How can people succeed with poor self-esteem?

[quiethumir]

If self-esteem was the key to success and happiness, how come a lot of people have successful careers, but are not successful in their relationships, and they say they don't really like themselves and are unhappy?

[Kait]

Originally Posted by quiethumir

If self-esteem was the key to success and happiness, how come a lot of people have successful careers, but are not successful in their relationships, and they say they don't really like themselves and are unhappy?

Well, I don't think most people are happy in their "successful careers" just because the have strong self esteems.

Self esteem comes from within us....we have to love ourself first. We have to like the bad and good because we are not perfect.

A great example to me would be Oprah Winfrey. She has a great successful career but do you think her selfesteem sores when she struggles with her weight? I think at first her weight bothered her but I don't believe she lets it get to her today. This is where self esteem comes in to play. I think, she has relationships that have lasted for years, without even marriage. I DO believe she is happy.

[GregD]

I think that's a very good question and the root cause is generalization.

I think you can have someone fantastic at their business and confident in their skills but having a very low self-esteem about something outside their business like their physical appearance (which is not required for that specific job)

Also I can think of a great example of IT people who make lots of money and big success from their IT corner, but could be terrible at talking to any person, man or woman, purely because of lack of practice.

Likewise you may be a fantastic accountant, but have no idea how to handle a woman (your wife) or children.

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When they say self-esteem is key to success and happiness - this is a general ideal statement and many people who reach what THEY call success is not the kind of success described by this statement i think.

[sharshar89]

People with too high self esteem tend to see things as easy and thus get complacent over time..Once they get complacent they lose competitiveness..People with lower self esteem tend to take external things as a judge of their well-being thus they try hard in everything..Also..They think they can't make it so they try even harder than others..Therefore the result.

[Prinie]

Because they push themselves. If you dedicate yourself to something, if you work hard or hard enough at something, you'll have a relatively good amount of success. Motivation. And you don't have to have high or low self-esteem to have that.

[WisdomDome]

I wouldn't say that self-esteem is THE key to success and happiness, however it is one of several helpful factors.

Self-esteem is, much like the previous posters have said, a generalization.

For example, you may find that someone is a very talented artist and their work is very creative and unique, but if this person is unhappy with their work it's unlikely that they're ever going to pursue anything to make themselves successful. They don't have the self-esteem or the confidence to pursue, or even in some cases to set their goals. If this person wants to obtain a career as some type of artist, they're going to have to believe in their work and build up some self-esteem in order to have faith in themselves. They're perfectly capable of performing, they just may not pursue anything deeper than what they believe that they can get.

On the other hand, you may have somebody who produces less impressive art, but has the self-esteem and confidence to pursue a career, or whatever they may want and they might get it because they actually put forth the effort.

In either case, both people could lack personal self-esteem in their social skills, or perhaps lack physical self-esteem and this is what could be holding them back from certain areas of success.

[newkaren]

Originally Posted by quiethumir

If self-esteem was the key to success and happiness, how come a lot of people have successful careers, but are not successful in their relationships, and they say they don't really like themselves and are unhappy?

In short, they expect to.

[abcbac]

Self esteem is really important for happiness. Money doesn't bring you self esteem. Self esteem comes from within. Also self esteem isn't the only thing to achieve success.

[trees]

Originally Posted by quiethumir

If self-esteem was the key to success and happiness, how come a lot of people have successful careers, but are not successful in their relationships, and they say they don't really like themselves and are unhappy?

Because high-self esteem isn't required for decent outwardly "success" as defined by our society. But I believe if you want to be a earth-shaker, someone like King Jr, Ghandi, or hell, even Steve Jobs, you've GOT to have strong confidence in yourself. That's not the same as high self esteem I'd argue. I don't like this whole idea of a self-esteem as something you obtain. Self-esteem is too focused on yourself, almost in a selfish way. I think confidence in yourself is different; the way these giants changed our world was because they had this amazing vision WAY beyond themselves and they had the self confidence that they could achieve it. It just comes from a different place.