Change – You Can Handle It!

Part 3

Self-esteem affects change

By Wendy Collier, B. Ed.

Summary: By looking at a common change like family and friends moving, you will learn how to look at a situation with a healthier perspective. Then, you can apply this skill to other situations of change.

Change is very difficult for people who experience negative self-esteem in certain situations; or who grew up with insecurity in their life. These people need to have stability, certainty and comfort in their life. It is like a safe harbor for their mental, emotional, physical and spiritual well-being.

Outer security and inner security in their life is a basic need and they work hard to achieve it. So, when a change comes along, their first reaction is to feel threatened by it. To them it means that a part of their world just became uncertain. If they have not been taught skills to handle changes effectively, then the change can force these people into a negative, downward spiral of dysfunction.

Let’s look at a common change – family and friends moving. We may feel sadness, disappointment, a loss, and even a void in our life. The depth of these feelings will differ according to how close your relationship is with them.

Now, look at what they feel – all the same feelings you have plus the details and stress of the move, new home, new neighbors, finding a new school for the kids, having to make new friends, finding new activities and groups to belong to, new doctors, new dentists, etc.; the list goes on. If you’ve moved in the past 10 years you will understand that it is more complicated now than it used to be. Does that help you get your feelings into a healthier perspective? I know for sure it helped me and my family.

The skills that people with negative self-esteem need to learn to handle change are: how to look at change from a healthy perspective; how to see that the change is not a personal attack, criticism or judgment of them; and how they can deal with the change one step at a time. These skills will help them power through the change with minimal damage to their sense of self-esteem and security.