Self-esteem is your evaluation of yourself, including how positively or negatively you tend to regard your own qualities and value.
It can feel very different from one day to another, especially when it is closely tied to performance, approval or a particular role.
Praise arrived. You were allowed to like yourself for an hour.
Then a message went unanswered, or somebody else did something impressive, and the feeling changed.
The question isn’t whether praise should matter. It is how much authority an outside response has been given over your relationship with yourself.
I AWAKE’s books invite more specific attention to what you do, need and experience. You can recognise a mistake without requiring it to settle your worth. You can enjoy an achievement without asking it to permanently remove uncertainty.
A flattering self-description can be pleasant. A more reliable relationship with your own experience may need more than keeping that description intact.
Self-worth considers value beyond a particular result. Approval asks what happens when being accepted becomes a condition for accepting yourself.
Noba’s Self and Identity, by Dan P. McAdams, introduces the development of self-understanding. It offers a wider perspective than trying to maintain an uninterrupted positive opinion of yourself.