Health
Your Best Is Good Enough
By ALICE O’BRIEN
Psychiatric Nurse
We hear a lot about selfesteem; how to keep it healthy, how it develops, and the effects of having negative or low self-esteem. But what is selfesteem? Why is it important? Self-esteem refers to our fundamental belief we have in ourselves, the value or worth we place on ourselves as a person. You may be a very accomplished decent person with many positive qualities, but if we believe we are inadequate, if we believe we are not good enough, or if our over-all picture of ourselves is negative then we have low self-esteem. This, in turn, will affect how we see ourselves and how we live our life. Thinking badly about ourselves can affect our mood, our
motivation, and our enjoyment in life. What are the signs of having low self-esteem? •Being very critical of ourselves. • Being very sensitive to criticism feeling defensive when criticised. • Difficulty making decisions as we do not trust our own judgement. • Excessively trying to please others. • Feeling guilty when putting ourselves first. Low self-esteem can be caused by a number of different factors including early life experiences that may have given us negative messages about our worth, bullying experiences, traumatic relationships ,or even stress. So, how do we improve our selfesteem? Firstly we can begin to question our self-critical thoughts. Just because we think something
does not make it true. Self-critical thoughts can be loud and intrusive, but that does not make them true. Secondly, drop the precautions that keep the beliefs in place. For example, we may not try anything new because our negative beliefs are telling us we would be no good - try it anyway and disprove the thought. If you don’t try you will never know. Finally, learning to appreciate our positive qualities and treating ourselves with kindness and compassion can replace our negative self-belief. Using a notebook to log positive traits, actions, or achievements can help us to remember them when we are having difficulty recalling them. And remember the golden rule of self-esteem; You do not always have to be the best, your best is good enough.
Ditch The Fad Diets
By SIOBHAN O’SULLIVAN SOS Fitness
The Celery Juice Diet. The Keto Diet. The Aloe Vera Diet. The list goes on. And on. And on. Many of you reading this will have tried one of the above or something like it. These diets do work. In the very short term. You are eating practically nothing (I mean, one of them makes you replace food with Aloe Vera). Your body is losing weight because you are eating less calories than your body needs. But what happens when the diet is over? Have you learnt how to manage
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your emotions around food so you don’t overeat everything in front of the TV when you are bored? Have you learnt how to create a balanced meal that is going to keep you sustained throughout the day? Have you learnt how to change your habits for the long term so you can maintain any weight lost? People will challenge me that fad diets do work because they are losing weight. However, the issue is what happens after the diet ends. You have not learnt how to
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change your eating behaviours for long term success. When I work with clients, one of the first things we look at is their relationship with food and repairing that. We look at why someone may overeat or why someone is afraid to eat for fear of putting on weight. Trust me, the fad diets don’t work long term. Save your money and invest in a coach who truly cares about your success and not just lining their pockets. For more information on nutrition coaching, check out my website https://sosfitness.ie/nutrition/
Issue 64 May 20th, 2022
