential to our psychological health. But what is self-esteem? Why does it matter? How do you develop it, and how do others affect it?
Psychotherapist and self-esteem expert Nathaniel Branden answers these questions in The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem. In Part 1 of this guide, you’ll learn Branden’s definition of self-esteem and why it matters. In Part 2, you’ll discover how you can improve your own self-esteem by practicing six pillars, or categories of behaviors. In Part 3, we’ll explore how external factors influence your self-esteem, and in Part 4, you’ll learn how you can nurture self-esteem in others. Along the way, we’ll compare how Branden’s ideas relate to other psychologists’ work on self-esteem and provide practical strategies for implementing Branden’s ideas in your everyday life.
In order to improve your self-esteem, you must first understand what self-esteem is and why it matters. In this section, we’ll discuss the two essential elements of self-esteem and how your choices affect your self-esteem. Then, you’ll learn the four major reasons self-esteem matters, according to Branden.
Branden argues that self-esteem comprises capability and worthiness. Capability, which Branden calls “self-efficacy,” is when you trust your own mind and judgment—so you feel like you’re generally capable of learning the skills you need to earn a living, have healthy relationships, and recover when you face difficulties. Worthiness, which Branden calls “self-respect,” is the belief that you deserve happiness because you’re inherently valuable: It drives you to treat yourself well and expect similar respect from others. Both beliefs are essential to self-esteem.
(Shortform note: Branden’s definition of self-esteem is unique: Most psychologists define self-esteem as your sense of global self-worth, or how much value you believe you have—which encompasses self-respect but not self-efficacy. Moreover, some psychologists argue that self-efficacy refers to your confidence to succeed in a specific task, and your confidence in your general capability is simply “confidence.”)
Branden contends that your self-esteem both drives and depends on your behavior in a never-ending cycle: Your actions align with your expectations of yourself, and your behaviors inevitably affect your self-esteem—you can’t avoid feeling some way about how you choose to behave, and these feelings affect your opinion of yourself.
(Shortform note: In Awaken the Giant Within, life coach Tony Robbins contends that your identity works similarly: Your identity is a set of beliefs about yourself, and since you strive to be consistent with your beliefs, you act in ways that reinforce your existing identity. However, Robbins attributes this striving for consistency to external societal pressure: Society says changing your beliefs is wishy-washy, so you avoid it.)
1. Self-esteem affects you no matter what. As Branden notes, you can ignore your opinion of yourself, but you cannot refrain from having one. (Shortform note: It’s possible that the lower your self-esteem, the harder it is to ignore your opinion of yourself. In The Happiness Hypothesis, psychologist Jonathan Haidt explains that humans have a negativity bias that wires us to fear bad things more than we like good things—which may lead us to pay greater attention to negative thoughts.)
2. Self-esteem promotes your well-being. You’re capable of knowing what to do and choosing not to do it—but with high self-esteem, you select choices that support your well-being instead. (Shortform note: In reality, most of us don’t make the best choices available, regardless of our self-esteem levels. As psychologist Daniel Kahneman explains in Thinking, Fast and Slow, humans are subject to several cognitive biases that lead us to illogical choices.)
3. Self-esteem protects us from the worst life has to offer. Branden contends that someone with high self-esteem quickly recovers from life’s inevitable challenges; someone with low self-esteem lacks this ability, which inhibits their success. Of course, self-esteem doesn’t guarantee a fulfilled life, but without it, you won’t live the most fulfilling life possible. (Shortform note: In fact, one study of homeless youth found that having higher self-esteem buffered against some of the damaging effects of living on the streets.)
4. Self-esteem is necessary to survive the modern world, which requires you to make more choices than ever before. Branden contends that the more choices you need to make, the more you need self-esteem—you must trust your own judgment, decide what matters, and act accordingly. (Shortform note: Researchers add that the decisions you make throughout the day may drain your mental energy, making it more likely you’ll give into unhealthy impulses—and make worse choices—as the day goes on.)
You now know what self-esteem is—but how do you improve yours? In Part 2, Branden posits that you do so by practicing six pillars, or categories of behavior: Live with Awareness, Accept Yourself, Take Responsibility, Assert Yourself, Live Intentionally, and Act with Integrity. In this section, we’ll first discuss why practicing these pillars improves your self-esteem. We’ll then elaborate on each pillar, explaining what it entails and why it matters.
Branden explains that by practicing these pillars, you behave in ways that foster and improve your self-esteem. Since self-esteem consists of confidence that you’re capable and worthy, it occurs when you’re capable and worthy—so you must act like you are. Anybody can do this, Branden notes: While external factors affect your self-esteem, as we’ll discuss later, your behavior is the most important factor.
(Shortform note: If self-esteem occurs when you’re capable and worthy, that suggests that people should be able to accurately assess these traits in themselves. But research suggests that people tend to overestimate their capability in skills that might reveal their character—like how good of a friend they are. Healthy self-esteem requires recognizing not only your positive traits but also your flaws.)
But if you’re trying to build a belief that you’re capable and worthy, how do you behave according to the six pillars, which seem to require self-esteem? For example, how do you accept yourself (Pillar #2) without the self-esteem to feel worthy? Branden explains that you have to start somewhere—and since behaviors both cause and are effects of self-esteem, practicing the pillars begins a virtuous cycle: The more you accept yourself, the more you’ll raise your self-worth—and thus your self-esteem. The higher your self-esteem, the more self-worth you have, and the more you’ll accept yourself.
(Shortform note: Similarly, dissonance theory contends that if you do something out of line with your beliefs, you’ll change your beliefs to match your behavior.)
To practice each pillar, Branden recommends a therapeutic tool called sentence-completion exercises. He provides various “sentence stems,” or prompts—like, “If I accept my feelings more…” The exercise entails quickly brainstorming several endings for each prompt, without overthinking or self-editing. (Shortform note: Branden provides sentence-completion exercises for each pillar in the book, and we’ve summarized them in the full guide. His Twitter feed also lists dozens of sentence stems on topics like exploring feelings of anger and reflecting on your parents’ influence on you.)
How Do Sentence-Completion Exercises Improve Your Self-Esteem?
Scholars theorize that doing sentence-completion exercises improves both your self-awareness and your self-responsibility. First, psychologists contend that doing sentence-completion exercises increases your awareness of your behavior, which may improve your self-esteem if this awareness motivates you to improve your behavior. Second, psychologists argue that doing sentence-completion exercises encourages you to take responsibility—which, as we’ll learn later, is a pillar of self-esteem. They attribute this to the fact that the self-awareness you gain through your actions is a greater impetus for change than a therapist’s prodding.
Branden’s first pillar of self-esteem is to live consciously, or live with awareness. To do so, look for information about all the realities that affect your life, accept them, and act accordingly. For example, you take control of your finances by checking your bank account and adjusting your budget as needed. If you don’t look for this information, you’re not living with awareness; you’re choosing ignorance. If you learn relevant information and don’t react appropriately, you’re also not living with awareness—you’re still denying reality on some level.
(Shortform note: Consider developing a consistent system to help you pay attention to and act on the realities of your life, like the one that life coach Brendon Burchard recommends in High Performance Habits: Every week, chart your work-life balance by ranking your happiness levels in 10 areas, like work and family, then write down your goals for the next week in each area.)
Branden explains that living with awareness is the foundation of self-esteem. Every day, you make decisions that either do or don’t demonstrate a commitment to conscious living: You live with awareness by not buying a drink you can’t afford, or by not avoiding a necessary but tough conversation. Each decision either nurtures or chips away at your self-esteem—and, collectively, they determine your self-esteem.
(Shortform note: Branden’s explanation suggests that living with awareness improves your self-esteem by improving your self-efficacy: You react appropriately to your reality, so you make better decisions. With each good decision you make, you gather evidence that you’re capable—which increases your confidence that you’ll be capable in the future, and thus your self-esteem.)
Branden’s second pillar of self-esteem is to accept yourself by choosing not to live in conflict with yourself. (Shortform note: Like Branden, psychologist Tara Brach argues in Radical Acceptance that accepting yourself is critical to overcoming feelings of unworthiness: You must recognize your desires and dislikes without judging yourself for them.)
Self-acceptance happens on three different levels, says Branden.
1. You’re on your own side. On some fundamental level, you’re born believing that your life is worth fighting for, and this belief propels you to make the behavioral changes necessary to improve self-esteem. (Shortform note: In You Are A Badass, success coach Jen Sincero implies that we may lose this belief as we age because we absorb messages from those around us that make us stop trusting our instincts and fill us with self-doubt.)
2. You’re willing to experience all your emotions and behavior—both good and bad—even if you disapprove of some. This is essential because you can only change what you accept: If you deny that some unpleasant reality exists, you won’t try to change it. (Shortform note: In The Power of Now, spiritual teacher Eckhart Tolle also extols the importance of accepting unpleasant realities—otherwise, you’ll wish for something else, which will create pain and prevent you from moving forward. However, Tolle emphasizes accepting the situation you’re in at a particular moment—not an aspect of yourself, like self-esteem.)
3. You treat yourself with kindness by accepting your poor behavior, then empathetically questioning why you behaved poorly. (Shortform note: In Nonviolent Communication, psychologist Marshall Rosenberg recommends asking yourself, “What unmet need prompted me to act that way?”) This questioning allows you to address the root cause of your mistakes, so you’re less likely to repeat them. And by being kind, you avoid damaging your self-esteem even more than your poor behavior did already. (Shortform note: Treating yourself with kindness may also benefit the people around you: New mothers who treat themselves with kindness when they make mistakes may encourage friends who give birth after they do to do the same.)
Branden’s third pillar of self-esteem is to practice self-responsibility, or take responsibility in all areas of your life. Branden explains that when you take responsibility, you take ownership of your life, behavior, and well-being. (Shortform note: In The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, Mark Manson argues that taking responsibility will make you happier because you’ll feel empowered even in the worst situation.)
To do so, face your life actively rather than passively, which manifests in the following:
1. You are productive. You understand that you must achieve independence by working. So you ask yourself: What can I do? How can I improve my current state? (Shortform note: If you hate your job and thus struggle to be productive, try redefining work as any activity you do that aligns with your purpose, as Joseph R. Dominguez and Vicki Robin do in Your Money or Your Life. Accepting that you may never get paid for your true interests motivates you to find a different job that funds them and frees you to work on them for fulfillment instead of pay.)
2. You think independently. You analyze others’ opinions, only repeating them if you believe and understand them. (Shortform note: When analyzing others’ opinions, don’t automatically criticize them, which educators Mortimer J. Adler and Charles Van Doren warn against in How to Read a Book. They note that, in order to have a productive conversation, you must fully understand the author’s argument before you criticize it.) Similarly, you proactively find solutions instead of waiting for instructions. (Shortform note: To find an effective solution, The Oz Principle authors recommend pinpointing the root of the issue so you’re not wasting your time on superficial aspects.)
3. You are responsible for reaching your goals. You understand that only you can develop and implement a plan to achieve your goals. (Shortform note: In Getting Things Done, productivity expert David Allen offers a six-level model of prioritizing for effectively scheduling the tasks that support your goals.)
Branden contends that taking responsibility is essential both to self-esteem and to your general well-being for three reasons.
1. If you don’t take responsibility, you won’t feel like you control your life—so you can’t feel capable or worthy, which self-esteem requires. (Shortform note: The Happiness Advantage author Shawn Achor adds that feeling control over your life is essential to happiness and success.)
2. Unless you acknowledge that your self-esteem is your responsibility, you won’t take the actions necessary to raise it. (Shortform note: One life coach lists several warning phrases that may indicate that you’re holding others responsible for your self-esteem, such as “If only” or “It’s their fault.”)
3. If you don’t take responsibility, you might wait for someone to save you instead of fixing your own life—but since this person will never appear, your life will never improve. (Shortform note: Even if someone does show up to save you, it may not improve your life. “White knights” try to “save” their romantic partners by fixing all their problems, but they often engage in harmful behaviors, like controlling their partner under the pretense of helping them.)
Branden’s fourth pillar of self-esteem is to assert yourself by expressing what you want, need, and value in appropriate ways. You don't speak or act in ways incongruous with your thoughts or beliefs—and when this involves opposing others, you express this refusal politely.
(Shortform note: While asserting yourself requires confidence, in Crucial Conversations, the authors specify that it also requires humility if you’re opposing others: You must be humble enough to realize that you don’t know everything and that your opinion is a starting point for discussion.)
Branden contends that various elements of asserting yourself improve your self-esteem. For example, since self-assertion involves thinking for yourself and acting accordingly, living with awareness (Pillar 1) is an act of self-assertion.
(Shortform note: Branden’s discussion suggests that asserting yourself in general improves your self-esteem by reinforcing its two elements: capability and worthiness. You only assert yourself if you believe that you’re capable of generating good ideas and that they’re worthy of expression.)
Branden’s fifth pillar of self-esteem is to live purposefully, or live intentionally. Branden explains that when you live with intention, you don’t just react to what happens: You proactively decide what your long-term goals are, create plans to achieve them, then implement those plans.
(Shortform note: In Atomic Habits, habits expert James Clear warns that creating and following goals may be ineffective for long-term change. Once you reach the goal, you stop performing the behavior—which sends you right back to square one. Instead, Clear recommends creating identity-driven habits: Decide who you want to be, then create systems to support that identity.)
Branden explains that living intentionally improves your self-esteem by improving your confidence in your capability. You develop this confidence through the intentional process of achieving specific goals, not the achievement itself: If you win a race, your confidence rises not because you won but because you were able to create and follow a winning training plan.
(Shortform note: Working on small behavioral changes—not massive long-term goals—may give you more opportunities to live intentionally and thus have a greater impact on your self-esteem. Plus, according to The Compound Effect author Darren Hardy, consistently maintaining small changes often leads to the most dramatic results.)
Branden’s sixth and final pillar of self-esteem is to act with integrity, meaning that you strive to behave in ways that reflect your values. Additionally, since you can only live by your values if you know what they are, living with integrity involves examining why you have certain values and changing them if necessary—like if you hold a value you learned from others but no longer believe in. (Shortform note: In Awaken the Giant Within, Robbins recommends creating a value hierarchy. When you’re clear on which of your values are the most important to you, you can actively pursue the ones that will fulfill you the most.)
Branden warns that when you act without integrity, you damage your self-respect and thus your self-esteem. By rejecting the behavior your own mind deemed right, you reject yourself and lose self-respect. This is true even if nobody else knows about your bad behavior. (Shortform note: In reality, how others perceive you also impacts your behavior: In Atomic Habits, Clear explains that we often behave in certain ways because we want to fit in with different groups.)
You now know what you can do to improve your self-esteem—but external factors also affect your self-esteem. Branden contends that every culture affects the self-esteem of its members by instilling particular beliefs that affect how they view the world, thus impacting their self-esteem. (Shortform note: In 12 Rules for Life, psychologist Jordan Peterson adds that our perception of humanity as a whole also influences our self-esteem: Since humanity has repeatedly committed evil acts like the Holocaust, it’s become much easier for us to hate both humanity as a whole and ourselves (for being part of the fundamentally “evil” human race).)
For example, Western men are taught to judge their worth by how well they can provide for their families. This belief damages men’s self-esteem by teaching them to derive their worth from a service they provide, not from their intrinsic worth as human beings. (Shortform note: Psychologists warn that men may develop an “Atlas Complex," believing that they must provide for everyone. They inevitably buckle under the pressure, which damages their health and relationships.)
Some cultures value self-esteem more than others. For example, cultures that prioritize the group tend to devalue individuals and thus self-esteem. (Shortform note: Members of these cultures still can have high self-esteem, but it often stems from factors Branden doesn’t associate with self-esteem. Notably, young members of some group-minded cultures derive self-esteem from fulfilling societal expectations.)
But Branden argues that everybody needs self-esteem, regardless of culture, because you need self-esteem to survive. Unless you feel you’re intrinsically worthy, you won’t, for example, take the actions necessary to protect yourself—which will damage your ability to survive. (Shortform note: One Finnish study casts doubt on Branden’s argument: It found that low self-esteem did not increase mortality rates—only hopelessness did.)
You’ve now learned about how others influence your self-esteem—but how can you influence others’ self-esteem? In Part 4, you’ll learn the roles parents, schools, companies, and psychotherapists play in nurturing others’ self-esteem.
Branden contends that parents should provide children with the skills and beliefs they need to behave in ways that generate self-esteem. Newborns are like blank slates who are on a journey of psychological development to become autonomous adults with healthy self-esteem. If the parent doesn’t provide optimal conditions for this journey, he damages the child’s developing self-esteem, and that child could grow into an adult in an arrested stage of psychological development.
(Shortform note: To encourage self-esteem-supporting behavior in your kids, try promoting healthy striving, which Brené Brown defines in Daring Greatly as the drive to become the best version of yourself based on your own—not others’—standards. Brown warns that since children are so vulnerable, teaching them to judge themselves by others’ standards may unintentionally shame them, which traumatizes them and damages their self-esteem.)
To foster your child’s self-esteem, Branden recommends parenting behaviors that make the child feel “seen,” or understood. Your child determines how accurate her experience of herself is by gauging your reaction to her: When your reaction reflects what she believes, she feels understood, and this nurtures her self-esteem. But if your reaction doesn’t reflect her beliefs, she feels misunderstood and “invisible,” which harms her self-esteem. (Shortform note: Parenting experts add that making your child feel understood has other benefits: A child who feels understood is one who communicates his needs, remains motivated, and is more self-aware.)
Branden contends that it’s important to teach self-esteem in schools because schools are ripe with opportunities to promote or harm the self-esteem of their students. If a parent is emotionally unable to teach his child the skills needed to achieve healthy self-esteem, schools can rectify this gap—or, if they misstep, reinforce the harmful behaviors learned at home.
(Shortform note: In particular, researchers have highlighted how school-sponsored extracurricular activities can promote self-esteem by giving students opportunities to engage in what Branden would call self-esteem-supporting behaviors, like taking on challenges. This may be especially helpful for children who haven’t learned such behaviors at home.)
Branden recommends that schools support their students’ self-esteem on three levels:
1. The Curricular Level: Make building self-esteem a major educational objective. Schools should provide their students with the tools necessary for economic success, one of which is self-esteem: For example, workers at most modern jobs must make judgment calls, which requires self-esteem. (Shortform note: One 2019 study suggests that schools’ current curricula still don’t provide students with these skills: Over half of companies struggle to hire employees who are adaptable, which requires self-esteem.)
2. The Teacher Level: Teachers must improve their own self-esteem by following the six pillars. Kids imitate the adults in their lives—so if their teacher behaves in ways that reflect healthy self-esteem, they’re likely to imitate those behaviors. (Shortform note: Similarly, one study reveals that improving teachers’ mental health may improve their students' mental health, too.)
3. The Classroom Level: Each teacher should turn their classroom into an environment that supports self-esteem. (Shortform note: Doing so may also improve students’ grades: Studies suggest that students with higher self-esteem are more academically engaged, which can improve academic performance.) Branden suggests several ways to do so—like focusing on students’ strengths to help them gain confidence. (Shortform note: To determine your students’ strengths, some educators recommend looking for the subjects in which they demonstrate “brilliant behaviors.” For example, they may ask particularly thoughtful questions about a given topic.)
Branden argues that companies must foster their employees’ self-esteem to succeed in today’s knowledge economy. For companies to keep up with constantly changing realities and increasing global competition, their employees must engage in behaviors that require healthy self-esteem—like remaining aware of and responding appropriately to market developments (Pillar #2).
One way companies can promote their employees’ self-esteem, according to Branden, is to create a culture that fosters innovation and initiative by encouraging employees to see problems as opportunities, not challenges. They should also give employees the power and materials they need to do their jobs and to innovate when necessary.
(Shortform note: In No Rules Rules, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings and business professor Erin Meyer describe how Netflix policies that support self-esteem led to the company’s massive success: Today, Netflix has over 200 million subscribers. One such policy that fosters innovation and initiative lets Netflix employees propose and test big ideas—even if their bosses disagree.)
Branden contends that psychotherapists should make building self-esteem one of their main goals. This is partly because building self-esteem accomplishes both of psychotherapy’s two main goals: reduce suffering and uncover strengths. (Shortform note: Even if the psychotherapist doesn’t change the content of her treatment, one study suggests that framing the treatment goals as an attempt to live a life that’s more closely aligned with their values may increase how engaged the clients are.)
Branden recommends several ways psychotherapists can adjust their practices to improve their client’s self-esteem. One is to help the client figure out what he needs to learn instead of telling him what he needs to learn. Working out what he needs to learn on his own improves the client’s self-efficacy. In contrast, telling your client what to do may teach the client what they need to learn, which builds self-esteem, but robs him of the opportunity to reach that insight himself, which also nurtures self-esteem.
(Shortform note: Other professionals add that telling your clients what they need to learn or do ultimately harms your client because it doesn’t empower them to make their own decisions. As a therapist, your job is to help your client understand why she acts the way she does so that they can make better decisions in the future—even if you’re not there.)
In the modern world, most of us assume that we must have good self-esteem in order to be psychologically healthy. But what, exactly, is self-esteem, and how do you improve it?
In The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem, psychotherapist Nathaniel Branden challenges the prevailing assumption that self-esteem is unconditional love for yourself. Instead, he argues that your self-esteem depends on your behavior—and that only by behaving according to certain tenets, or pillars, can you improve your self-esteem. He also examines the role external influences play on your self-esteem, and how you can influence others’ self-esteem with the right behaviors.
Nathaniel Branden was a psychotherapist who dedicated his life to examining how self-esteem affects our daily lives, writing almost 20 books on the topic. As a result, Branden is known to many as “the father of self-esteem.” However, Branden was perhaps best-known for his relationship with philosopher Ayn Rand. Although the pair had a famous falling out in the late 1960s, Branden initially gained fame as her collaborator and was also her lover for some time. Branden’s initial work on self-esteem was heavily influenced by Rand’s ideas, and much of the material in his first book, The Psychology of Self-Esteem, was first published in a magazine they co-edited.
Branden passed away in 2014 at the age of 84.
Connect with Nathaniel Branden:
Publisher: Bantam
Published in 1994, The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem is Branden’s 14th book and his 11th on self-esteem. It builds on several ideas Branden discussed in previous works but is considered by its publishers as Branden’s “definitive book on the subject.” Notably, Branden’s first book on self-esteem, The Psychology of Self-Esteem, provides the philosophical underpinnings for what Six Pillars defines as self-esteem. Additionally, Branden first introduced several of the pillars, or behaviors he recommends for improving self-esteem, in How to Raise Your Self-Esteem (1987).
As noted in his introduction, Branden wrote Six Pillars as a criticism of the self-esteem movement of the late 1980s and early 1990s. In the mid-1980s, California politician John Vasconcellos discovered scientific research that correlated low self-esteem with various psychological issues. As a result, Vasconcellos came to believe that improving self-esteem could reduce various psychological and social issues—and in 1986, California created a state task force devoted to discovering how that might be.
This task force captured the attention of national media—first as a joke, then as a serious endeavor after University of California researchers confirmed a correlation between low self-esteem and social issues. This research, coupled with the task force’s publication of reports that highlighted how self-esteem improves practically everything—from your grades to your health to whether you follow the law—began a self-esteem craze that swept the nation: Companies, schools, and the government began creating programs focused on combating various issues by improving individuals’ self-esteem.
While Branden agreed with the premise that improving individuals’ self-esteem would reduce social issues, his disagreement with popular beliefs about how to raise self-esteem led him to write Six Pillars. His emphasis on self-esteem founded in your behavior stood out amongst a sea of texts touting self-esteem as love for yourself no matter what.
Reviewers who liked Six Pillars were most impressed with Branden’s philosophy of self-esteem and the actionable exercises in the book. However, many found Branden’s writing style confusing and wished that he’d been clearer and more concise.
Reviewers who disliked the book echoed its fans’ complaints about Branden’s writing style. They also found the book uneven: Most preferred the first half of the book, which focuses on what self-esteem is and how to improve it, over the second half, which discusses external influences on self-esteem. People who’d read Branden’s previous work were especially critical that Branden presented few new ideas in Six Pillars—Kirkus Reviews called it “yet another rehash of [Branden’s] favorite subject.”
In Six Pillars, Branden presents several useful ideas about self-esteem. However, his verbose writing style sometimes muddies his message: It’s not always clear what Branden is trying to say or why he thinks self-esteem works in the way that it does. This issue is compounded by the fact that Branden introduced many of the ideas in Six Pillars in previous works, and he often directs his reader to those works to get a more thorough explanation of certain ideas. In fact, Branden fills an appendix entitled “Recommendations for Further Study” solely with his own books on self-esteem. This strategy may keep Branden’s verbosity in check, but Branden’s lack of explanation within Six Pillars sometimes weakens his arguments.
Branden divides Six Pillars into three parts:
Branden ends his book with three appendices, the last of which is the “Recommendations for Further Study” discussed in the previous section. His first appendix criticizes other popular definitions of self-esteem (notably the one set forth by California’s task force). His second appendix presents a comprehensive 31-week program designed to improve self-esteem.
While Branden’s Part 1 ping-pongs between defining self-esteem and explaining its impact, our Part 1 defines self-esteem fully before touching on its impact. We’ve also split Branden’s Part 3 in half: Our Part 3 focuses on how external factors influence your self-esteem, while Part 4 highlights the actionable steps individuals and organizations can take to improve others’ self-esteem.
We’ve also added commentary that examines how modern scientific research supports or weakens Branden’s ideas and provides several practical strategies for implementing Branden’s ideas and improving your self-esteem.
In the modern world, most of us believe that self-esteem is essential to our psychological health. But what, exactly, is self-esteem? Why does it matter? How do you develop it, and how do others affect it?
In The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem, psychotherapist Nathaniel Branden answers these questions. He argues that self-esteem is a reflection of how you view yourself and that low self-esteem contributes to most psychological issues, while high self-esteem leads to greater achievement and happiness. Branden also contends that your self-esteem depends both on what you and others—like your parents—do.
Because of Branden’s pioneering work in the field of self-esteem and multiple best-selling books on the topic, he’s often called the “father of the self-esteem movement.” His first book, The Psychology of Self-Esteem, is credited with introducing self-esteem to the masses in 1969. He wrote Six Pillars in 1994 in response to how interpretations of self-esteem had changed since he first popularized the concept: By the 1990s, people tended to believe that self-esteem depended mostly on external factors, while Branden also emphasized internal factors.
This concerned Branden because you can’t develop effective methods for improving something unless you can define it. If you believe that self-esteem depends mostly on external factors, you won’t change your behavior—but Branden thought that changing your behavior is essential to improving self-esteem. Branden also worried that popular but ineffective methods for raising self-esteem would damage the reputations of both the concept of self-esteem and the broader field of psychology.
The Difficulties of Studying Self-Esteem
Modern researchers and psychologists, like Branden, have also criticized the self-esteem movement of the early ‘90s. However, many of their criticisms also apply to Branden’s
work.
Notably, researchers have generally found that self-esteem has a correlational relationship to various psychological and social issues and benefits, but not a causal relationship. In fact, as one critic notes, a 2003 review of the scientific literature on self-esteem found that “self-esteem is not a major predictor of almost anything.”
Critics also point out a persistent lack of consensus on what exactly constitutes self-esteem. Most scientific studies today—including those referenced in our commentary throughout this guide—still describe self-esteem as a general sense of self-worth and do not focus on behaviors that either improve or lower your self-esteem. One 2019 journal article suggests that lack of consensus on self-esteem may partly be attributable to linguistic bias: For example, the same behavior may be perceived by Person A as assertive, indicating high self-esteem, and by Person B as narcissistic. Since everybody defines various values slightly differently, it’s difficult to reach a consensus on exactly what self-esteem—or even the behaviors that Branden contends support self-esteem—entails.
Finally, Branden neglects to mention an issue that plagues both the self-esteem movement and his own work: How exactly do you measure self-esteem? Psychologists tend to use self-reported scales, like the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale, but if you don’t know what self-esteem is exactly, it’s hard to measure. Since Branden argues that your self-esteem depends on your behavior, an accurate measure of your self-esteem would likely depend on how often you behave like you have self-esteem. But Branden doesn’t suggest a scientifically valid way to measure people’s self-esteem, which makes proving or disproving his ideas more difficult.
So how, exactly, can you improve your self-esteem and achieve your full potential? In The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem, Branden presents a roadmap for doing so.
To understand why self-esteem matters and how to improve it, we must first understand what it is. In this section, you’ll learn about the two essential elements of self-esteem, and how your choices affect your self-esteem.
Branden argues that self-esteem is the tendency to believe that you’re capable of handling the fundamental necessities of life and that you deserve happiness. Branden calls this confidence in your own capability “self-efficacy,” and your belief that you deserve happiness “self-respect.” Both are essential ingredients of self-esteem: You cannot have healthy self-esteem if you lack either.
(Shortform note: Branden’s definition of self-esteem is unique: Most psychologists define self-esteem as your sense of global self-worth, or how much value you believe you have—which encompasses self-respect but not self-efficacy. Moreover, some psychologists define self-efficacy differently from Branden: They argue that self-efficacy refers to your confidence to succeed in a specific task, and your general confidence in your capability is simply “confidence.”)
Branden explains that the first element, self-efficacy or capability, is when you trust your own mind and judgment—so you feel like you control your life. You’re confident that you’re generally capable: You believe that you can learn the skills you need to succeed, even if you lack those skills in a specific area. You’re also confident that you can handle the fundamental necessities of life, namely to earn a living, have healthy relationships, and recover when you face difficulties.
(Shortform note: Research suggests that being confident in your capability may be more important than how capable you actually are, at least when it comes to how others perceive you. In The Confidence Code, Katty Kay and Claire Shipman note that people who think they’re capable (even if they’re objectively not) exude nonverbal cues that make them seem confident and inspire respect from others.)
The second element, self-respect or worthiness, entails believing you deserve happiness because you are generally good and inherently valuable. You believe that you’re worth making happy and that you deserve to enjoy the fruits of your labor. As such, you treat yourself well and expect similar respect from others. (Shortform note: In The Gifts of Imperfection, researcher Brené Brown also emphasizes the importance of worthiness, or believing that you are good enough as you are and deserve to be loved. One key to feeling worthy is to abandon the idea that you need to fit societal expectations: You are worthy as you are.)
Crucially, Branden contends, your self-esteem both drives and depends on your behavior in a never-ending cycle: Your actions align with your expectations of yourself, which are reinforced by the consequences of those actions. (Shortform note: In Awaken the Giant Within, life coach Tony Robbins contends that your identity works similarly: Your identity is a set of beliefs about yourself, and since you strive to be consistent with your beliefs, you act in ways that reinforce your existing identity. However, Robbins attributes this striving for consistency to external societal pressure: Society says changing your beliefs is wishy-washy, so you avoid it.)
Since you have total control over your behavior, your choices inevitably affect your self-esteem: You can’t avoid feeling some way about how you choose to behave, and those feelings affect your opinion of yourself. As such, self-esteem can’t be divorced from your behavior; it’s trust in your own capability and worthiness because you act in ways that support these ideas.
That said, self-esteem depends on the pattern of choices you tend to make—not a single choice. As such, self-esteem isn’t something you achieve once; you work on it throughout your life as it fluctuates.
(Shortform note: One study found that middle-aged people tend to have high self-esteem that gradually declines after they reach retirement age (around 60). Researchers posit that your self-esteem may drop as you age because of the change to your life roles—for example, you may no longer feel needed once your kids leave the nest. Branden might argue that a change in your life role necessarily encompasses a change in your behavior—and it’s this change in your behavior that reduces your self-esteem.)
We’ve now learned what self-esteem is—but why does it matter? Branden shares several reasons.
First, Branden argues, self-esteem affects you no matter what. You can ignore your opinion of yourself, but you cannot refrain from having one.
(Shortform note: It’s possible that the lower your self-esteem, the harder it is to ignore your opinion of yourself. In The Happiness Hypothesis, psychologist Jonathan Haidt explains that humans have a negativity bias that wires us to dislike and fear bad things more than we like good things. This may lead us to pay greater attention to negative than to positive thoughts.)
Second, Branden argues, self-esteem promotes your well-being, which depends on your ability to think of and select the most appropriate behavior. You’re capable of knowing the right thing to do and choosing not to do it—in other words, you have the free will to think and act in self-destructive ways—but high self-esteem leads you to bypass such self-destructive options in favor of choices that support your capability and worthiness.
(Shortform note: In reality, most of us don’t make the best choice available, regardless of our self-esteem levels. In Thinking, Fast and Slow, psychologist Daniel Kahneman explains that humans are subject to several cognitive biases that lead us to illogical choices—like the availability bias, our tendency to overweight and recall strong emotions over less emotional but more important issues.)
As a result, self-esteem creates self-fulfilling prophecies. For example, people with high self-esteem keep trying when they face challenges, which makes them more likely to succeed—which raises their self-esteem. But people with low self-esteem don’t try as hard, so they’re more likely to fail, which lowers their self-esteem.
(Shortform note: While studies have found that the higher your self-esteem, the greater you keep trying after you fail, most studies have failed to find that self-esteem causes success—only that the two are correlated.)
Third, Branden asserts that self-esteem protects us from the worst life has to offer—he calls it the “immune system of consciousness.” When you have high self-esteem, you’re able to deal with and quickly recover from life’s inevitable challenges. With low self-esteem, you lack this ability, which inhibits your success. Of course, you can technically survive without self-esteem, and self-esteem doesn’t guarantee a fulfilled life, but without it, you definitely won’t have the most fulfilling life possible.
(Shortform note: In fact, one study of homeless youth found that having higher self-esteem buffered against some of the damaging effects of living on the streets, like loneliness and suicidal thoughts.)
Finally, Branden argues that self-esteem is more important than ever because you need it to survive the modern world, which requires you to make more choices than ever before: Not only do you have total freedom over your beliefs, jobs, and spouses, but modern knowledge worker jobs also require you to take initiative and make choices in a way that factory jobs didn’t. Branden contends that the more choices you need to make, the more you need self-esteem—you must trust your own judgment, decide what matters, and act accordingly. Without self-esteem, you’ll grow afraid of these choices and escape to places that don’t require choice but are dangerous in other ways—like a cult.
Dealing With Decision Overload
Even the most mentally robust people occasionally struggle with the amount of choices they must make every day: Research shows that the decisions you make throughout the day may drain your mental energy, making it more likely you’ll give into unhealthy impulses as the day goes on.
Psychologists also contend that some mental health conditions that correlate with low self-esteem—like depression—may exacerbate this energy drain. However, they don’t recommend improving your self-esteem to make better choices. Rather, they suggest developing routines: By reducing the number of small decisions you make each day, you conserve your mental energy for big decisions that matter.
You’ve now learned why self-esteem matters—but how, exactly, does it improve your life? In this section, you’ll learn the major benefits of self-esteem. Then, you’ll learn how self-esteem correlates positively with several traits that improve happiness.
Branden first argues that healthy self-esteem benefits every area of your life and makes you generally happier. This is partly due to self-fulfilling prophecies: High self-esteem drives you to take positive actions, which creates positive results, which leads to even more positive actions. For example, when you have good self-esteem, you go after and are more likely to achieve more meaningful goals.
(Shortform note: Branden’s argument that self-esteem creates self-fulfilling prophecies may be an example of circular reasoning— a common problem with self-esteem research, according to one critic. For example: Why did this person go after meaningful goals? He had high self-esteem. How do you know he had high self-esteem? Well, he went after meaningful goals.)
Branden also suggests that self-esteem correlates positively with several traits that affect your ability to succeed and be happy, including:
When you’re rational, you respect evidence, and you understand that two contradictory statements cannot simultaneously be true in the same way. As such, you change your thoughts when they’re proven wrong instead of clinging to them. High self-esteem correlates with greater rationality because, as we’ll learn in Pillar #1, self-esteem requires that you look for and respond appropriately to evidence. (Shortform note: In actuality, most of us don’t change our minds because we rarely believe we’ve been proven wrong. This is due to confirmation bias, which Kahneman describes in Thinking, Fast and Slow: We tend to find and interpret information in ways that confirm our existing beliefs and undervalue information that contradicts them.)
Both intuitiveness and creativity require trust in your own mind. Your intuitions stem from subconscious thoughts that you can’t explain logically, so you must trust your mind enough to believe and act on such thoughts. (Shortform note: One study adds that your unconscious assessment of your own self-esteem levels is an act of intuition in and of itself.) Similarly, you only act on your creative insights if you believe that you’re capable of good ones. As such, high self-esteem correlates with both intuitiveness and creativity. (Shortform note: However, research suggests a caveat: One study found that people who have high self-esteem in a specific area are more creative in that area.)
When you’re confident in your own capability, you take ownership of your decisions and trust your ability to make them without others’ input—so high self-esteem correlates with higher independence. (Shortform note: This may be especially true when your self-image is questioned: One study found that someone whose ego is threatened becomes more independent if they have high self-esteem, but more reliant on others if they have low self-esteem.)
Just as healthy self-esteem benefits you, poor self-esteem harms you. In this section, you’ll learn how having low self-esteem causes you to behave in ways that further erode your self-esteem, diminish your happiness, and create problems in your relationships and work. We’ll also discuss how low self-esteem can be concealed by a false sense of self-esteem that may ultimately cause greater harm.
Branden warns that poor self-esteem encourages fear—and thus obstructs your ability to raise your self-esteem. He contends that to increase your self-esteem, you must believe that you’re capable and worthy of facing reality—about yourself, others, the circumstances of your life, and the consequences of your actions. But if you suspect you’re not capable or worthy, you don’t look for answers because you fear that they might prove you right: In other words, low self-esteem makes you afraid of facing reality. So you instead find comfort in the idea that you behave how you do because it’s who you are. Your behavior aligns with this image—which, as we’ve seen, lowers your self-esteem even further, creating a vicious cycle.
For example, if you have low self-esteem, you might fear that you’re incapable of sending out a strong job application—and then grow so paralyzed by this fear that you never bother to create one. You then create an image of yourself that you’re the kind of person who can’t find a job, and then you continue behavior that prevents you from finding a job—like not filling in the application.
(Shortform note: While people with low self-esteem are afraid of their own perceptions of reality, they tend to trust external validation. One study suggests that people with low self-esteem are more receptive to positive feedback from others than from themselves because they see others as more reliable. So if you’re afraid to fill out a job application, you could ask a friend to do it with you.)
Branden adds that if you have low self-esteem, you’re more likely to struggle in your romantic relationships. When you don’t love yourself, you’re unable to give love to others. So you instead look for others to give you the approval you can’t give yourself. This isn’t really love, Branden posits, but rather a search for validation. Worse, if you do receive love, you can’t accept it. When reality clashes with your narrative that you’re unlovable, you grow anxious. But you never consider that your narrative is wrong. Instead, you resolve your anxiety by making reality match what you believe and taking self-sabotaging actions that prove you’re unlovable—like being cruel to partners who treat you well until they get fed up with your mistreatment and leave.
(Shortform note: One study suggests a different way people with low self-esteem sabotage their relationship: To avoid being rejected outright when they ask their partners for help, they seek support in indirect ways—like sulking. However, this technique backfires: The partners tend to respond negatively, and the people with low self-esteem end up without the support they wanted.)
Moreover, low self-esteem damages your ability to succeed at work, too. Notably, you may feel threatened by others’ success. Since you’re unconfident in your own abilities, you judge others’ accomplishments not by their own merits but by how they reflect on you: When they succeed, you feel jealous and worry that their achievement will show the world how little you’re accomplishing. This may lead you to engage in destructive behavior, like being unnecessarily rude to your successful colleague.
(Shortform note: To diminish your jealousy over others’ accomplishments, one founder recommends saying to yourself: “Wow, I’m looking forward to reaching that milestone. What can I learn from how they got there? Viewing their accomplishment as an achievable goal will put it in a positive light and motivate you to work on your own ventures, too.)
Finally, some people with low self-esteem develop a false sense of self-esteem, or “pseudo self-esteem”—which, Branden warns, is dangerous. They don’t want to admit that they feel incapable and unworthy, so they find external sources of validation—like friends or lovers or possessions. For example, you may derive your self-worth from the attractiveness of your spouse. But this isn’t true self-esteem, Branden contends. Self-esteem ultimately comes from how you—not others—view yourself. So self-esteem that comes primarily from others lacks the benefits of true self-esteem. Moreover, Branden warns, it risks making you dependent on how others view you—which would lower your self-esteem even more.
(Shortform note: Social media has turned over-reliance on external validation into an epidemic, leading to low self-esteem, depression, and anxiety in many users. As it becomes easier to validate others and receive validation, people crave it in every aspect of their life—and they’ve grown so attached to other people’s reactions that they can’t recognize how they feel about themselves. To break this cycle, use self-reflection to recognize when you’re seeking validation through social media, and consider taking a break or even deleting your social media accounts in order to learn to rely on your own judgment of yourself.)
Now you know what self-esteem is—but how do you improve yours? In Part 2, Branden posits that you do so by practicing six pillars, or categories of behavior: Live with Awareness, Accept Yourself, Take Responsibility, Assert Yourself, Live Intentionally, and Act with Integrity.
Branden explains that by practicing these pillars, you behave in ways that foster and improve your self-esteem. As we’ve seen, self-esteem consists of confidence that you’re capable and worthy. In other words, it occurs when you’re capable and worthy—so you must act as if you are, which you do by practicing these pillars.
(Shortform note: The premise that self-esteem occurs when you’re capable and worthy assumes that people can accurately assess these traits in themselves, but research suggests that people tend to overestimate their capability in skills that might reveal their character—like how good of a friend they are. Healthy self-esteem requires recognizing not only your positive traits but also your flaws.)
Consistency is key, Branden notes: The more you get used to behaving in ways that support self-esteem, the more likely you’ll continue behaving in those ways because doing the opposite will make you uncomfortable. Imagine a child learning to brush their teeth: At first, it’s hard and uncomfortable, so they don’t want to do it. But eventually, they develop the habit—and grow into adults who can’t fathom not brushing their teeth regularly.
Branden’s pillars focus on your actions—not your beliefs—because beliefs alone don’t affect your self-esteem. Rather, your beliefs only affect your self-esteem if they drive your behavior. As with any value, your beliefs are hollow unless they’re expressed through action. For example, you must believe that effort is worthwhile in order to practice a new skill—if you never try something new, your belief in the value of effort has no substance.
But if you’re trying to build a belief that you’re capable and worthy, how do you practice the six pillars, which seem to require self-esteem? For example, how do you accept yourself (Pillar #2) without the self-esteem to feel worthy? Branden explains that you have to start somewhere—and since behaviors both cause and are effects of self-esteem, practicing the pillars begins a virtuous cycle: The more you accept yourself, the more you’ll raise your self-worth—and thus your self-esteem. The higher your self-esteem, the more self-worth you have, and the more you’ll accept yourself.
(Shortform note: Similarly, dissonance theory contends that if you do something out of line with your beliefs, you’ll change your beliefs to match your behavior. For example, in one famous study, men who were paid $20 to lie to a woman that a tedious task was interesting later rated the task as boring; men who were paid only $1 rated the task as interesting—presumably to justify their lie to the woman.)
These practices also focus specifically on what you do—not what others do. This is because, as Branden contends, anybody can significantly improve their self-esteem as long as they perform the right behaviors. External factors like a dysfunctional childhood may hamper your ability to develop healthy self-esteem, but they don’t determine it. We’ll discuss in Parts 3 and 4 how external factors impact self-esteem, but since the essential ingredient in improving your self-esteem is changing your behavior, that is Branden’s primary focus.
Are Self-Esteem-Supporting Behaviors Identity-Driven Habits?
Branden’s description of self-esteem-supporting behaviors closely aligns with James Clear’s description of identity-driven habits in Atomic Habits. According to Clear, an identity-driven habit begins with a decision about who you want to be. You then determine how this person would behave—and you act accordingly. The more you behave like that person, the more evidence you gather that you are that person. Eventually, you start to believe you are that person. At that point, you’re behaving like that person because it’s who you are.
Similarly, Branden argues that first, you decide that you want to be someone with high self-esteem. You then learn and implement the behaviors that support self-esteem. The more you behave like someone with high self-esteem, the more you start to believe you have self-esteem. Eventually, you do that behavior because you identify as someone with self-esteem.
You now know that in order to improve your self-esteem, you must behave in accordance with the pillars of self-esteem. But, as Branden notes, you only make the effort to improve your self-esteem if you have the motivation to do so. So where does this motivation come from? Branden contends that it stems from your love of life. Loving your life is essential because it motivates you to overcome the two major obstacles to improving your self-esteem: laziness, or inertia, and your desire for comfort.
(Shortform note: Branden calls this love of life the seventh pillar of self-esteem, and he presents it in his conclusion. We’ve included it here because it’s foundational to the six pillars: Unless you love your life, you won’t bother trying to improve your self-esteem through these behaviors in the first place.)
Branden explains that sometimes, we don’t improve our self-esteem due to inertia: We don’t want to do the work required. But unless you do this work, it’s impossible to raise your self-esteem. When you love your life, you see the value in working to improve your experience and well-being, so you’re able to overcome this inertia.
(Shortform note: In Tiny Habits, behavioral expert BJ Fogg warns against relying on motivation —like that which stems from your love of life—for long-term change because motivation is too fickle: It ebbs and flows based on various circumstances. Instead, Fogg contends that you can improve your odds of successfully changing by substituting abstract goals—like “have higher self-esteem”—with more concrete behaviors, like those described in the six pillars.)
Branden adds that we may not improve our self-esteem because we want to stay comfortable. As we’ve seen, improving your self-esteem eventually brings several benefits but may be uncomfortable in the short term. For example, to accept yourself, you must face truths you’d rather ignore. If you can’t handle this unpleasantness, Branden argues, you’ll shy away from every obstacle—and thus never do the work necessary to improve your self-esteem. But if you love your life, you’ll willingly withstand this discomfort because you’re pursuing a greater goal: higher self-esteem that will raise your quality of life. Additionally, as you experience the benefits of your growing self-esteem, you’ll grow even more motivated to keep going.
(Shortform note: If you can get more comfortable with being uncomfortable, you may grow more motivated to improve your self-esteem and find the process less unpleasant. In Can’t Hurt Me, military hero David Goggins recommends building your tolerance for discomfort by doing something you dislike every day.)
Branden’s first pillar of self-esteem is to live consciously, or live with awareness. In this section, you’ll first learn what living with awareness is and why it’s important. Then, you’ll learn how to use sentence-completion exercises to make living with awareness easier.
Branden explains that when you live with awareness, you look for information about the external and internal realities that affect your life, accept them, and act accordingly. For example, you take control of your finances by checking your bank account and adjusting your budget as needed. If you don’t look for information about these realities, you’re not living with awareness—you’re choosing ignorance instead. If you learn relevant information and don’t react appropriately, you’re also not living with awareness—you’re still denying reality on some level.
(Shortform note: Consider developing a consistent system to help you pay attention to and act on the realities of your life, as life coach Brendon Burchard recommends in High Performance Habits: Every week, chart your work-life balance by ranking your happiness levels in 10 areas, like work and family, then write down your goals for the next week in each area.)
Branden specifies that living with awareness involves situational awareness: You’re aware of everything that’s important in a particular situation and act accordingly. As such, you simultaneously choose not to pay attention to unimportant stimuli, which allows you to live in the moment. For example, if you’re focused on reading this guide, ignoring the room’s temperature is a sign you’re living with awareness—unless your teeth are chattering.
(Shortform note: Sometimes, things seem important but are just pressing. For example, if you’re working on an important presentation, a phone call from your boss about the presentation is both important and pressing, but a phone call from her about the holiday party may just be pressing. To determine whether something is important or merely pressing, plot out the difference with the graph recommended by productivity expert Stephen R. Covey in First Things First.)
Branden names several more specific habits you implement when you live with awareness.
1. You use your mind. You choose to think for yourself and to look for knowledge. (Shortform note: One way to do this is to learn about the unconscious biases that affect our decisions, which Kahneman describes in Thinking, Fast and Slow. Understanding these biases is an act of awareness that can help you make better decisions.)
2. You’re always learning because you know it’s necessary to maintain awareness of reality in an ever-changing world. You’re curious about the world around you and open to new ideas. You seek information that could alter your life and respond appropriately if you encounter it. You prioritize the truth instead of your ego, so you readily admit when you’re wrong. (Shortform note: In Ego Is The Enemy, Ryan Holiday warns that your ego can convince you that you know everything—but even someone who’s mastered a skill can find new ways to improve. He recommends becoming a mentor to someone more junior than you: The experience of teaching what you know improves your understanding of it and encourages you to grow.)
3. You know that what you believe isn’t necessarily true. For example, if your friend doesn’t text you, you may believe she doesn’t care about you. But just because you believe this doesn’t make it true—maybe she had an emergency. (Shortform note: If you’re having trouble discerning the difference, try the litmus test presented by researchers Douglas Stone, Bruce Patton, and Sheila Heen in Difficult Conversations: A fact is measurable and verifiable. Everything else is subjective.)
4. You try to understand yourself. You pay attention to your feelings, emotions, and behaviors, and you act on what they reveal. (Shortform note: If you don’t know how you feel about something, try the head/heart technique: Notice your thoughts, then direct your attention to your heart area. Do any feelings arise? These can be pure emotion or physical cues that indicate emotion—like a fluttering in your heart.)
5. You try to face unpleasant realities when necessary. You may occasionally succumb to the temptation of avoiding these painful realities—but as long as you sincerely attempt to face them, you’re living with awareness. (Shortform note: If you suspect you’re avoiding something, ask yourself questions like, “What dark secrets about myself have I never told anyone?")
6. You persist when you inevitably encounter difficulties, instead of giving up or making a half-hearted effort. That said, if you stop pursuing a goal because you lack the time or energy required to resolve the challenges involved, you’re still living with awareness. (Shortform note: Persevering when you encounter difficulties is an element of grit, which psychologist Angela Duckworth defines as a combination of perseverance and passion. In Grit, she contends that this perseverance doubles your success—first because perseverance increases your talent, and then because it increases the application of that talent.)
7. You practice deep breathing and relaxation techniques in order to fully embrace and feel your emotions. Branden explains that when you block your emotions, you breathe more shallowly and tighten your muscles. The longer you live without awareness of your emotions, the more ingrained these physical habits become—and eventually, you become incapable of feeling as much as you used to. Techniques like deep breathing reverse this pattern: You become physically able to feel more, so you’re able to be more aware of your emotions.
(Shortform note: Physically reconnecting with your body may be especially important for trauma survivors, who are prone to low self-esteem. In The Body Keeps the Score, researcher Bessel van der Kolk contends that trauma survivors suffer major disconnection from their bodies, and it’s only by becoming aware of and responding to their physicality that they can work through their trauma.)
You’ve now learned what living with awareness is—but why does it matter?
Branden argues that living with awareness is the foundation of self-esteem. Every day, you make decisions that either do or don’t demonstrate a commitment to conscious living: You live with awareness by not buying a drink you can’t afford, then do the opposite by avoiding a necessary but tough conversation. Although you don’t consciously remember most of these decisions because you make so many of them, each decision either nurtures or chips away at your self-esteem—and, collectively, they determine your self-esteem.
(Shortform note: Branden’s explanation suggests that living with awareness improves your self-esteem by improving your self-efficacy: You react appropriately to your reality, so you make better decisions. With each good decision you make, you gather evidence that you’re capable—which increases your confidence that you’ll be capable in the future, and thus your self-esteem.)
Moreover, Branden contends that living without awareness can lead to addiction: You turn to addictive substances to reduce your awareness of your pain. But the tools of your addiction only blunt your pain temporarily. Afterward, your pain returns more powerfully than before—so you need even more of your substance to dull your awareness of it. Branden adds that addiction is only possible if you live without awareness: You only knowingly do something bad for you if you ignore the reality that it’s bad for you.
(Shortform note: Like Branden, psychologist Tara Brach contends that addiction is an attempt to escape pain. However, in Radical Acceptance, she argues that addiction stems primarily from an inability to accept yourself. As we’ll see, Branden also discusses the importance of accepting yourself but doesn’t directly link it to addiction.)
How can you live with greater awareness? Branden recommends sentence-completion exercises, which is a tool used in therapy and in psychological research. For two weeks, when you wake up, brainstorm six to 10 endings to prompts, or “sentence stems,” like the ones listed below. These endings don’t need to be unique or meaningful, just grammatically correct. Write quickly without self-editing, spending no more than 10 minutes on the exercise. (Shortform note: We’ve included a selection of Branden’s full list of sentence stems for this exercise. He has several more in his books, as well as on his Twitter feed.)
Don’t review your answers. When you finish, go about your day as normal. Then, each weekday evening, write six to 10 endings to sentence stems like the ones below.
Don’t re-read any of your answers during the week, and don’t worry about repeating some answers. Each weekend, review your weekday writing and write at least six endings to the following prompt:
Branden contends that completing these exercises will naturally improve your self-esteem. He explains that we all have a well of knowledge we can’t immediately access. Completing these prompts allows us to tap into that well: Knowing you have to reflect each day on how greater awareness would improve your life increases how aware you are, improving your self-esteem.
Branden believes that once you complete the two-week program, you’ll have a solid understanding of how sentence completion works. You can then develop your own prompts to improve your consciousness in areas where you’re struggling with awareness.
How Sentence-Completion Improves Your Self-Esteem
Scholars theorize that doing sentence-completion exercises improves both your self-awareness and your self-responsibility—and since these are two pillars of self-esteem, this would explain why Branden believes that these exercises improve your self-esteem.
First, psychologists contend that by doing sentence-completion exercises, you naturally gain a greater awareness of your inner psychic life, which may propel behavior change: The more aware you become of some behavior, the more motivated you become to improve that behavior, so the greater your likelihood of changing it.
Second, psychologists argue that doing sentence-completion exercises encourages you to take responsibility—which, as we’ll learn later, is a pillar of self-esteem. They attribute this to the fact that the self-awareness you gain through your actions is a greater impetus for change than a therapist’s prodding.
Now that you’ve learned how living with awareness improves self-esteem, think about how you practice awareness currently and ways you might do so better in the future.
Describe a recent challenge you encountered. What problem did you face?
Now, describe how you responded to this situation. In what ways, if any, did you practice awareness? For example, did you ask relevant questions and respond quickly?
In what ways, if any, did you avoid awareness? For example, did you delay dealing with the situation?
How could you have responded with better awareness?
List three actions you will take to respond with awareness if a similar situation arises in the future.
Branden’s second pillar of self-esteem is to practice self-acceptance, or to accept yourself. In this section, you’ll learn what accepting yourself entails and why it’s important. Then, you’ll learn how to make accepting yourself easier.
Branden defines accepting yourself as choosing not to live in conflict with yourself. While an essential ingredient of self-esteem, it’s not the same as self-esteem: Self-esteem is a state you experience; accepting yourself is an action you take.
(Shortform note: Like Branden, Brach argues in Radical Acceptance that accepting yourself is critical to overcoming feelings of unworthiness. You must recognize your desires and dislikes without judging yourself for them or feeling forced to act upon them.)
Branden posits that you accept yourself on three different levels.
At the first level of accepting yourself, you’re on your own side. On some fundamental level, you’re born believing that you’re valuable and deserve to exist simply because you’re alive, though some people lose this belief as they age. This primal belief propels us to ask for the help we need and demand the respect we deserve.
(Shortform note: Branden contends that you may lose the conviction that you’re valuable due to your behavior, but success coach Jen Sincero proposes an alternative reason: In You Are A Badass, she argues that we lose our love for ourselves as we age because we absorb messages from those around us that make us stop trusting our instincts and fill us with self-doubt.)
At the second level of accepting yourself, you’re willing to experience all your emotions and behavior—both good and bad. This doesn’t mean you approve of them, just that you don’t deny them. To accept your feelings, Branden explains, use both your body and mind. Breathe deeply to feel the emotion and then take ownership of it—instead of tensing or denying it.
Notably, recognizing your reality isn’t the same as accepting it. For example, you might admit you love someone inappropriate—then immediately move on because you’ve admitted your feelings. This isn’t accepting yourself. You’re not sitting with your reality; you’re avoiding it.
(Shortform note: Like Branden, Brach also stresses the importance of understanding your experience without trying to change it and of always responding with care to whatever you’re experiencing, regardless of whether you’ve erred. Brach adds that if you can’t respond with care—like you might when you recognize but don’t accept your reality—you likely lack the tools to cope with what you’re experiencing, which leads you to judge or blame yourself.)
At the third level of accepting yourself, you treat yourself with kindness. To do this, Branden argues, you accept your poor behavior, then empathetically question why you behaved poorly. (Shortform note: In Nonviolent Communication, psychologist Marshall Rosenberg asserts that poor behavior stems primarily from unmet needs, so he suggests empathetically asking yourself questions like, “What unmet need prompted me to act that way?”)
Finally, Branden recommends, when you inevitably struggle to accept an emotion or behavior, accept yourself by accepting your unwillingness to accept it. If you can’t accept that, accept your unwillingness to accept that unacceptance. Keep going until you reach something you can accept.
(Shortform note: In The Power of Now, spiritual teacher Eckhart Tolle suggests an alternative mental exercise for dealing with things you struggle to accept: Imagine that the irritant has entered your body, and work to break down the “wall” it’s bumping up against so that it can pass through you.)
You now know what accepting yourself is—but why does it matter? Branden explains that you benefit from your general self-acceptance and from each individual level of accepting yourself.
In general, accepting your feelings can reveal a previously hidden emotion you can now deal with. For example, focusing on your indignation over not acing a test may reveal anxiety about your intelligence—and you can work on this anxiety. (Shortform note: If you don’t accept your feelings, these hidden emotions will come out anyway, the authors of Difficult Conversations warn—and if you avoid them, they’ll color your communication, ruin your relationships, and make you feel worse about yourself.)
Looking at each aspect of this pillar, first, being on your own side is the foundation on which you build self-esteem. Without this baseline belief that your life is worth fighting for, you won’t make the behavioral changes necessary to effectively improve your self-esteem. (Shortform note: Although Branden doesn’t draw this connection, this may relate to the necessity of loving your life, as we discussed previously.)
Second, being willing to experience your actions and emotions matters because you can only change what you accept. Branden rejects the idea that accepting your reality implies resignation to it; rather, you find the motivation to change only when you accept the reality you dislike. For example, Branden notes that you’ll only act to improve your self-esteem if you accept that you have low self-esteem. If you deny that you have low self-esteem, why would you try to change it?
(Shortform note: In The Power of Now, Tolle also emphasizes the importance of accepting your current reality, but he recommends accepting the situation you’re in at a particular moment—not an aspect of yourself, like your level of self-esteem.)
Third, treating yourself with kindness makes you less likely to repeat your mistakes. Compassionately reflecting on why you acted poorly allows you to address the root cause of that mistake. By doing this, you avoid damaging your self-esteem—so you don’t behave in negative ways that reflect damaged self-esteem in the future.
(Shortform note: Treating yourself with kindness may also benefit the people around you. For example, one psychologist notes that new mothers who treat themselves with kindness when they make mistakes may encourage friends who give birth after they do to do the same.)
Fourth, Branden adds that accepting your unwillingness to accept something naturally weakens that unwillingness. Resistance requires something to fight against; if there’s nothing, it naturally fades. (Shortform note: One healer adds that the key to acceptance is to understand why that resistance exists. Knowing it’s there for a good reason may help you relax and make you more open to whatever you’re resisting.)
Finally, Branden warns that if you don’t accept yourself, you risk not fulfilling your potential. Many of us resist our strengths because we fear the responsibility they come with. But unless you accept them, you can’t take full advantage of them.
(Shortform note: In contrast, some experts warn that relying too heavily on your strengths may also prevent you from fulfilling your potential. For example, one man’s penchant for planning may make him unable to delegate, which harms his work. So accept that the same quality can be both good and bad in different situations and work on specific aspects of it when necessary.)
Branden recommends a five-week writing program to help you learn to accept yourself.
Follow the instructions listed below every weekday morning and evening. Then, each weekend, review your answers and write six to 10 answers to the following prompt: “If any of what I wrote this week is true, it might be helpful if I…”
An Alternative Way to Accept Yourself: Build Shame Resilience
Practicing “shame resilience” may also improve your ability to accept yourself. In The Gifts of Imperfection, Brown explains that shame is a feeling that you don’t deserve love because you’re not good enough. This feeling compels you to reject and hide parts of yourself that you think others will dislike—just as you do when you cannot accept yourself.
However, you can build resilience against this shame by learning to identify shame as it occurs and move past it in a healthy way. Brown implies that you can do so via a four-step process:
Step 1: Learn how your shame manifests so that you can identify and address it. You may experience physical sensations, like a dry mouth, or fall into thought patterns, like “I’m not good enough.”
Step 2: Identify and evaluate the root cause of your shame. Shame often comes from not meeting certain expectations, so questioning those can build shame resilience. Are they really valid, or are they unrealistic?
Step 3: Talk to someone trustworthy about your feelings of shame. If you refuse to talk about your shame, it will fester and consume you. However, its influence over you will diminish if you get the shame out of your mind and into the world, where you and others can address it.
Step 4: Avoid unhealthy reactions to shame. Research has shown that we frequently deal with shame in various unhealthy ways, such as by distancing ourselves from or shaming others. None of these approaches to shame will help you to accept yourself.
Branden’s third pillar of self-esteem is to practice self-responsibility, or take responsibility in all areas of your life. In this chapter, you’ll learn what taking responsibility is, why it matters, and how you can facilitate it.
Branden explains that when you take responsibility, you take ownership of your life, behavior, and well-being.
(Shortform note: In The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, Mark Manson argues that taking responsibility will make you happier because you’ll feel empowered even in the worst situation.)
Specifically, Branden argues, you understand and practice the following:
1. You are responsible for reaching your goals. You understand that only you can develop and implement a plan to achieve your goals, and only you can ensure your schedule reflects your commitment to those goals. You also know that it’s your job to ask for any help you need. (Shortform note: To effectively schedule the tasks that support your goals, try the six-level model of prioritizing that productivity expert David Allen suggests in Getting Things Done.)
2. You are responsible for your behavior. You understand that you choose every action you take. (Shortform note: In Goals!, Brian Tracy writes that it's important to learn that any change you want to make in your life is entirely up to you. This means that you have to free yourself from a sense of entitlement, a victim mentality, and hypersensitivity to other people's opinions.)
3. You are responsible for how you relate to others. You don’t shift blame—if you claim to act some way because somebody else is unreasonable, you’re shirking your responsibility. You also understand that it’s your job to clearly communicate your message and to ensure that others understand it.
(Shortform note: You may struggle to take responsibility for your behavior and relationships if you’ve experienced trauma that affects either. Keep in mind the distinction that The Subtle Art of Not Giving A F*ck author Manson points out: You are not to blame for everything that happens to you, but you are responsible for how you respond to it.)
4. You are responsible for your happiness and self-esteem, which are totally in your control. You don’t depend on others—like your parents or spouse—to provide it. (Shortform note: In Designing Your Life, Silicon Valley innovators Bill Burnett and Dave Evans recommend a technique you can use to exercise greater control over how you feel about your life: Plot out several ways of living that you might enjoy, pick one, then let go of the options you didn’t choose instead of agonizing over them.)
Branden adds that taking responsibility involves facing life actively rather than passively, which manifests in the following.
1. You are productive. You understand that you must achieve independence by working. So you ask yourself: What can I do? How can I improve my current state? (Shortform note: If you struggle to improve your productivity because you dislike your job, try redefining work as any activity you do that aligns with your values, purposes, and dreams, as Joseph R. Dominguez and Vicki Robin do in Your Money or Your Life. Accepting that you may never get paid for what you truly want to do gives you both the freedom to pursue it without worrying about pay and the motivation to find a different job that funds your true interests.)
2. You think independently. You analyze others’ opinions, only repeating them if you believe and understand them. (Shortform note: While Branden primarily warns against automatically accepting others’ opinions, in How to Read a Book, educators Mortimer J. Adler and Charles Van Doren add that automatically criticizing others’ opinions is also harmful. If you criticize an author without first fully understanding them, you’re not having a conversation that can lead to learning, because you’re not actually criticizing the author’s argument.)
3. You look for solutions instead of waiting for instructions. (Shortform note: To find an effective solution to any problem, The Oz Principle authors recommend pinpointing the root of the issue so you’re not wasting your time on superficial aspects.)
Branden contends that taking responsibility is essential both to self-esteem and to your general well-being: If you don’t take responsibility, you won’t feel like you control your life—so you can’t feel capable or worthy, which self-esteem requires. For example, if you don’t take responsibility for your finances as an adult and instead rely on your parents to fund your life, you won’t feel like you can do things they dislike—so you won’t feel capable or worthy of living according to your own desires.
Codependency: What Happens When You Don’t Take Responsibility
Counselor Melody Beattie’s description of codependency—when someone becomes so obsessed with someone else that they lose sight of themselves—demonstrates how not taking responsibility can harm your well-being and self-esteem. In Codependent No More, Beattie explains that codependent people often take responsibility for others but never for themselves—which leads them to neglect their own well-being. And although Beattie doesn’t explicitly connect not taking responsibility with damage to your self-esteem, she does recommend improving your self-esteem to become less codependent—which suggests that taking responsibility would improve your self-esteem, too.
Additionally, you only act to raise your self-esteem if you understand that your self-esteem is your responsibility. Since Branden believes that your self-esteem depends on your behavior, he rejects the notion that you can develop and maintain self-esteem through external sources regardless of your behavior. For example, even if your parents instill in you high self-esteem, you might act in ways that contradict the six pillars and diminish your self-esteem. If you don’t acknowledge that you’re in control of your self-esteem, you won’t behave in the ways necessary to raise and sustain it.
(Shortform note: One life coach lists several warning phrases that may indicate that you’re holding others responsible for your self-esteem, such as “If only” or “It’s their fault.”)
More generally, if you don’t take responsibility, you risk never improving your life. Branden contends that some people who aren’t self-responsible wait for someone to come save them instead of fixing their own lives. But this person never appears, so their lives never improve.
(Shortform note: Even if someone does show up to save you, it may not improve your life. Psychologists coined the term “white knight syndrome” to describe people who try to “save” their romantic partners by fixing all their problems. But white knights often engage in harmful behaviors, like controlling their partner under the pretense of helping them.)
Finally, Branden argues, taking responsibility compels you to treat others well. When you recognize that you have ownership over your choices, you also recognize that others have ownership over their choices. Therefore, you don’t treat others as tools for accomplishing your goals: If you want them to do something, you give reasons that appeal to them. For example, if you ask your parents to babysit your kids, you frame it as an opportunity for them to spend time with their grandkids—and you don’t get mad if they have other plans instead.
(Shortform note: One Harvard Business Review writer found that accepting others’ ownership over their choices ultimately benefited her. When she asked someone for help with her research, they refused—but they offered to introduce her to someone who might be interested. Since the writer was flexible and agreed, she ultimately got the help she needed.)
To take more responsibility in your life, Branden recommends a nine-week sentence completion program.
Every weekday, follow the instructions listed below. Then, each weekend, review your answers and write six to 10 answers to the following: “If any of what I wrote this week is true, it might be helpful if I…”
Week 1: Create and answer four sentence stems addressing what taking responsibility means to you, how you feel about taking responsibility for yourself, and what happens when you do or don’t take responsibility for yourself.
Week 2: Create and answer four sentence stems addressing what happens when you do or don’t take responsibility for your goals, what would happen if you took responsibility for your relationships, and in what ways you occasionally behave passively.
Week 3: Create and answer three sentence stems addressing what would happen if you took more responsibility for ideas your parents taught you and for your acceptance or rejection of those ideas, and what would happen if you were more aware of the ideas that drive you.
Week 4: Create and answer four sentence stems addressing what happens when you do or don’t take responsibility for your happiness, and what happens when you do or don’t take responsibility for who you choose to spend time with.
Week 5: Create and answer four sentence stems addressing what happens when you do or don’t take responsibility for what you say to others, what happens if you grow more aware of what you say to yourself, and what happens when you take responsibility for what you say to yourself.
Week 6: Create and answer four sentence stems addressing the ways in which you increase your helplessness, depression, and anxiety, and what happens when you take responsibility for the behaviors that increase your helplessness.
Week 7: Create and answer five sentence stems addressing what happens when you take responsibility for the behaviors that increase your depression and anxiety, what would happen if you felt prepared to face your responsibility, what you have trouble acknowledging, and what happens when you take responsibility for how you live.
Week 8: Create and answer four sentence stems addressing the situations in which you feel like you’re taking the most or least responsibility, and what would happen if you could live for yourself and ignore others’ expectations of you.
Week 9: Create and answer four sentence stems addressing what would happen if you admitted that you could alter your own life, what would happen if nobody could save you from your own life, what would happen if you took responsibility for your life, and what you’re starting to notice.
Alternative Ways to Facilitate Self-Responsibility
In addition to Branden’s sentence-completion exercises, there are several practices you can do to encourage greater self-responsibility in your life.
One method is to tell yourself different stories about why you’re not acting in service of goals. If you’re not self-responsible, you’ll tell yourself BED-time stories: You’ll blame others, make excuses, and practice denial. Such stories give you an excuse to do nothing to improve your life. If you find yourself using phrases like “If only” or “I will when X happens,” you may have fallen for such stories.
To take responsibility, replace these stories with OAR-some stories: Take ownership of your choices, hold yourself accountable, and take responsibility. Since you’ll likely struggle to change your thought patterns, consider also getting help from a mental health professional.
Another way to encourage greater self-responsibility in your life is to stop complaining. Complaining is a form of evading responsibility because you focus on the negative circumstances around you. Instead, when bad things happen to you, focus on the positive by asking yourself, “What’s the lesson in this?” Alternatively, you could also take responsibility by trying to fix the situation in some way.
A third strategy is to be present. By paying more attention to your thoughts, you’re more likely to notice when your thinking evades responsibility—and when this happens, replace these thoughts with ones that take responsibility instead.
Think about how you take responsibility currently and ways you might do so better in the future.
Name an important goal of yours. This could be personal—like improving a relationship—or professional—like learning a new skill.
Write down two ways you’ve pursued this goal in the past week.
If you didn’t pursue this goal, write down why.
Evaluate your answer to the question above: Is it full of excuses, or do you take responsibility for your role in the situation? Remember that even a valid reason for not pursuing your goals may signal an avoidance of responsibility. For example, you may not have pursued your goal because you were sick—but you may have fallen ill because you’ve been neglecting your health.
Take responsibility for your goals by listing two things you’ll do to achieve them this week.
Branden’s fourth pillar of self-esteem is to practice self-assertiveness, or assert yourself. In this section, you’ll learn what asserting yourself entails and why it matters. Then, you’ll learn how to improve your ability to assert yourself.
Branden explains that when you assert yourself, you express what you want, need, and value in appropriate ways. You don't speak or act in ways incongruous with what you think or believe—and when this involves opposing others, you express this refusal carefully. For example, you stand up to your boss calmly, not by yelling at them.
(Shortform note: Asserting yourself might seem like it primarily requires confidence—but in Crucial Conversations, the authors add that expressing yourself to people who oppose you also requires humility: You must be humble enough to realize that you don’t know everything and that your opinion is a starting point for discussion.)
Specifically, Branden explains, when you assert yourself, you do the following:
1. You assert your consciousness. At its core, asserting yourself is the choice to think for yourself and act accordingly. (This closely aligns with the definition of living with awareness because, as Branden notes, living with awareness is the “most fundamental act of self-assertion.”) You live in a way that demonstrates your values while simultaneously protecting your boundaries. For example, if you value family time, you set a hard stop on a late work meeting, and you stick to it.
(Shortform note: If you struggle to express your values in your romantic relationships, try following the tips Amir Levine and Rachel Heller suggest in Attached, like timing your discussion for when both parties are calm and collected.)
2. You act on your inner thoughts and feelings. Branden emphasizes that just having thoughts and feelings doesn’t constitute asserting yourself. It’s only when you act on them—like when you fight for your idea—that you assert yourself. (Shortform note: If you struggle to act on your ideas, The Confidence Code authors Kay and Shipman recommend starting with baby steps. For example, if you struggle to express your ideas in a meeting, start with lower stakes by suggesting where to go to lunch.)
3. You prioritize your own desires over others’ expectations because you understand that only you—not others—are accountable for your decisions. For example, you honor your calling to become an artist, even if your parents think doing so is selfish because you won’t be able to fund their retirement. (Shortform note: In The Four Tendencies, author Gretchen Rubin explains that some people readily respond to external expectations but struggle to respond to internal ones—no matter how important their desire is to them. Such people may only be able to prioritize their desires by building external accountability into their system. For example, you may only create art if you regularly tell your parents how much you produced.)
4. You try to master life’s challenges head-on. You learn new skills, improve those you already possess, and persist even if the learning process stumps you. (Shortform note: In Drive, Daniel Pink adds that you only work on your skills and persist despite struggling if you have a growth mindset—a belief that your abilities aren’t fixed and you can improve with effort.)
You’ve now learned what it means to assert yourself—but why does it matter?
Branden contends that various elements of asserting yourself improve your self-esteem. For example, living with awareness is an act of self-assertion, and we’ve already discussed in Pillar #1 how living consciously improves self-esteem.
(Shortform note: Branden’s discussion suggests that asserting yourself in general may improve your self-esteem by reinforcing its two elements: capability and worthiness. You only assert yourself if you believe that you’re capable of generating good ideas and that they’re worthy of expression.)
Branden further contends that asserting yourself is essential for a healthy society. If you’re from a society that prioritizes group harmony over individual expression, you might fear that asserting yourself will isolate you from your community. However, Branden argues, a healthy society requires people to assert themselves: A society is only healthy if its members are healthy, and healthy people value both their individuality and their relationships.
(Shortform note: Branden argues that asserting yourself improves the health of your society—but he disregards the immediate detrimental impacts that asserting yourself can have on the individual in certain cultures and for certain types of people. For example, studies show that women who are just assertive as their male peers aren’t as well-liked.)
Branden recommends the following four-week sentence-completion program to improve your ability to assert yourself.
Every weekday morning and evening, follow the instructions listed below. Then, each weekend, review your answers and write six to 10 answers to the following prompt: “If any of what I wrote this week is true, it might be helpful if I…”
Week 1: Create and answer four sentence stems addressing what asserting yourself means to you, what would happen if you asserted yourself a little more today, what would happen if you were taught that your desires mattered, and what would happen if you behaved as they did.
Week 2: Create and answer four sentence stems addressing what happens when you pay attention to or ignore your innermost desires, what would happen if you acted in accordance with your desires, and what would happen if you expressed yourself more regularly.
Week 3: Create and answer four sentence stems addressing what happens when you ignore your views, what would happen if you expressed or ignored your desires, and what would happen if people knew your true, best self.
Week 4: Create and answer four sentence stems addressing what would happen if you could access your true and best self, what happens when you convey your true self, what happens when you conceal your true self, and what would happen if you wanted a fuller life.
Alternative Strategies for Asserting Yourself
If you struggle to assert yourself in a specific situation, other strategies experts recommend include the following:
Use relaxation techniques like gentle breathing or meditation to alleviate any fear you may have around asserting yourself.
Practice what you’ll say beforehand by conversing with friends or writing a script. This boosts your confidence and makes your message stronger.
Temper your language so that you don’t come across as accusatory or aggressive. Use “I” statements like “I feel” instead of “you” statements like “You did this.” Similarly, saying “Part of me” instead of “I” can introduce ambivalence and make your message easier to stomach.
Be mindful of your non-verbal communication: Even if your words are calm, aggressive body language will muddy your message. In 12 Rules for Life, psychologist Jordan Peterson states that if you stand up straight, you’ll exude confidence.
Branden’s fifth pillar of self-esteem is to live purposefully, or live intentionally. In this section, you’ll first learn what it means to live intentionally and why it matters. Then, you’ll learn how to make living intentionally easier.
Branden explains that when you live with intention, you don’t just react to what happens: You proactively decide what your goals are, create plans to achieve them, then implement those plans.
(Shortform note: In Atomic Habits, Clear warns that creating and following goals may not be effective for long-term change. Once you reach the goal, you stop performing the behavior—which can send you right back to square one. For long-term change, Clear recommends creating identity-driven habits instead: First decide who you want to be, then create systems to support that identity.)
Specifically, you do the following:
1. You live productively. In other words, you earn your keep by actualizing your thoughts, setting and pursuing goals, and creating things that support your existence. The amount you produce is irrelevant—as long as you’re trying to be productive. (Shortform note: How do you live productively after retirement? One way is to view your retirement as an opportunity to implement your legacy, as this would still involve actualizing your goals.)
2. You know what you want long-term in your personal and professional life—or you’re trying to figure it out. You can only steer your life appropriately if you know where you want to go. (Shortform note: Once you know what you want, follow Ego is the Enemy author Ryan Holiday’s advice: Work toward your goals instead of talking about working toward them. Holiday warns that the latter is a form of procrastination that replaces the time you should spend working with time spent talking.)
3. You practice self-discipline. You can ignore your immediate desires that conflict with your long-term goals. But you’re also capable of living in the present when it’s appropriate. For example, you skip most bar hangouts to study for your graduate school admission test, but you go when it’s your best friend’s birthday, and you don’t bring your flashcards. (Shortform note: In The Willpower Instinct, health psychologist Kelly McGonigal suggests combating unhealthy desires by slowing down your breathing. This turns on your pause-and-plan response, which protects you from making impulsive decisions that are bad for you.)
4. You know how you’ll get what you want. You have specific plans to achieve specific goals. (Shortform note: In Smarter Faster Better, Charles Duhigg recommends setting SMART goals: Your goals should be Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Timely.)
5. You know whether your behavior supports your goals because you regularly check whether you’re behaving according to your plan. If not, you adjust your behavior or your purpose. (Shortform note: In Atomic Habits, Clear suggests an easy way to determine whether your behavior supports your goals: Create a habit tracker, which is a visual representation of your progress toward each goal.)
6. You pay attention to real-world feedback and adjust accordingly because you know that following your initial plan doesn’t always work. For example, your actions may have unintended negative consequences that detract from your ultimate goal. (Shortform note: To adjust your plan effectively, investor and Principles author Ray Dalio recommends thinking about everything that led to the problem and writing down specific tasks and timelines to solve it. He also recommends considering the second- and third-order consequences of any change; doing so may help you avoid further unintended consequences.)
According to Branden, living intentionally improves your confidence in your capability—and thus your self-esteem. He contends that we develop this confidence through the process of achieving specific goals, not the achievement itself: If you win a race, your confidence rises not because you won but because you were able to create and follow a winning training plan.
(Shortform note: Working on small behavioral changes—not massive long-term goals—may give you more opportunities to live intentionally and thus have a greater impact on your self-esteem. Plus, according to The Compound Effect author Darren Hardy, consistently maintaining small changes often leads to the most dramatic results.)
Since confidence comes from the process of succeeding and not from the success itself, you can develop confidence in your capability even if you don’t succeed. Understanding this may prevent you from using external achievements as the main source of your self-esteem—which Branden warns against, especially the use of professional achievements. So much of your professional success is out of your control: For example, you may be fired if your company loses money. So if you derive self-esteem from your professional success, you risk letting setbacks you can’t control diminish not only your financial standing but also your self-worth.
(Shortform note: Using professional achievement as the main source of your self-esteem may also damage your mental health. In an effort to prove yourself, you may overextend yourself and risk burning out.)
To improve the likelihood that you’ll live intentionally, Branden recommends creating and answering several sentence stems that address questions like the ones listed below. Branden doesn’t provide a specific timeline during which you should complete these sentence stems.
(Shortform note: Another way to improve how intentionally you live is to build routines, as Hardy recommends in The Compound Effect. He argues that setting daily, weekly, and monthly routines helps you get into a rhythm that makes following new habits even easier.)
Branden’s sixth and final pillar of self-esteem is to practice personal integrity, or act with integrity. In this section, you’ll learn what it means to act with integrity, why it matters, and how you can improve your ability to do so.
Branden explains that when you act with integrity, your behavior reflects your values. You may not choose the perfect option every time, Branden notes, but you strive to find and follow the option that best reflects your values. If your values point to opposing behaviors, you weigh your options and select what seems best.
(Shortform note: In Awaken the Giant Within, Robbins recommends creating a value hierarchy. When you’re clear on which values matter the most to you, you can actively pursue them, which will fulfill you the most and improve your life.)
As Branden notes, since you only live by your values if you know what they are, living with integrity also involves examining why you have certain values and changing them if necessary. You developed your values based on both your personal experience and what others taught you, but you may no longer believe in them. These values may even cause harm. If so, don’t ignore them—re-examine and update them.
(Shortform note: In The Subtle Art of Not Giving A F*ck, Manson also warns that we may hold destructive values that crowd out positive values and lead to dissatisfaction. For example, Manson says that prioritizing superficial pleasure may disrupt your relationships with others.)
Branden argues that when you act without integrity, you damage your self-respect and thus your self-esteem. By rejecting the behavior your own mind decided is right, you reject yourself and lose self-respect. This is also why others’ knowledge of your bad behavior is irrelevant: Your self-respect depends only on how you judge yourself. Since you can’t avoid knowing whether your behavior reflects your values, you can’t violate your integrity without damaging your self-respect—and thus your self-esteem.
(Shortform note: In reality, how others perceive you also massively impacts your behavior. In Atomic Habits, Clear explains that we often behave in certain ways because we want to fit in with different groups. So surrounding yourself with people who have similar values—and would judge you for rejecting them—may help you act with more integrity.)
In addition to self-judgment, living without integrity causes guilt, which you feel because you chose not to live by your values. But you can only choose to live by your values—to practice integrity—in situations you can control. As such, it’s important to understand the difference between what you can and can’t control. For example, you can’t control that you were promoted right after your friend was fired, but you can control how you deliver that news to her. Otherwise, you may feel guilty over something you couldn’t control—which may comfort you by making you feel like you could have changed an unfortunate situation, but will damage your self-esteem.
(Shortform note: If you still feel guilty over a situation you can’t control, some experts recommend expressing gratitude in practical ways, like thanking people who have supported you and acknowledging opportunities you’ve had. )
How can you improve your practice of integrity? Branden recommends two main methods.
Branden contends that you must follow all five steps; otherwise, you won’t stop feeling guilty. However, it’s OK if you’re unable to complete a step due to circumstances you can’t control (for example, if it’s impossible to minimize or make up for the damage you caused)—as long as you try your best to complete it.
(Shortform note: Branden never makes explicit why these five steps repair your integrity. However, he writes that acts of integrity can alleviate any guilt you feel from acting without integrity, which suggests that these five steps work because they are acts of integrity.)
(Shortform note: Branden’s five steps align with Mark Manson’s advice in The Subtle Art of Not Giving A F*ck for repairing broken trust in relationships. Manson argues that people break trust when they value something else more than the relationship, and that’s what damages the relationship. To regain trust, the transgressor must own up to the values that led to the rift. Then, through improved behavior over time, they must prove that they prioritize the relationship over those values.)
To improve your ability to act with integrity, Branden recommends a two-week sentence completion program.
Every weekday, follow the instructions listed below. Then, each weekend, review your answers and write six to 10 answers to the following: “If any of what I wrote this week is true, it might be helpful if I…”
Week 1: Create and answer four sentence stems addressing what integrity means to you, in what situations you struggle to act with integrity, what would happen if you became more aware of those situations, and what would happen if you behaved with more integrity in your life.
Week 2: Create and answer four sentence stems addressing what would happen if you behaved with integrity in your career and relationships, and what would happen if you lived only by the values you sincerely believe in—not by the ones you don’t.
An Alternate Method for Practicing Integrity
In Dare to Lead, Brené Brown recommends a different method for ensuring that you regularly practice your values: Create a set of guidelines for each of your values, then check in with those guidelines occasionally to ensure that you’re acting with integrity and that your actions represent who you really are. As you develop your guidelines, reflect on these questions for each value:
What are several behaviors that support this value?
What are behaviors that I would consider to be outside this value?
Can I think of a particular moment of integrity, when I was especially living by this value?
You’ve now learned what you can do to improve your self-esteem. Although Branden emphasizes that self-esteem starts with your own behavior, he also examines the role that external factors play in supporting or diminishing self-esteem. In Part 3, you’ll learn about how the culture you grow up in influences your self-esteem.
Branden discusses how every culture influences the self-esteem of its members—to both their advantage and disadvantage. In this section, you’ll first learn why self-esteem is a universal need, regardless of whether a particular culture supports it. Then, you’ll learn how cultures affect the self-esteem of their members—and how cultural values that support or discourage self-esteem affect the overall health of societies.
While Branden acknowledges that self-esteem is a recent Western concept, he argues that everybody needs self-esteem, regardless of culture, because you need self-esteem to survive: You only feel capable of handling the fundamental necessities of life—which you must in order to survive—if you have healthy self-esteem. Similarly, unless you feel you’re intrinsically worthy, you won’t, for example, take the actions necessary to protect yourself—and in this way, you’ll damage your ability to survive. (Shortform note: One Finnish study casts doubt on Branden’s argument. It found that low self-esteem did not increase mortality rates—only hopelessness did.)
Additionally, every culture affects the self-esteem of its members by instilling particular beliefs that affect how they view the world, thus impacting their self-esteem. Individuals often aren’t aware of these cultural beliefs—but even when they are, Branden argues, it’s impossible to avoid the influence of these beliefs.
(Shortform note: In 12 Rules for Life, Peterson argues that our perception of humanity as a whole also influences our self-esteem. Since humanity has repeatedly revealed its propensity for evil—for instance, through atrocities such as the Holocaust—it’s become much easier for us to hate both humanity as a whole and ourselves (presumably for being part of the fundamentally “evil” human race).)
As an example, Branden points to two traditional Western beliefs regarding gender roles. First, Branden notes, women were historically deemed subservient to men. The ways in which this belief manifests in modern society continue to damage women’s self-esteem—even the ones who don’t consider themselves subservient to men in any way. (Shortform note: In The Confidence Code, Katty Kay and Claire Shipman explain that these beliefs manifest in schools: Girls are encouraged to be well-behaved, which discourages confidence-building behavior and may thus damage self-esteem.)
Second, Western men are taught to judge their worth by how well they provide for their families. This belief damages men’s self-esteem by teaching them to derive their worth from a service they provide, not from their intrinsic worth as human beings. (Shortform note: Psychologists warn that men may develop an “Atlas Complex" and believe that they must provide for everyone until they buckle under the pressure—which damages their health and relationships.)
Branden argues that two types of cultures are particularly unsupportive of self-esteem.
First, group-minded cultures, which Branden calls “tribal cultures,” prioritize the needs of the group over those of its members. By their nature, these cultures deem the individual unimportant—and so self-esteem is unimportant, too. (Shortform note: People from group-minded cultures can still have healthy self-esteem, but it often stems from factors Branden doesn’t believe indicate self-esteem. For example, one study found that young members of some group-minded cultures derive self-esteem from fulfilling societal expectations.)
Second, cultures that are both religious and authoritarian have proven to be unsupportive of self-esteem throughout history. Such cultures, Branden points out, regularly punish various expressions of self-esteem. For example, they punish anybody who dares to assert themselves by expressing a different point of view. However, the fact that these cultures don’t value certain pillars of self-esteem doesn’t diminish the pillars’ importance for members of those societies: Asserting yourself is still important even in religious, authoritarian cultures.
(Shortform note: The fact that many people go to great lengths to assert themselves in religious, authoritarian cultures despite the dangers of doing so supports Branden’s contention that expressing yourself is critical to your self-esteem. In Burundi, where people in gay relationships may be fined or jailed, young lesbians sometimes wear a secret symbol of their sexuality in public.This symbol allows them to find other lesbians with whom they can be themselves and take a break from hiding their sexuality—a self-rejecting behavior that likely damages their self-esteem.)
Not every culture has such a straightforward relationship with self-esteem. Branden notes that American culture has elements that both support and are detrimental to self-esteem. On one hand, the Declaration of Independence enshrines personal freedom, which demonstrates how Americans value the individual—not the group. Similarly, Americans of previous centuries had to pave their own economic way instead of relying on the community—which required the capability and worthiness that are integral to self-esteem. On the other hand, other cultural aspects—like the gender roles described above and the legacies of slavery and discrimination against Black Americans—are harmful to self-esteem, especially among certain segments of the population.
(Shortform note: In Sapiens, philosopher Yuval Noah Harari argues that such cultural contradictions are beneficial. America’s contradicting attitudes and actions related to self-esteem—for example, that the Declaration of Independence enshrined personal freedom when slavery was legal in the United States—lead to cognitive dissonance, which occurs when we simultaneously hold multiple beliefs that are incompatible with one another. Cultures continually attempt to resolve contradictions like these in their myth, which leads us to examine and progress beyond them, allowing for a more creative and dynamic species.)
Furthermore, since the foundation of the United States, Americans have always come from many different cultures. As a result, they’ve always had many different cultural beliefs, some of which carry over from cultures that don’t value self-esteem. Therefore, American culture has always included values that support self-esteem, and others that are harmful to self-esteem.
(Shortform note: In Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell describes how a single culture in the American South simultaneously supports and harms self-esteem. The American South is a culture of honor, in which your self-worth (and sometimes your livelihood) is based on your reputation, so you’re more likely to fight if it’s challenged. On one hand, a culture of honor harms your self-esteem because it prioritizes external validation. On the other hand, a culture of honor values self-assertion, which supports self-esteem.)
Branden warns that today, elements detrimental to self-esteem are starting to dominate American culture and leading to various social problems. In the mid-20th century, ideological movements like nihilism, moral relativism, Marxism, and epistemological agnosticism spread amongst American academics. As a result, academics started to teach several ideas that Branden deems anti-self-esteem. For example, they taught that nobody can know what constitutes reality, so our minds are unimportant and unreliable. They also taught that nobody can control their behavior, so nobody can take credit nor be held accountable for their behavior.
(Shortform note: Branden’s rejection of mid-20th-century ideological movements likely reflects the objectivist philosophies he learned from Ayn Rand. For several years, Branden ran a business teaching Rand’s objectivism, which centers on the idea that reality exists whether you can perceive it or not. In contrast, the movements Branden names—nihilism, moral relativism, Marxism, and epistemological agnosticism—all fall broadly under the umbrella of postmodernism, which argues that reality is essentially unknowable and a conceptual construct.)~~ ~~
These ideas created a populace who started to believe that they were victims who were owed more. This ideology also influenced the systems Americans created—which, Branden argues, explains the rise in various societal problems over the latter half of the 20th century. For example, Branden contends that modern welfare systems don’t effectively fight poverty because they teach the poor that their poverty is out of their control. As such, the poor believe that improving their economic situation is impossible and thus don’t try to improve their lives.
(Shortform note: Branden’s emphasis on personal responsibility for your economic situation ignores the reality that many people face systemic inequities—even within the welfare system—that make it harder for them to improve their lives. For example, prior to 2021, even the maximum benefits from the government’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) couldn’t cover moderately priced meal costs in 96% of US counties.)
To resolve these problems, Branden asserts, Americans—and every culture—must instead uphold and fight for the elements that support self-esteem. The increase in social issues in modern America proves that cultural values that are anti-self-esteem decrease the self-esteem of its members and thus harm them. Instead, Branden argues, cultures should instill values that support each pillar of self-esteem; this will not only raise individuals’ self-esteem but also create a healthier, happier society.
(Shortform note: The logic of Branden’s argument is faulty: The corresponding rise of anti-self-esteem cultural values and social issues does not prove that those values caused those social issues. In How to Lie with Statistics, journalist Darrell Huff explains that there are several other ways to explain the relationship between two factors. For example, it’s possible that both factors are effects of some other cause, or that they correlate merely due to chance.)
You’ve now learned about how others influence your self-esteem—but how can you influence others’ self-esteem? In Part 4, you’ll first learn the influence parents have on our self-esteem and Branden’s recommendations for helping your children develop healthy self-esteem. Then, we’ll explore the roles that schools, companies, and psychotherapists play in nurturing others’ self-esteem.
Branden discusses the influence that parents have on their children’s self-esteem. In this section, we’ll first discuss the main goals of parenting with regard to helping children develop self-esteem. Then, we’ll discuss the specific practices parents should implement to help their kids develop self-esteem.
Branden contends that proper parenting should provide children with the skills and beliefs they need to behave in ways that generate self-esteem. Newborns are like blank slates who are on a journey to discover themselves—in other words, to reach the final stage of psychological development, when they are autonomous adults with healthy self-esteem. If the parent doesn’t fulfill his duty to provide optimal conditions for this journey, he damages the child’s still-developing self. Unless this damage is rectified, the child grows into an adult who is in an arrested stage of psychological development—and whose self-esteem is unhealthy. Of course, these children can still adopt behavior that nurtures their self-esteem, so parenting doesn’t determine a child’s self-esteem, but it can support or hamper it.
(Shortform note: To encourage self-esteem-supporting behavior in your kids, try promoting healthy striving, which Brené Brown defines in Daring Greatly as the drive to become the best version of yourself based on your own—not others’—standards. Brown warns that since children are so vulnerable, teaching them to judge themselves by others’ standards may unintentionally shame them, which traumatizes them and damages their self-esteem.)
One of the main ways to foster children’s self-esteem is to make the child feel “seen,” or understood—which is a common theme among the specific parenting behaviors Branden recommends. He explains that, since we can’t know with certainty if our experiences of ourselves are objectively true, we look to others’ reactions to us to determine how accurate they are. Children, who are still developing, do this with their parents: When their parents’ reactions reflect what they experience and believe, they feel understood, which makes them feel that they are special and that they belong. But if the parents’ reaction does not reflect what they believe, they feel misunderstood and “invisible,” which harms their self-esteem.
(Shortform note: Parenting experts add that making your child feel understood has other benefits: A child who feels understood is one who communicates his needs, remains motivated, and is more self-aware.)
Making a child feel seen doesn’t involve agreeing with everything they do. You can still criticize them, but your reaction can’t make the child’s belief seem absurd. For example, don’t provide overblown praise for an objectively mediocre achievement.
(Shortform note: One psychologist notes that if your child’s action reminds you of a traumatic experience, you may overreact and criticize them more harshly than warranted. She recommends identifying your triggers, and if your child engages in them, take a moment to collect yourself so that you don’t overreact.)
But what are the specific behaviors parents should perform to help their children generate self-esteem? Branden recommends focusing on the following.
1. Parents should provide an environment where their child feels safe—both physically, with proper food and shelter, and emotionally. In part, this involves creating a predictable environment. The rules don’t constantly change and the parents act relatively stably. Growing up in a predictable environment supports the development of self-efficacy: If I can accurately predict what will happen in my home, I learn that my mind is useful and trustworthy—and when I trust my mind, I grow confident in my capability.
(Shortform note: In Attached, Levine and Heller add that growing up in a predictable environment also encourages secure attachment, which studies show correlates positively with self-esteem: If your parents are available and responsive to your needs, you develop an expectation that others will also care about your needs.)
2. Parents should express love through their words, behavior, and emotions. A child who receives love learns that they are worthy of love; a child who doesn’t receive love learns that they are unworthy of love.
(Shortform note: Try learning your child’s love language, which Gary Chapman defines in The 5 Love Languages as the types of actions that make him feel the most loved. Chapman’s book focuses on how to speak your partner’s love language, but his advice is applicable to everybody—including your children.)
Expressing love through touch is especially effective. This is partly because touch is preverbal, so you can use it on children who are too young to understand words. Additionally, touch is physical: If you lovingly touch me, I know that you love me—not some abstract version of me—because I can feel you doing so. Children who are touch-deprived often don’t feel loved; they think that someone who really loved them would touch them.
(Shortform note: Touch may also be effective because of its physiological effects: Being touched lowers your heart rate, relaxes you, and encourages dopamine, a hormone related to pleasure.)
3. Parents should accept their children by listening to and recognizing what the child wants, feels, and thinks. Branden explains that children who are accepted learn to accept themselves. In contrast, children whose parents reject them learn to reject themselves: They agree with their parents so as not to lose their love. You don’t have to be enthusiastic about or agree with every desire your child has. For example, you don’t have to love football because your kid wants to play professionally. But you do have to accept that he loves it.
(Shortform note: Modern psychologists emphasize that recognizing and accepting your child’s needs doesn’t mean always giving in to their desires—a parenting strategy that can backfire because it ultimately diminishes the respect your kids have for you.)
4. Parents should respect their children by treating them politely: Don’t use language to your child that you would never use to an adult—like telling her she’s “dumb” for forgetting something. Branden explains that by treating your child and the people around them with respect, your child learns that it’s standard to treat both themselves and others with respect.
(Shortform note: Modern parenting experts argue that, in an attempt to respect their children, many parents have gone too far in the other direction: Parents ask children to do things instead of telling them what to do. This strategy works for trivial decisions, but not for important decisions like eating healthily. For example, children who are asked to eat healthily learn that they’re in control and only eat what they want, which can lead to long-term health issues.)
5. Parents should provide their children with reasonable rules and expectations. You should be able to explain why these rules exist and update them to age-appropriate levels as your child grows. Branden rejects the notion that letting your child run free encourages healthy self-esteem. Instead, he contends that by setting boundaries, you reassure children that they’re safe because someone appropriate is in control. So boundaries encourage self-esteem; a lack of boundaries encourages not self-esteem but insecurity and anxiety.
(Shortform note: In 12 Rules for Life, Peterson contends that by not teaching your kids boundaries, you’re effectively outsourcing that training to society, which is far less tolerant than you are. For example, if you don’t teach your child how to control her temper, other children may refuse to play with her.)
6. Parents should praise their children descriptively, or “appreciatively,” instead of judgmentally, or “evaluatively.” Branden contends that if your praise includes some kind of judgment, you create dependence: The child learns to evaluate their worth by what others think. But if you praise a child without expressing judgment, you both encourage behavior that supports self-esteem and teach the child to rely on their own judgment—which encourages self-esteem. To do this specifically describe the praiseworthy behavior, then let the child draw their own conclusions. For example, if a picky eater tries broccoli for the first time, say, “You couldn’t touch anything green three weeks ago, but today you ate broccoli.” The child will conclude that they did a good job—and since you’re praising their efforts, they’re more likely to expend effort in the future.
(Shortform note: Similarly, in Mindset, psychologist Carol Dweck recommends praising your children for what they’ve achieved through practice and persistence, keeping your focus on how they succeeded or improved. Dweck explains that if you praise a child’s intelligence or ability, you imply you’re proud of them for some inherent trait—and your child may develop resistance to difficult challenges that may expose that trait’s weakness.)
7. Parents should criticize their children’s behavior instead of judging the child. To do so, state the behavior, state how you feel about the behavior, then state how he can make amends (if applicable). Don’t globalize a single behavior and use it to judge him. For example, don’t tell him he’s lazy because he overslept. This will make your child feel rejected and thus unloved or unworthy, which will reduce his self-esteem. Moreover, if your child believes your judgment, he’s more likely to act like what you say he is: If you say he’s mean, he’ll believe he’s mean and so act meanly.
(Shortform note: In No-Drama Discipline, parenting experts Daniel J. Siegel and Tina Payne Bryson recommend approaching parenting mindfully. When your child misbehaves, first ask yourself why your child did what he did to avoid blowing up at him.)
8. Parents should encourage a healthy attitude toward mistakes. When your child errs, accept the error instead of reprimanding them. And don’t try to fix the child’s error, either. Give your children the tools they need to rectify the mistake on their own, like by asking leading questions.
(Shortform note: In Mindset, Dweck explains that if you have a fixed mindset—a belief that qualities like intelligence are innate and unchangeable—it may be difficult to encourage a healthy attitude toward mistakes because you struggle with failure. She recommends developing a growth mindset—a belief that you can improve your abilities—by creating a fixed-mindset persona to remind you that this isn’t who you want to be.)
Branden warns that unhealthy attitudes toward mistakes lead to damaged self-esteem. Errors are necessary to learning: You must err repeatedly as you practice a skill so you can eventually master it. But if you reject a child whenever he slips up, he may start to reject himself whenever he errs—which reduces his self-esteem. And if you don’t let a child make his own mistakes, he may learn that learning is less important than not failing. This limits his ability to practice several behaviors that generate self-esteem, like self-assertiveness. (As you may recall, one way to be self-assertive is to try to master life’s challenges head-on.)
(Shortform note: In The Confidence Code, Kay and Shipman contend that you can improve your child’s comfort with mistakes by exposing them to risk slowly—then being intentional and constructive when they inevitably fail. For example, don’t push your child off a boat to teach her how to swim; take her to the pool and let her practice without yelling at her for being a bad swimmer.)
Branden adds that, in addition to the behaviors listed above, parents should work on their own self-esteem. This is partly because you can only make your child feel understood if you accurately see what’s happening; this requires you to practice consciousness, which is essential to self-esteem. Additionally, Branden notes, children learn from what their parents do—so the best way to teach healthy self-esteem is to have healthy self-esteem. Try implementing the pillars discussed in Part 2 in your interactions with your children. This will help improve both their and your own self-esteem. For example, if you operate with more consciousness towards your children, you’ll help improve their self-esteem by making them feel more seen.
(Shortform note: Working on your self-esteem may be particularly important for new mothers, especially if they have multiple children: A Norwegian study found that mothers’ self-esteem increased for the first six months of their baby’s life—but then steadily declined until their child turned 3. (The study didn’t follow the mothers long-term, so it’s unclear how their self-esteem may fluctuate throughout their children’s life.) Even if your youngest children don’t remember your self-esteem in their earliest years, your older children are more likely to pay attention to and emulate the example you’re setting.)
Branden contends that schools can be an excellent place to promote self-esteem. In this section, you’ll learn why schools are a good place to teach self-esteem—and the three levels on which schools can promote self-esteem.
Branden writes that schools are ripe with opportunities to promote or harm the self-esteem of their students. Many parents are emotionally unable to teach their children the skills and beliefs necessary to achieve healthy self-esteem. Schools can rectify this gap and guide their students towards healthy self-esteem—or, if they misstep, they can reinforce the harmful behaviors learned at home and further impair their students’ psychological development.
(Shortform note: In particular, researchers have highlighted how school-sponsored extracurricular activities can promote self-esteem by giving students opportunities to engage in what Branden would call self-esteem-supporting behaviors, like taking on challenges.)
(Shortform note: Students come to school with varying degrees of self-esteem—so how can educators tell who might have low self-esteem and need extra support? The American Psychological Association suggests that students with low self-esteem may shy away from anything new, insult themselves, or avoid anything they may struggle with.)
So how can schools effectively teach their students self-esteem? Branden says that to do so, schools must support self-esteem on three levels.
On the macro level, Branden argues that educators should make building self-esteem a major educational objective. Schools are meant to provide their students with the tools necessary for success, and in the modern workforce, you need self-esteem to succeed. For example, many modern jobs require you to make judgment calls—which you can only do if you trust your own mind and thus have self-esteem.
However, schools are designed to teach compliance over self-esteem because that was necessary for success in previous labor markets: Back when most people worked in factories, you succeeded if you followed orders well. But this system doesn’t work anymore.
(Shortform note: The findings of one 2019 McKinsey study suggest that, in the nearly 30 years since Six Pillars was published, schools have not updated their curricula to provide students with these skills. Over half of companies struggle to hire employees who can solve problems or are adaptable—both skills that require self-esteem.)
So how, exactly, can schools adjust their curricula to teach self-esteem? Branden suggests three main additions.
1. Schools should teach children how to feel and accept their emotions without acting on them. Many children are rejected by their parents when they express emotion—so they learn that certain emotions are bad and should be suppressed or ignored to avoid parental rejection. By teaching children how to properly deal with their feelings, schools can prevent these kids from growing into adults who always suppress or ignore their emotions—in other words, who live in self-rejecting ways that damage their self-esteem.
(Shortform note: In contrast, psychologist Daniel Goleman suggests that acting on negative emotions appropriately is the key to utilizing them effectively. In Emotional Intelligence, Goleman explains that some students succeed by using their anxiety as a source of motivation. In fact, there’s an ideal peak of useful anxiety in which the amount of nervousness propels the worrier toward excellence.)
2. Schools should teach children how to have healthy relationships because healthy self-esteem requires confidence in your ability to do so. (Shortform note: Researchers add that teaching children how to have healthy relationships in school may also reduce domestic violence among young people.)
3. Schools should teach children critical thinking skills because, in a world that depends on knowledge work, students must learn how to use their minds effectively in order to survive. (Shortform note: One technology company adds that teaching critical thinking to kids can also help them detect and avoid misinformation on the internet, which could lead them to avoid dangerous situations like meeting a stranger from the web.)
At the teacher level, Branden contends that teachers who want to increase their students’ self-esteem must first improve their own self-esteem by following the six pillars laid out in Part 2. Kids imitate the adults in their lives—so if their teacher has healthy self-esteem, they’re more likely to imitate and learn the behaviors that support it.
Additionally, teachers provide the greatest value to their students by believing in their potential—so much so that the student comes to believe in her own potential, too, even if she didn’t at first. When a student believes in her own potential, she believes that she is worthy and capable of doing more—in other words, she has greater self-esteem. In order for a teacher to believe in someone else that strongly, Branden argues, he must believe in himself first—in other words, he must have self-esteem.
How Improving Teachers’ Mental Health Affects Students Although few modern studies have specifically examined whether a teacher’s level of self-esteem affects his students’ self-esteem levels, one study suggests that improving teachers’ mental health has multifaceted benefits for students: When teachers and administrators at one school were given access to free therapy sessions, all of them reported an increase in their own mental health as well as improvements in their students’ mental health and academic success.
Researchers suggest that the schools’ prioritization of their employees’ mental health also may have promoted teacher retention: The year after this program began, 10% of the teachers quit—12% less than the previous year. This suggests that instead of relying on teachers to improve their self-esteem on their own, schools can benefit from providing programs that support teachers’ self-esteem, too. After all, if a teacher quits, their self-esteem boost no longer benefits students.
In addition to supporting each student’s self-esteem with self-esteem-nurturing curricular changes and teachers, Branden argues that schools can support self-esteem on a micro level. To do so, each teacher must ensure that their classroom is an environment that supports self-esteem. Teachers can do so by following five simple rules.
(Shortform note: Supporting self-esteem in your classroom may also improve your students’ grades. Studies suggest that students with higher self-esteem are more academically engaged, which can improve academic performance.)
1: Treat every student with respect. Branden contends that many adults treat children with disrespect they would never direct towards adults. So by treating your students with respect, you reinforce their sense of self-worth and support their self-esteem. (Shortform note: One simple way to let your students know that they matter is to use their names whenever you speak to them.)
2: Treat every student the same. A child who thinks that their teacher will treat every student fairly feels safe and confident in their capability to handle the classroom; a child who thinks their teacher plays favorites doesn’t have this sense of safety or confidence. (Shortform note: As Jennifer Eberhardt notes in Biased, you may treat your students differently due to your unconscious racial biases. To mitigate this bias, attend empathy-focused training sessions, during which you listen to students’ stories about experiencing discrimination in schools and learn strategies for prioritizing a healthy, balanced relationship with your students.)
3: Focus on what your students are good at to help students gain confidence in their own value. Branden notes that this may involve helping your students realize what their strengths are if they don’t know them yet.
(Shortform note: To determine what your students are good at, some educators recommend looking for the subjects in which they demonstrate “brilliant behaviors.” For example, they may ask particularly thoughtful questions about a given topic or be unusually focused on it.)
4: Notice every student. Branden explains that every child needs to feel like she’s significant. You can send that message by paying attention to every student in your class—especially the smart, shy ones. These kids often don’t receive much attention from adults, so they start to believe they’re insignificant, which damages their self-esteem.
(Shortform note: You can make your students feel significant by tailoring your classroom activities to their interests. To do so, educators recommend asking your students to fill out questionnaires about themselves—like their favorite foods or songs—so you can get to know them better.)
5: Be careful how you administer authority. In any classroom, kids will misbehave. As a teacher, you must strike a balance when dealing with these infractions: You can’t insult them as it would damage their self-worth and thus their self-esteem. But you can’t overlook these infractions either—teaching kids that they can get away with anything discourages self-responsibility and likewise damages their self-esteem.
(Shortform note: Branden’s recommendation may have been influenced by the educational climate of the 1990s, when many schools adopted “zero tolerance” policies and severely punished even the smallest infractions. Research suggests that this imbalanced approach, when it increases expulsion and suspension, doesn’t improve student behavior.)
Branden recommends two ways to strike that balance. First, he urges, teach your students why specific rules exist. A child who understands why a rule exists is more likely to follow the rule because she’s contributing to an environment she wants. For example, if she knows that you must raise your hand to speak so that everybody gets a fair chance to speak, she follows the rule because she wants to be in a classroom where everybody can speak. In other words, in following the rule, she’s exercising her own power for a desired outcome—and so she’s practicing self-esteem-supporting behavior. In contrast, if she follows a rule because she’s afraid of being punished, her actions are motivated by fear or avoidance of punishment, which does not contribute to her self-esteem.
(Shortform note: In Indistractable, productivity expert Nir Eyal recommends a similar approach to parents who want to reduce their kids’ screen time. Teach kids that it’s up to them to make smart decisions about their time because the apps are designed by people who don’t have their best interests in mind. Eyal even recommends that kids determine their own screen time limits—this way, the child learns to self-regulate and will stick to these limits even if the parents aren’t able to enforce them. This likely further supports the child’s self-esteem because she’s exercising her own power for an outcome she decided on.)
Second, Branden recommends, instead of punishing kids, let them live out the consequences of their infractions so that they’re more motivated to follow the rules. For example, if a disruptive student breaks something, make them fix it.
(Shortform note: The same disciplinary action can be viewed as a punishment or a logical consequence, depending on how it’s used. For example, most people assume that a time-out is a punishment. But one resource for teachers contends that time-outs are logical consequences—not punishments—because in a time-out, you ask the child to calm down and think about their actions.)
Branden argues that companies should foster the self-esteem of their employees. In this section, we’ll first discuss why self-esteem has grown essential to economic success. Then, we’ll discuss what companies can do to promote self-esteem.
As discussed in Part 1, Branden contends that self-esteem has become essential to economic success due to the new demands of the knowledge economy. In the manufacturing economy, companies succeeded by having a few leaders who made impactful decisions and a large workforce that obeyed orders. But this isn’t enough to succeed in a world that values knowledge and ideas. In such a world, companies must keep up with constantly changing realities and ever-increasing global competition—which requires employees with high self-esteem.
Branden explains that employees at every level of the organization must be able to learn quickly and make effective decisions instead of relying on orders from the top. In order to keep up with constantly changing realities, companies must learn quickly, predict and detect problems, and solve them fast. They need employees who can identify and seize every opportunity they have to come up with new ideas. Similarly, companies can only succeed in a globalized world if their employees are acting consciously. They cannot get too comfortable at the top; they must always remain aware of and respond appropriately to new developments. All of these skills, as we’ve seen, are only possible if you have self-esteem.
So what must organizations do to promote self-esteem and ensure their economic success? Branden makes the following recommendations:
1. Create a culture that fosters innovation and initiative. To do so, managers should encourage their employees to see problems as opportunities, not challenges. They should also give employees the power and materials they need to do their jobs and to innovate when necessary. Managers must also budget enough money to implement new innovations. Employees whose creativity is never rewarded will eventually grow disheartened and may lose their creativity altogether.
2. Create a culture that allows people to lack knowledge and to fail. To do so, managers should set an example: Admit when you don’t know something, and apologize if you fail—but treat it as an opportunity for growth. Branden adds that company policies shouldn’t excessively punish failure: Making the damage of failing greater than the reward of success deters people from taking risks.
3. Create a rational environment: An environment that people can make sense of is one that supports people’s trust in their own mind. Companies can support rational environments with policies that prioritize fairness and integrity. Managers can support rational environments by clearly laying out what employees must do, explaining why those rules and expectations exist, and respectfully disciplining those who don’t follow them.
4. Create a culture that values people by treating people with respect and acknowledging their contributions. To do so, managers should convey respect and empathy in all interactions. They should also reward good work with promotions, pay raises, and public praise
5. Create a culture that promotes learning and development. To do so, managers should assign employees projects that align with their interests and assets—but that sometimes require their employees to grow in order to successfully complete them.
The Power of Promoting Self-Esteem: The Policies That Helped Netflix Succeed
In No Rules Rules, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings and business professor Erin Meyer describe how Netflix used these recommendations to create a company culture that empowered employees. And, just as Branden contends, Hastings credits this self-esteem-supporting culture with turning the company into a streaming giant that has more than 200 million subscribers across 190 countries, creates award-winning content, and is consistently listed among the best places to work.
Some notable Netflix policies that support self-esteem—which you may consider implementing in your own company—include the following:
Netflix fosters innovation and initiative by letting employees propose and test big ideas—even if their bosses disagree. This same policy encourages learning and development: Although employees can pursue projects they’re interested in, they’re expected to learn from their failures to avoid repeating their mistakes.
Netflix shows its employees that they’re allowed to fail by letting them see their managers fail: In one-on-one meetings, managers schedule time for their employees to give them feedback.
Netflix supports a rational environment by asking employees to act in the company’s best interests instead of having strict travel and expense policies.This prioritizes fairness by allowing people to make wise decisions. For example, an employee who has a big presentation in an unusually expensive location can stay in a decent hotel without worrying about spending limits—and this employee feels fairly compensated instead of griping that he has to have a terrible night’s sleep even though his presentation is for the company. Moreover, managers periodically check their employees’ expenses and correct any employees who’ve gone overboard—which amounts to respectful discipline that works: After a few conversations, employees tighten up their spending.
Netflix demonstrates it values people by teaching employees to give and receive feedback in encouraging—not demotivating—ways: Employees learn how to treat others with respect and explicitly acknowledge each others’ contributions.
In addition to the above, Branden argues, both the leader of the company and individual managers must work on their own self-esteem. The leader sets the tone for how the entire company behaves. For example, if the leader fears failure, the company will learn to do the same because that’s what the leader has shown she values. As such, a leader who wants to create a company that supports self-esteem must improve her own self-esteem so that she can transmit those values down the chain of command. The same is true of managers, who lack the full influence of the company leader but still influence everybody they interact with.
(Shortform note: Branden’s argument suggests you should avoid working for leaders with low self-esteem—but how do you assess that? One leadership expert presents four warning signs that your manager has low self-esteem: 1. She micromanages her employees. 2. She takes all the credit for others’ ideas. 3. She is mean to her employees. 4. She only supports ideas that come from people higher on the corporate ladder than she is.)
In Chapter 16, Branden explains how psychotherapists can help their clients improve their levels of self-esteem. In this section, you’ll first learn why Branden thinks self-esteem should be a main goal of psychotherapy. Then, you’ll learn the ways he recommends psychotherapists modify their practices so that they can improve their clients’ self-esteem.
Branden argues that psychotherapists should make building self-esteem one of their main goals for two main reasons. First, he says that many psychological issues stem from unhealthy self-esteem. For example, he writes that shyness comes from a lack of self-assertion—or a lack of self-esteem—while aggression occurs when people try to pretend that they have self-esteem when they don’t. So building self-esteem would help repair these psychological issues. Second, Branden argues that psychotherapy has two main goals: reduce suffering and uncover strengths. Building self-esteem accomplishes both of these goals.
How Modern Psychologists Think Self-Esteem Affects Shyness and Aggression
Generally speaking, psychologists agree that low self-esteem contributes to shyness, but they’re divided on how aggression relates to self-esteem levels. Some contend that low self-esteem contributes to aggression, while others contend that high self-esteem does so.
One study revealed that this difference stems from a lack of consensus on how to define self-esteem. Psychologists who link aggression to low self-esteem equate self-esteem with your general self-opinion. In contrast, psychologists who attribute aggression to high self-esteem define self-esteem as the level of confidence you have in a particular skill set (for example, if you think you’re socially skilled). They contend that this type of high self-esteem may spark aggression if others don’t agree with your self-evaluation, leading you to act out.
(Shortform note: One study suggests that framing the treatment goals as an attempt to live a life that’s more closely aligned with their values may increase how engaged the clients are—even if the psychotherapist doesn’t change the content of her treatment.)
So how, exactly, can psychotherapists help their clients improve their self-esteem? Branden makes several recommendations that we’ve listed below.
1. Respect the client, no matter how poorly the client acts. By respecting the client, psychotherapists treat the client as somebody who is fundamentally worthy as a human being. This can encourage the client to believe they are fundamentally worthy—and, as we’ve seen, such a belief is essential to self-esteem.
(Shortform note: Therapists can show respect to their patients by using appropriate language (for example, not cursing), accepting their clients’ beliefs and values without judgment, not rushing clients to say more than they feel comfortable revealing, and not allowing the relationship to move beyond a professional context.)
2. Help your clients figure out what they need to learn, instead of telling them what they need to learn. For example, don’t tell them that nobody’s coming to save them—lead them to that realization. Telling your client what to do may teach the client what they need to learn, which builds self-esteem—but it robs them of the opportunity to reach that insight themselves, which improves self-efficacy and thus self-esteem. Moreover, when telling the client what to do, you risk letting your personal desire for adulation bleed into your profession and subtly judging the client. If you judge the client, you undermine the environment of respect you are trying to create.
(Shortform note: Other professionals add that telling your clients what they need to learn or do ultimately harms your client because it doesn’t empower them to make their own decisions. As a therapist, your job is to help your clients understand why they act the way they do so that they can make better decisions in the future—even if you’re not there.)
3. Focus on discovering the client’s strengths. To encourage self-esteem, Branden recommends that you help clients discover their untapped potential so that they can do better in life. This potential may be hidden simply because it has not yet been uncovered or because the client is repressing it for whatever reason. If it’s the latter, psychotherapists can help clients work through this repression by giving them sentence stems like the following.
(Shortform note: Today, therapy that helps clients discover their strengths is known as strengths-based therapy, which research shows improves self-esteem. While some of these therapists may use sentence-completion work, strengths journaling is more common: The client writes about how their strengths have improved their lives, which leads them to grow more aware of how these qualities are helping them now.)
4. Teach your clients that they perform negative behaviors because those behaviors provided some immediate benefit when they were first developed—even though they may cause long-term harm. For example, a child whose parent yells at him for expressing emotion learns to stop expressing emotion. This benefits him in the short term because he avoids parental rejection, but it may cause long-term harm if he grows into an adult who can’t express emotion. A client who understands why he behaves in some unhealthy way is far less likely to berate himself for that behavior—a self-rejecting act that makes it even harder to improve these behaviors. He’s also finally able to see why this unhealthy behavior no longer benefits him—and grows more open to considering alternatives.
(Shortform note: The mere fact that you engage in self-destructive behaviors—which provide immediate benefit but cause long-term harm—may be evidence of a simultaneously negative and positive quality. Research suggests that people who engage in self-destructive behaviors feel emotions more powerfully than others, but feeling emotions powerfully is also associated with positive qualities like greater empathy and creativity. Understanding these positive effects may reduce how likely you are to berate yourself for self-destructive behavior.)
5. Teach your clients how to recognize and unite subselves. Branden contends that everybody has subselves, which are like mini-personalities that we’ve internalized, and that often kick in when we face particular situations. Imagine yourself as a group of friends on a road trip: Your conscious self is the main driver, but each of your subselves occasionally takes over the driving.
Each of these personalities is specific to you. For example, Branden discusses the mother-self, which is an internalized version of your mother—not a generic mother figure. When you hear your mother’s voice in your head telling you not to do something, that’s your mother-self talking to you. In addition to a mother-self and father-self, you have subselves that represent internalized versions of you as a child, a teenager, and the opposite gender (your feminine side if you’re a man, or your masculine side if you’re a woman).
Branden argues that we can only accept ourselves—and thus gain self-esteem—if we become aware of and accept all our subselves and learn to unify them with our conscious self. This can be a difficult task because we may want to reject our subselves. For example, if you hated your mother, you probably dislike the idea that you have a mother-self. Even if you accept that your subself exists, you may hear your mother’s voice in your head and yell at it. But since your mother-self is part of you, rejecting that self or behaving in ways that demean it means that you are rejecting yourself, which damages your self-esteem.
Psychotherapists must help clients face each subself, accept it, and discover what it needs so that their conscious self can meet its needs in their relationship. In this way, you learn to treat each subself with kindness.
How Other Psychologists Talk About Subselves
Other psychologists have also suggested that we have subselves that we must identify and accept in order to improve our lives, but their explanations of subselves differ from Branden’s in a few ways.
For example, in The Anxiety and Phobia Workbook, Edmund Bourne proposes that there are four subpersonalities that may induce anxiety: the worrier, the critic, the victim, and the perfectionist. While Branden asserts that subselves are unique to each person, Bourne posits that these four subpersonalities represent archetypes that work the same way in everybody. For example, if Lisa and Tina have different mothers, Branden’s theory dictates that they have different mother-selves. But Lisa and Tina both have the critic, which treats both the same way: It lowers their self-opinions by judging them harshly.
Additionally, while Bourne recommends identifying and accepting our subselves, he doesn’t argue that you must learn to unify them with your conscious self. Rather, he focuses on ways to overcome these subselves so that they stop distorting your thoughts and inducing unnecessary anxiety. To do so, Bourne recommends that you stop overanalyzing and just do whatever you want. You may also consider growing mindful of harmful thoughts so that you can objectively analyze and interrupt them if necessary.
If you have children, they’ll inevitably make you mad. Answering these questions will help ensure you discipline them properly while still protecting their self-esteem.
Describe a situation in which your child misbehaved recently. What did they do?
How did you respond to your child’s behavior? Did you yell at them or calmly discuss the issue? Did you do nothing?
Reflect on how your behavior likely affected your child’s self-esteem. What might they have learned from your behavior? Are you happy with this lesson?
List two behaviors you can do in the future that will provide your child with the appropriate discipline but still support their self-esteem.