How to overcome a negative self-image and self-talk

As part of a bingo fundraiser for my dance team, a friend of mine requested some thoughtful advice on a specific topic:

“How to overcome negative self-image and negative self-talk, and being hypercritical about myself”

I thought this was an excellent topic because I think many of us struggle with the same issue at some point in our lives, myself included.

When I think of what causes negative self-talk or having a negative image of oneself, two ideas come to mind:

1. Comparison
2. Perfectionism

On Comparison

Comparison is widely cited as the easiest way to make oneself unhappy. It’s a normalized thing that in society, we are conditioned to compare ourselves to others. And that somehow, our “ranking” in comparison to others is so important that it should determine how good we feel about ourselves.

In my opinion, the #1 culprit of our own unhappiness is almost always linked to comparing ourselves or our circumstances to someone else or another set of circumstances.

The cure to this is simple: gratitude

When we’re grateful, it’s hard to feel any other negative emotions. It pulls our attention and focus to what we have, and then we start to appreciate those things more. With the right perspective, we’ll realize that comparing what we have to what others have is a useless endeavor that has no benefits.

If you think you want someone else’s life, you’re failing to see that they have their own set of problems. More likely than not, those problems will make you grateful for your own. There’s always a dark side to the “greener grass” that someone else has that we don’t see.

A bonus cure: focus on helping others

When we focus on helping and improving the lives of others who cannot help us or return the favor in any way (meaning they are unable to reciprocate), we get out of our own heads and stop inventing worries for ourselves. We realize that our own problems are usually so minor and irrelevant in the grand scheme of things, and gives us perspective on what actual problems are like from worse-off people.

On Perfectionism

Perfectionism is something that I believe is highly correlated with unhappiness, negative self-image, and being hypercritical of oneself. While perfectionism is defined as “not accepting anything less than perfect”, colloquially it can be a toxic standard we put on ourselves out of fear of what other people think. I read once that perfectionism is externally driven, meaning those who tend toward perfectionism do so because of the fear of being perceived as inadequate to others.

In other words, it’s motivated by what others think of us instead of what we think of ourselves. Perfectionism is a negative trait that should never be glorified or put on a pedestal.

While self-improvement and having high standards are always positive things, being driven by a fear of others’ opinions is a recipe for unhappiness. Though many great things have been achieved due to this dysfunctional motive, I highly doubt it has ever created lasting or meaningful happiness. It keeps the individual on a perpetual treadmill of desiring more without ever being satisfied.

Plus, by definition, perfect is never attainable. So we’re essentially playing a game we’ll never win. Think about it.

The cure: grace + self-love

Give yourself grace that you’ll never be perfect. Encourage yourself to always get better and improve. But treat yourself as a parent watching your baby learn how to walk. You know that they’ll get it eventually, they just require encouragement.

No parent expects their baby to walk immediately, just as you should not expect yourself to be perfect at anything. However, you can become great and fulfilled through the process of constant improvement.

And if you love yourself, you won’t put pressure on yourself to be perfect. Nobody is and nobody will be. But the effort and progress you made is something worth celebrating as much as possible.

I hope my ramblings have sparked some thought and further self-reflection 🙂

Cheers!