Today’s world is flooded with quite a number of emotional and psychological challenges among humans. One of such challenges affecting humans today include mental health issues; depression, anxiety and the likes. Low self-esteem has been shown in quite a number of mental illnesses as a risk factor of mental illnesses that is affecting a lot of teenagers today.
Self-esteem involves an individual perception and holistic evaluation of him/herself. It could either be positive or negative which is largely based on a teenager’s evaluation of him/herself. However, an individual’s evaluation of oneself is mainly based on the standard of his/ her peers, family and the level of self-esteem such individual has built overtime
BYL EPISODE ONE: LOW SELF-ESTEEM AMONG TEENAGERS AND THE STRUGGLE FOR A HEALTHY SELF ESTEEM
This episode of ‘Blackie, Yam-leg and Lefty’explains and revolves around self-esteem issues among teenagers, their peers, society and in their individual families. It shares the stories of teenagers who explicitly explains their individual experiences and challenges from a first-person point of view that revolves around their self-esteem. Self-esteem is an individual’s subjective evaluation of his/herself. It involves the beliefs that individual has known when growing up and what they are now. It also involves the way an individual interact with people, and how the individual carries him/herself in the society. Humans are social beings and we have been wired to communicate with other people around us. This means we are gregarious and cannot survive without communicating with other people. Furthermore, communication is ubiquitous; we communicate at every point in our daily activities.
Self-esteem could be either positive or negative based on a number of factors. An individual with positive self-esteem exercises confidence, enthusiasm as well as accepts corrections when he/she makes a mistake while an individual with low self-esteem lacks confidence among his peers and spends time in solitude.
The teenagers in this episode passionately share their individual life-experiences on low self-esteem and how they eventually conquered. Some of the causes of low self-esteem as gathered from these teenagers revolves around physical attributes which eventually led to loneliness, false assumptions and being uncomfortable among peers.
EFFECTS OF LOW SELF-ESTEEM
One of the effects of low self-esteem is the avoidance of activities that promotes mental health. As a result of low self-esteem, most teenagers now practice avoidance, social withdrawal; not interacting well with other people. People with low self-esteem also practice social exclusion as against social inclusion which has been shown to boost our happiness.
Low self-esteem also leads to anxiety, depression and substance abuse. Most teenagers with low self-esteem are involved in substance abuse to feel better which eventually leads to tolerance, dependence and addiction to these substances.
In conclusion, self-esteem is linked to several aspects of our lives. Consequently, a low self-esteem leads to social withdrawal. Likewise, a positive self-esteem promotes individual and societal growth.
