Poor Self-Confidence
…lack of information and not knowing why one holds certain beliefs can leave an individual on shifting ground.Denise Winn, The Manipulated Mind
The inability to act selfishly stems from lack of self-confidence. Once your self-confidence is solidified, you can handle the emotional and environmental factors that would normally stifle or destroy your dieting efforts. What’s more, as a self-confident woman, you will educate yourself so that you can identity and avoid failure-prone desperation diets.
Research tells us that self-confidence raises the likelihood of dieting success. For instance, a study published in a 1996 edition of the Journal of Clinical Psychology pointed out that the more self-esteem and self-control a person has, the more weight she will lose and the longer she will keep it off. And if she does regain weight, she will regain less than she would had her confidence not been fortified.
Poor self-confidence arises from a poor self-image. Author of Giving Away Success, Susan Schenkel unveils that a woman’s view of her attributes as emotional, helpless and intuitive provokes her lack of confidence.
Many women simply do not trust themselves to know, or have, what it takes to lose weight. The fastest way to dispel this mistrust is to educate yourself about nutrition or enlist the help of a professional. Once you establish self-confidence and self-trust, you do not have to combat feelings of doubt or question whether or not your diet will work.
When you are pursuing any task with great anxiety, it takes a tremendous effort to realize a meager result.
Chin-Ning Chu, Do Less, Achieve More
Most women have learned to mistrust diets because in the past they used diets that involved minimal or no nutritional education, and acts of self-denial. Such diets are failure destined. This scenario of denial and failure-dieting destroys a woman’s self-esteem, as Colleen Sundermeyer points out in Emotional Weight. She explains that the more we deprive ourselves, the more we learn not to trust ourselves.
So, a failed diet may reinforce a lack of self-confidence. To avoid the dire cycle of shame and guilt, you must establish your self-confidence independently of your weight.
Disconnecting Your Self-Confidence from Your Self-Image
True confidence has nothing to do with what is happening in your outer life. True confidence isn’t created because of what you do, but because of your belief in the ability you have within to do anything you want to.
Barbara DeAngelis, PhD, Confidence: Finding It and Living It
Most women tie their self-concept to their self-image and way in which others perceive them. Jane R. Hirshchmann and Carol H. Munter warn us in When Women Stop Hating Their Bodies that each time we call ourselves “fat,” we are saying that something is “wrong” with us.
Ironically, how we see ourselves is not always based on reality, but on our self-confidence. According to a study in the International Journal of Eating Disorders, how we see ourselves does not depend on the reality of our shape or size, but our level of self-esteem.
A lack of self-confidence detracts from our dieting goals. If you link your self-confidence and self-image to how you ought to look, you are setting yourself up for several dieting pitfalls. For example, if you disrupt you diet by overeating, or if you see a slender person enjoying a cheeseburger, you may feel that your dietingefforts are futile.
But if your self-esteem is strong, you will combat feelings of helplessness, and avoid emotional overeating by reminding yourself that you are aware of your desires and will meet your goals in due time.
The worst thing we can do while dieting is fail to address a poor self-image. If we are upset by our looks, we must do all we can safely and sanely do to change our image. Failure to do so will leave us feeling controlled by an adversarial body, trapped in uncertain emotions and helpless to affect any change. When dieting, you must have complete confidence in the fact that you, and only you, control your self-image.
Not Doing Anything about a Poor Self-image
Wanting what you don’t have or hating what you do have is the fast track to anxiety.
Chin-Ning Chu, Do Less, Achieve More
Our emotions and self-esteem are tied to how we view ourselves. One could argue that such vanity is pointless, and that a real woman values her intellect and not her looks. But when we probe inside ourselves, we find vanity comfortably lodged within.
For example, a 1999 survey of American women conducted for the Teresa and H. John Heinz III Foundation, with technical assistance from Shape
Up America, reports that 70% of overweight women (vs. 41% of thin women) like their bodies less than they like themselves.
Similarly, in an investigation entitled Body Esteem and Body Shape Satisfaction in Women with Regional Adiposity, researchers Karen McConnell and Pamela Swan found that a woman’s waist and hip size influence her body esteem and self-image.
If a woman can’t look at herself honestly and lovingly, her own self-rejection will clearly show.
Bonnie Bernell, Bountiful Women
Since our body image significantly influences our self-esteem, gradually changing our self-image, or re-interpreting our self-image, opens pathways to bolstering our self-esteem. This does not entail rushing to get liposuction or a belly tuck.
Truthfully, most women who hate their bodies do so because they feel that their less-than-perfect body entitles them to a less-than-perfect life– and, more significantly, less acceptance and less love. Thus, our bodies become scapegoats for our unfulfilled desire for love, acceptance and appreciation.
Underneath it all, our body ideals are largely the effects of “mind viruses” and false desires. That is, we are primed by media images to associate “thin” with “good” and “acceptance.” Naturally,
we want to feel good about ourselves and feel accepted by others. And so, we seek out quid pro quo love, asking the world to, “Love me because I am thin. Love me because I am smart.” Yet, we never acknowledge that real love has no value at bargaining tables. The value of real love is implicit and given in exchange for absolutely nothing.
Alas, the first step you must take to improve your self-image is to love your body and accept it –– without regard to any of the pseudo-body-perfect mind viruses currently infecting you. Tell the world and yourself, “Love me because I am.” No adjectives need follow to give this phrase completeness, love yourself because you are.
Self-acceptance is a rare commodity in women, since our upbringing has so often emphasized a constant striving for perfection.
Paula J. Caplan, The Myth of Women’s Masochism