The Bondage of Emotional Pain

Life’s Like This — There are moments, I believe, in most of our lives, where the joy of living is overcome with depression, anxiety, and the fear of stepping outside one’s comfort zone to experience the best that life can offer. Moments in life, where it can be difficult to escape the bondage of emotional pain because we are fearful of letting others get close to us, where we can trust them with our feelings, and where we can let them get to know us to a point where a bridge of understanding can be built and relationships can flourish. Quite often, emotional pain is hidden, deep in a closet of darkness, and tucked away in seclusion where it can languish in solitude. But for others, their emotional pain is quite evident; they seem to carry the wounds of their heart on their sleeves where it is apparent to all that know them. For those of us caught up in a web of emotional pain, we often ask ourselves, when will it all end? Why, despite all the counseling we may have gone through, does the pain still persist? And why must we be held hostage to this pain from which there seems to be no escape?

Overcoming Low Self-Esteem

Life’s Like This — It’s not who you are that holds you back, it’s who you think you’re not. I came across the preceding words and found myself pausing and reflecting on their meaning. If you are reflecting on them now, you might find them to be a mind-twister. As I attempted to digest their meaning, I came to realize an important truth about how we measure ourselves in life and why we don’t find complete satisfaction in our achievements — and that truth, is that our negative self-talk strips us of the confidence, satisfaction, and more importantly, the self-esteem that we all need to have in what we have accomplished in life. For years I have been trying to discover who I am and ultimately my purpose in life. Like many people, I grew up with dreams of being involved with something I cared passionately about. I was driven to define myself by the sum total of my accomplishments — a career that I was determined to have, a loving family, close friends, and personal accomplishments that gave meaning to my life. And when that failed to happen, I got caught up in a spiraling decline of my self-esteem. With the decline of my self-esteem, I then found myself consumed with depression that affected nearly every aspect of my life. Low self-esteem does not discriminate, it can affect anyone, and when it does, the impact on one’s life can be devastating. It would be nice if when we suffer from low self-esteem that we could take a pill and suddenly escape its hold over us, but unfortunately, the best we can do is take depression medication, if needed, that hopefully will improve our mood and ability to put things in proper perspective. The biggest challenge to overcoming low-self esteem is fighting the negative self-talk that destroys our perception of ourselves. Negative self-talk undermines our ability to deal constructively with our shortcomings, disappointments, and painful memories. And until we find a way to reverse the habit of putting ourselves down, we will continue to suffer the effects of low self-esteem.