This is an awesome poem I wanted to share with you today, please read it with your heart wide open!

“A Return to Love” by Marianne Williamson

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?

Actually, who are we not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you.

We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It’s not just in some of us, it’s in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people the right to do the same. As we are liberated from our fears, our presence automatically liberates others.”

If you are struggling with self-esteem, I’d love to help you!

Here are 5 steps you can take to boost your confidence level up high again:

Step # 1: Deal with your past once and for all. Confront those situations that bring painful memories and forgive the people that have hurt you, even if you don’t feel like it. Maybe they have stolen your past, but don’t let them steal your future too!

Step # 2: Change the way you think about failure. Society dictates that failures are bad, therefore most people are afraid of making failures and experience huge condemnation when they miss it. Next time you fail, see it as an opportunity to learn, as a stepping stone to success.

Step # 3: Learn to deal with rejection. In today’s busy world, it is quite common to get brushed off by somebody. We all experience some sort of rejection every day. Don’t take it personally. Be a nice person, but don’t expect anything in return.

The only sure fire way to achieve this is by having a close relationship with God. He’ll not only meet your need of being loved, but He’ll also teach you to love people as He loves them: unconditionally.

Step # 4: Further you education. Learn more and become an expert in whatever you are good at. Study and read a lot. Practice the habit of learning something new every day. As you increase in your potential, you will be able to give more value to others.

Step # 5: Learn about finances. Learn to be a good steward of money. Although you might think money is not important, the lack of it does have the power of filling you with fear and worry. Learn about biblical money management, because only the Lord makes rich without adding sorrow.

You can find more valuable info on dealing with low self esteem here.

I want you to be refreshed today: You were fashioned for greatness! Don’t ever forget it!

Oh, and remember…

“You are God’s workmanship (piece of art) created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that

we should walk in them” (Ephesians, 2:10)

G.F.I.

Go For It!

Bettina

PS If you haven’t checked out my new book yet, you can find it here. It has a whole Chapter that deals with the issue of low self esteem and other limitations that turn us into less than what God has created us for.

Get your copy here.

Do you feel unimportant? Do others seem to ignore you all the time as if you never existed?

Whether it is due to our upbringing, or present failures in life, low self-esteem is due to the deception of thinking we are not as good, or lucky, as others are.

Once this lie is framing our mindset, we are bound for failure in everything we endeavor, because our thought patterns are messed up.

And it is right there, at the root of the problem, that we have to confront this lie.

3 Major Mistakes People With Low Self-Esteem Make That Mess up Their Thought Life

1.- Making their self-worth depend on other people’s opinion. Your worthiness does not depend on what others think of you, it only depends on what God thinks of you. He created every human being for an awesome and fulfilled life, and He doesn’t make exceptions. He certainly doesn’t create failures.

2,- Looking for something acceptable within themselves. People who try to find worthiness in themselves are looking in the wrong place. There is nothing within you that is big enough to give you the high self-esteem you are yearning for.

3.- Self-exaltation. Trying to build your self-esteem by your own effort is a dangerous attempt of self-exaltation. Self-exaltation always leads to a fall, sooner or later. The only one who can exalt you in an enduring way is God.

And He desires to exalt you and to help you right now. But first you have to surrender to Him and learn to flow with His plan. You will come to the point of not desiring anything else, and that is when He can exalt you without the danger of you messing up big time. 

Although human beings are intrinsically social and gregarious, there are moments when the community we live in does not fulfill its role of reinforcement it is supposed to have. It is then when people have to deal with feelings of exclusion and loneliness.

When these feelings of rejection are not appropriately dealt with, they have a paralyzing effect on the personal growth of the affected person. Lack of self-esteem and boldness will inevitably lead to a life of failure and underachievement.

If you are struggling in this area, here are some powerful thoughts that will help you confront those feelings of loneliness and rejection successfully:

Don’t Rely on Homo sapiens

• Most people who think that nobody believes in them judge by the actions of the people around them. Just because people seem to ignore you doesn’t mean they don’t believe in you.
• Don’t have too high expectations for people investing time in you. Remember that we live in a fast paced world. Most people, even our loved ones, don’t always take time to meet all the needs around them.

• Human beings are selfish by nature.  Most people are so busy with their own troubles that they don’t notice when somebody around them could need a bit of encouragement.

• Although they don’t show it, people around you are probably hurting just as much as you are. Take the first step and sow love and care into another life without expecting anything in return. You will be surprised by the effects this will have on your own life.

Rely on God Instead

• Jesus knows exactly how you feel. He too was rejected and even killed by his contemporaries, yet He walked in a life that always pleased His Father, regardless of what people thought. And His life caused a global impact on the history of mankind.

• God also has a perfect plan for you. He has designed you with a unique combination of gifts and talents to accomplish the task you have been given. He loves you and believes in you. And He promised to never forsake you if you chose to walk with Him.

Human needs hurt and hurt demands attention. People who are conscious of their hurting needs are prone to meditate about them throughout their day. Ultimately all their life starts to evolve around their unmet needs and they have fallen into the trap of self-centeredness without realizing it.

When you give too much attention to your unmet needs, you automatically magnify them. After a while they’ll seem so huge to you that it will seem impossible for you to ever have that requirement in your life satisfied.

Furthermore, a needy person will erroneously start looking toward others to satisfy their necessities. Under these circumstances disappointments are inevitable, and the downward spiral begins.

First of all, don’t depend on any other person to meet your needs, because there is nobody out there who will never disappoint you. Human beings are fallible, you know. All of them.

Second, turn your frustrated life over to the one who lovingly designed it. You might not be aware of it, but that state of mind you are in is not what God wants for you. And He is the only one who can fully meet those needs of yours. He wants you to live a happy and fulfilled life. He has a perfect plan for your life that is so exciting, that it exceeds everything you could ever imagine for yourself.

Third, Jesus died so that you could become free of anything that is holding you back. And that victim mentality sure is. Right now you can make Him the Lord of your life and He will show you how to change your deprived and pitiful life into a power house of love that is able to replenish your needs and those of others.

“For God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind.” (2. Timothy 1:7)

You know how it is when you lack self confidence: you have this great idea, you know it is a good thing to do, you are certain that it will benefit you and others. But you can’t get yourself to step out and do it.

After your mind has gone through the usual tug of war, you decide to leave it for “later.” And then it is filed under the innumerable unaccomplished projects you didn’t dare to pull off.

Here are 5 steps to always walking in triumphant self confidence:

Don’t be afraid of making mistakes. Society has dictated that mistakes are bad. It would surprise you to know that successful people make a lot of mistakes, but they don’t let fear take over. Mistakes are the very best learning tools around.

Prepare yourself well. Sometimes we get so turned on by a great idea, that we just launch into it without laying sufficient groundwork. It is better to race like the turtle: go slow, but sure. Remember: the hare lost the race because he got tired of running around unnecessarily.

Find good mentors. Every time I see people parachuting for the first time, they have this expert firmly harnessed to their back to show them when to pull the cord and how to avoid a crash landing. I don’t know about you, but I’d never jump out of a plane without one! Having a good idea does not mean you have to implement it all by your own. Find help. There are others who have already arrived where you are heading.

Keep close to God. God has a perfect plan for your life and He wants to help you accomplish it successfully. It’s not any old plan, it the master plan for your life! If you choose to submit to Him and to flow with His program, He will give you supernatural wisdom, strength and the necessary grace to succeed in everything you endeavor.

Find your worth in Jesus. Don’t look for worthiness inside yourself, it is not there. It is only in Jesus and in what He did for you that you will find the greatness you are yearning for.

Do you feel like deep down inside you know there is more to life, but you don’t know how to make it happen? Is there something pulling at your heart that wants out?

It’s so easy to get stuck in a rut. Your routine takes over and suddenly you find yourself watching life go by. You have become a mere spectator and there is no meaning in what you are doing anymore.

Nevertheless, God created every human being with a unique combination of talents and gifts to fulfill their purpose in life, –and he put a passion in their heart to drive them to do it.

In many of us that passion has simmered down to a mere flicker, but nevertheless, it is still there, waiting to be aroused again.

You really don’t have to look very far to find purpose in life. It is inside you. It is what God has already put in your hand that will lead you to where you are called to go.

Everybody has a passion, a dream that will give us a vision of what God can do in our lives once He has empowered it. All you have to do is dare to step out of your rut and start pursuing it.

You only have to take the first step and make the commitment to flow with His program, and He will reveal the path to follow.

When you follow your bliss, doors will open, where you would not have thought there were doors, and where there would not be a door for anybody else – Joseph Campbell

Sometimes we get so caught up in our daily routine with its preoccupations and challenges, that we forget what we are really here for, –the typical stressed out, but aimless life anybody can get trapped in.

Typical, but not natural. At the risk of sounding melodramatic, I believe that many people are so obsessed with getting by in life, that they miss out on the most important.

Most people feel once they’ve done their share of hard work for the day they can turn their brain off and just relax. And many times by doing that they close the door to those dreams that are lurking in their heart.

As days, months and years go by they alternately work and relax and get on with life until they reach midlife and suddenly realize that half their life is gone forever. And that dream is still there, waiting to be aroused.

Maybe we should all ask ourselves every now and then, “What will people remember about me once I’m not here anymore?”

Don’t get stuck in a rut. Don’t let life go by without living the legacy you were called to leave on this planet.

Life is not lost by dying; life is lost minute by minute, day by dragging day, in all the thousand small uncaring ways.–Stephen Vincent Benet

The main reason for human inefficiency is that people simply have a poor self-image. Usually we have no trouble doubting our capabilities and accepting our shortcomings, but we struggle when it comes to convincing ourselves that we can achieve much more than we think.

The whole problem lies in our mind-set which has been framed by the information we have received about ourselves throughout our lives. And most of it is plain junk. If you have been listening to all those voices and heeding their message about what is and what is not good and acceptable, your self-image is probably not in a very good shape.

But you don’t have to stay that way for the rest of your life. You can lift your eyes beyond yourself and get informed about what God has to say about you.

In His Word He clearly states that He has created each human being with a distinctive combination of talents and gifts and has designed a unique and marvelous plan for each one of us.

When you stop focusing on who you think you are and start meditating on what God thinks about you, then you will discover that genius He has already placed within you. It is then only that you’ll be able to boldly step out and confidently walk on the path He has already laid out for you.

If you are dependent on some drug treatment today, and you’re still struggling, you might have asked yourself whether there is not a more natural way to beat the blues.

Besides some very important changes in your lifestyle that you should check on, like enough exercise, at least 7-8 hours of sleep and a healthy nutrition, there is another simple and natural option. It is a guaranteed successful antidepressant therapy: self-directed learning.

There’s nothing like delving deeply into a subject you are passionate about. It will build your self-esteem, spur your spirit to a higher level, and give you a vision for life.

If you are feeling blue, what about tackling a new project in your life? There is probably more than one sitting on the shelf right now. That book you always wanted to write, or that course you were planning to sign up for in the future. Maybe there is a sport, or some hobby you have always wanted to pursue.

Come on, it is never too late to start! I mean, you don’t have to go to the Olympics. Just start having some fun! Once you make the first step, those creative juices will start flowing, and soon you will hold in your own hands a product of your very own making. Is that accomplishment or what?

Any new endeavor you start walking in will keep your mind off the lies of the devil that bring you down. You will discover those unique talents God has given you and you’ll start experiencing growth in your life.

You will also discover that God has a perfect plan for you! He will lead you to live out a meaningful and fulfilled life that will eventually be a blessing to many others. If you want to take a step today, go to http://www.Self-DirectedLearningForSuccess.com and get immediate access to my free e-book “The Power of Self-Directed Learning,” and my free e-course “7 Ways to Consistently Change Your Life.”

“Where am I going to learn how to do this? How am I going to pay for it? When can I possibly have enough time to invest in this?”

True, these questions are all essential when planning the project, but by focusing on them we often forget something far more important: our attitude. Attitude is everything. If you are not fiercely determined to make it happen, you’ll probably soon be waving goodbye to your once so promising project.

That is why it is so important to watch our attitude before we endeavor to launch ourselves into an exciting new project. Every new endeavor is a winning project when we start out, but we need to ask ourselves, “What will my attitude be once the going gets tough?”

So next time you want to launch yourself into a new project, look inside first. That is where the true self-directed learning potential lies. The ability to succeed is there, but can you see it? If you have already encountered failure in the past, it’s probably because you are not thinking right. You’ve got the wrong thought patterns.

A mind-set of failure is framed by listening to the wrong information about yourself. Maybe it’s time to hear what God has to say about you. Did you know that the ability to live a happy and successful life is already in you? Achieving great exploits is not beyond anybodies’ reach. God predestined every human to achieve greatness. As far as He is concerned, you are made in His image, designed to be extremely creative, marked for success, and destined to be abundantly blessed to bless others.

Why not choose to stick close to Him for your next project? Learn how to flow with His program, and enjoy walking with your Creator, who deeply loves you, and knows exactly how to lead you to a life of abundance and fulfillment.