There are multiple factors that can have an effect on your self-esteem. Your childhood, society, the media, and people in your life can all add or take away from how you feel about yourself. Studies have shown that people who have an unhealthy self-esteem are more likely to experience fatigue, anxiety, and depression.

Stress and self-esteem can be related because stress may worsen the symptoms of almost all medical and emotional conditions. Since people with low self-esteem may also have poor social support systems, low levels of self-esteem could be correlated with a greater perceived level of stress.

Cortisol responses to stress were found to relate to self-confidence, with the direction of the effects depending on trait anxiety. Our findings identify stress as a major regulator of individuals’ competitiveness, affecting self-confidence in opposite directions in high and low anxious individuals.

With healthy self-esteem you’re:

• Assertive in expressing your needs and opinions.
• Confident in your ability to make decisions.
• Able to form secure and honest relationships — and less likely to stay in unhealthy ones.
• Realistic in your expectations and less likely to be overcritical of yourself and others.

Try these strategies:

1. Use hopeful statements. Treat yourself with kindness and encouragement.
2. Forgive yourself.
3. Avoid ‘should’ and ‘must’ statements.
4. Focus on the positive.
5. Consider what you’ve learned.
6. Relabel upsetting thoughts.
7. Encourage yourself.

Either way, if you are wondering how to improve your self-esteem, here are some of our top tips.

1. Be nice to yourself.
2. You do you.
3. Get movin’
4. Nobody’s perfect.
5. Remember that everyone makes mistakes.
6. Focus on what you can change.
7. Do what makes you happy.
8. Celebrate the small stuff.