Psychologist Patrick Keelan rehearses the piano every day. It’s one of the ways he practises what he preaches. When he’s helping someone who is experiencing low self-esteem, he suggests they routinely engage with activities that use or improve their skills. “When you’re doing something you’re good at or getting better at, it gets harder to think negatively about yourself,” he explains.
Psychologists even have a name for this inner conflict – cognitive dissonance – and it’s a spark that can lead to a positive shift in how you see yourself. “If you keep up with activities you’ve mastered, it’ll put pressure on your attitude toward yourself to adjust to match,” Keelan says. “Something has to give.”
In other words, you shouldn’t wait until you’re feeling confident to brush up your chess game, learn to build furniture or try out a new recipe. Quite the opposite: just applying yourself to pursuits you find both interesting and challenging could, on its own, help to improve your self-perception.