I think self-esteem and vanity are correlated…

albeit, inversely.

Because the most vain are generally the ones with the lowest self-esteem.

That is, self-consciousness, vanity and low self-esteem tend to go hand in hand.

This is especially true of the most beautiful among us.

Why do Hollywood starlets routinely fall from the pedestal upon which we loft them to the depths of despair, drug addiction and self-inflicted death?

Because of an empty sense that they don’t quite measure up to the image we’ve projected upon them?

The psychologist tells me that my problems stem from low self-esteem.

That I need to be in love with that person I see in the mirror each morning.

But that’s particularly hard when I don’t really know who that person is.

Who am I…seriously?

A body?

A product of my past?

A job that I do?

A father?

A husband?

A failure?

Truth is, I’m not any one, nor all, of those things.

Who, or what, I am is a potential fulfillment of the purpose of my creator, here for a specific reason, and that reason has nothing to do with my, or the world’s, narrow conception of me.

Unless we can get off the dead-end track of thinking about ourselves in such restricted and limited ways, I believe we will never truly live the life we were meant to live.

So, self-esteem doesn’t come from gazing in the mirror each morning and liking what you see.

In that sense, self-esteem should be an entirely selfless concept…it becomes selfless-esteem…

hmm, kinda takes some of the pressure off, doesn’t it?

image credit: Angela Waye via Compfight cc