An Issue of Youth Self-Esteem

Youth self-esteem

Self esteem- it's something I'm noticing that is decreasing throughout the generations. As a society, we can and should show them how to regain it, and how to maintain it. To start off, self esteem is how someone feels and their judgements about themselves, their accomplishments, as well as worth and their value. It considers how they feel about their behaviors, abilities, beliefs, and so on. As children, male and female levels of self esteem are right around the same. But as they all hit adolescence and puberty, it all tends to decline. This decline is mainly caused by hormonal changes, body changes, body image issues, and social changes, plus others. Right around adolescence and puberty, though, female self esteem regularly is lower than male self esteem. The teen's self esteem becomes significantly more frail than usual during puberty.

Any mess ups, criticisms, not making a team, getting left out, flunking the math test only enforces their beliefs that they don't.  Girls see the models and actors in TV and social media, and compare themselves to the models. They notice that they don't look like them- aren't as skinny, or maybe they don't have perfect skin like the models. Because of these images and beauty standards, 7 in 10 girls believe that they aren't good enough in comparison to everyone else. They need to understand that these images are most likely photoshopped to make them fit the beauty standards that society has created. Despite popular belief, self esteem issues aren't limited to the female gender, males are impacted too. More than 40 percent of males in middle/ high school exercise regularly in the attempt to increase their muscle mass.

Additionally, more than 38 percent of males in the same age range have used protein supplements.  All these factors lead into low self esteem, or LSE to make it simple. Low self esteem can be harmful for reasons that you may not even know! For example- people with LSE are more likely to be followers, and more likely to be easily pressured into dangerous habits like smoking, drugs, alcohol, etc. They are more likely to do poorly in school, and more likely to blame other people for their mistakes. Furthermore, they are more likely to neglect their well being- adopting unhealthy eating habits, overeating, poor hygiene, not exercising, drug/ alcohol problems, and so forth. But there are ways that we can prevent all those bad things from happening. There are many ways that teens and adults alike can take their self esteem into their own hands, learning how to develop healthy self esteem and how to maintain it. Richard L. Weaver once wrote- We can control our self esteem. I feel that I should share how we all can do that. To start it all off, you can have healthy and positive friend groups. One of the most influential things for our self esteem are our friends. If your friends are pessimistic and always complaining, you are likely to pick up those mannerisms.

In the same way, if your friends are positive and happy, you will likely pick up the behaviors/ attitudes. This is the same with role models. In healthy relationships, there is support and listening. A sense of belonging. Other ways are to help others, it makes you feel better about yourself. You can change all negative self talk into positive self talk and avoid negative self talk all together. Beating yourself up brings your self esteem down. Positivity and focusing on what you like about yourself makes you more confident and happy.  Having healthy self esteem has its perks. Obviously, you are more confident and happy. Other than that, you deal with unexpected illnesses, challenges or mistakes better. As well as being more responsible, able to withstand stress, socializing better and more efficiently.  The youth's self esteem are in their own hands. But as a society, we need to show them how to regain and maintain healthy levels of self esteem. It has its perks, and missing out on them would be a real shame.

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