Self-Esteem

Opening Up and Sharing Helps Me Build My Children’s Self Worth

March 16, 2015 by Kathryn 23 Comments

Low self-esteem is something that I understand pretty well. I went through a very awkward phase in my early teens and it wasn’t until my mid-twenties that I embraced my self-worth and became the confident woman I am today. I have to admit that when I gave birth to my two boys, I hoped that I wouldn’t have to watch them struggle through self-esteem issues the way I once had. But of course, every child has issues with confidence at some point. And because I’m all too familiar with the negative effects that low self-esteem can have on a child, it’s been my mission to help my boys realize their value in the world.

If there is one lesson I have learned that has proven to be true again and again, it’s that modelling a love of self is the best way to ensure that my boys develop the same trait as they grow up. For the most part, that’s a very simple thing to do. I don’t, as a rule, speak negatively about myself. I carry myself with self-assurance. And I show the other people in my life the same respect I am accustomed to receiving, because I want my boys to know that everyone has value.

But what I’ve found most helpful for helping my boys build confidence, especially in the case of my oldest son, is sharing stories of some of my own previous struggles, and the eventual positive results. I remember one night a few years ago when doing just that helped my son conquer some social anxiety. As I was putting six-year-old Zackary to bed, he looked at me and asked, “Mom, why don’t I have a best friend?”

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Coca-Cola Canada Shares Stories of Inspirational Canadians this Summer to Help Encourage Acts of Kindness

July 31, 2013 by Kathryn 14 Comments

One of the basic truths of human nature is that our smallest actions can grow to have a big impact on our lives and the lives of others. Even something as simple as smiling at a person that looks sad can create a ripple that yields positive results all day long. And a recent national survey conducted by Environics Research on behalf of Coca-Cola Canada shows that Canadians are performing plenty of little acts of kindness in the course of a month! But many people believe that those actions aren’t getting the recognition they deserve.

That’s why Coca-Cola Canada went on a national search to find and showcase some of the amazing Canadians that go above and beyond with acts of kindness that enrich the lives of others on a daily basis. Reading about regular people doing such incredible things had me feeling inspired to make a difference too. These are some of the stories of everyday heroes that were found: [Read more…]

You’re Contagious, Make It Count!

August 24, 2012 by Kathryn 15 Comments

For the most part, bloggers are incredibly supportive of one another and I’m so glad to be a part of the Canadian blogging community. But every once in a while, a blogger will attack her peers because she feels that they’re not acting in the “right” way.

It hurts me when I see things like this, but as I thought about events like these, I realized that they are by no means limited to the blogosphere. High school is what will spring to many minds when public humiliations of this sort are discussed but even in adult relationships, humans often have the need to criticize and judge each other. It can be subtle: the mom on the playground commenting that SHE would never let her child eat a pre-packaged snack like the one you just handed your child. Or it can be more obvious, especially online: a hateful comment that visiting a fast-food restaurant on your vacation has doomed your children to a life of bad health and obesity.

blowing bubbles [Read more…]

Getting Personal Online-Bare Your Soul or Keep it Private?

June 6, 2012 by Kathryn 17 Comments

I’ve noticed in the last few months as I attend conferences and read other blogs that there is one unified message being preached by all the “bigwigs” of the blogosphere and I’ve been hearing it over and over again. “Tell your story. Share your experiences. Let your readers know what makes you different.” It all really boils down to the same thing, no matter how you say it: Be yourself.

But here’s the thing. For some people, being yourself might mean being more private. It might mean NOT sharing your angst-filled past or your current painful struggles to your thousands of readers. For some bloggers, it may not even fit with what you want your blog to be.

Blogger peer pressure is no different than any other type of peer pressure. It’s easy to start to feel bad when it seems like some of the biggest and most successful names in the business are continually pushing you to bare your soul and all you really want to do is share your favourite kids’ craft ideas. So what do you do when you start to feel that pressure? [Read more…]

Tough Love or Blog Bullying…You Decide!

April 10, 2012 by Kathryn 63 Comments

There has been a disturbing trend in the blogosphere recently and after mulling over it for the last few days, I’ve decided to speak out about it. I’ve seen similar behaviour in forums and on blogs in the past but in the last few weeks, it seems that there have been even more articles, Tweets and conversations that are just downright cruel to other bloggers. And why?

Well, believe it or not, some bloggers haven’t been interacting online long enough to know what is and isn’t deemed “good form” in the wild world of social media.

wheat and sunset These posts, comments and conversations aren’t necessarily meant to be cruel. On the contrary, I think in some way they are meant to be informative and inspiring. But honestly, is the blogosphere really so horrible at expressing itself that the only way we can inspire is to toss out generalized insults or to call newbie bloggers horrible names?

The tough love tactic isn’t a new one; it’s as old as human nature itself. The problem is that it very often has the exact opposite effect. Instead of lighting a fire of inspiration, it digs a pit of despair. And the people that a well-meaning blogger intended to help may just end up throwing in the towel instead. It’s easy to say that if anyone is willing to give up so easily, they probably weren’t meant to be doing this in the first place. It’s even true to a point. But does that really ever make such depreciation right?

Why can’t the same messages be sent with compassion? Why can’t the same lessons be taught with a desire to truly help another individual instead of a desire to make what you write “sensational?” We put on a good show of pretending that we’ve come a long way as a civilization, but the sad truth is that women are still notoriously unappreciated and undervalued in our society. Many women suffer from horrible self-esteem issues as a result. So why are we compounding that problem by attacking other women under the guise of “helping” them?

If you’re one of the new bloggers that’s stumbled across one of these blog posts and you’re now doubting yourself as a result…don’t! Do what you need to do and learn as you go! If you mess up along the way, you’ll fit right in with everyone else that has ever started a blog. Ever. But if you keep going, eventually you’ll figure out what you want to do with your blog and why, and that’s all that’s really important.

And if you’re one of the bloggers that thinks cruelty will help women learn to be better bloggers, I’m not going to try to convince you otherwise but I sure won’t be sharing your post. There’s enough negativity in the world and on the Internet already. If I can be sure that what I write was discouraging to nobody and maybe, if I’m lucky, encouraging to one, that’s all I ask. I’ll save the sensationalism for the people and the posts that deserve it. My fellow bloggers do not.

What do you think? Is there any redeeming feature of a cruel post with good intentions, or is it just blog bullying?

BlogWest 2012-Speaking on the Monetization Panel

March 13, 2012 by Kathryn 22 Comments

Thanks to my fabulous sponsor Skinfix, I recently attended the first-ever Western Canadian blog conference: BlogWest 2012. I knew almost immediately upon my return that one post wouldn’t be appropriate for sharing the event, since for me the event had three major highlights. I’ve decided to cover each one of them in a separate post; my first post is about my experience speaking on the Monetization Panel.

When I was given the opportunity to speak on the Monetization Panel at BlogWest 2012, I was completely thrilled. I made a lot of mistakes when I first started blogging and I was so excited about being able to share some of them so that other bloggers could benefit. I was also nervous, but I dealt with that by just pushing it out of my mind.

And that worked absolutely perfectly until the morning of our panel. That’s when the nervousness really hit hard. Fear sat in the bottom of my stomach like a lead weight. I took some deep breaths and forced myself to look calm and confident. I smiled a lot, talked about how excited I was and did everything I could to ensure my nervousness was known only to me. When I sat down moments before the panel started, I had already decided that I would contribute as much as I could because I really didn’t want to appear silenced by fear.

So the panel began. I didn’t stutter. My voice didn’t shake. I was told afterwords that I had looked and sounded confident and professional. I said most of the things I wanted to say and forgot a few points that I wish I had remembered. But overall, I’m pretty sure I did a darn good job.

blogwest monetization panel — Speaking with Melissa Vroon, Nicole Christen, Cora Brady and Julie Van Rosendaal (Source: This Bird's Day)

And then the panel ended. And I waited for the flood of relief to hit me now that the panel was over….

And it never came.

Instead, I think I actually felt worse. That lead weight in my stomach was even heavier. Because it was done now. And if I had said anything people didn’t like or didn’t agree with, there was nothing I could do. It was over. That was that.

I gradually did fight away that “after-nervousness.” And when it had finally retreated and I was feeling like my usual chipper and outspoken self again, I asked myself, “Will I do this again? I know if I do it long enough, I’ll become comfortable with it. But is it worth the agony and insecurity I’ll feel in the meantime every time I stand up to speak?”

And part of me screamed, “NO!! Absolutely not! You proved your point! You NEVER, EVER have to do it again!”

But after that first reaction, I thought back to when I was afraid to be videotaped, and how completely natural and comfortable I am on video now. I thought back further to when I first started blogging and I was so uncertain about it that I considered just posting other people’s buttons so that I could get bonus giveaway entries without actually ever having to write anything myself. I thought back even further, to a time when I was so shy that I was scared to even reply to somebody if they said, “Hello.”

And I thought about how I conquered all those fears. I didn’t do it by thinking about that voice screaming, “No!” in my head. I didn’t do it by thinking at all.

I did it by blindly leaping into anything that I had decided was interesting. I did it by shutting off my brain and blocking out the doubts, insecurities and fears that were running rampant inside my head. I did it by doing, I did it by pretending that I loved doing it, and I did it again and again and again until I actually felt as comfortable as I looked whether I was meeting a new person or shooting a promotional video.

And I’ll be darned if I’m not going to do it with public speaking too. So when the opportunity presents itself, I WILL dive in again and I will do it until I have mastered it; until I am as comfortable on a stage as I am in the audience.

Having made this decision, I know I have some uncomfortable days ahead of me. But will it be worth it?

There’s not a doubt in my mind.

Happiness is a Dirty Mirror

February 3, 2012 by Kathryn 11 Comments

Do you ever have those days when you just look and feel fabulous? Your hair is behaving, you’re wearing an outfit that you love and your self-esteem is through the roof? If you need those days more often, do I ever have a secret for you! Whatever you do…don’t dust your mirrors!

rose coloured glasses I discovered this trick a few days ago. I was glancing in my bedroom mirror as I passed by and I realized that I looked really, really good! My hair framed my face perfectly, my skin looked smooth and flawless and my eyes were bright and sparkling. I grinned, primped and totally enjoyed it; it’s always nice to realize that you look good without having gone to any special effort!

The next day, I had the same experience. I was thrilled, but also a little surprised. I hadn’t put on any makeup or even brushed my hair yet! And it was then that I realized that it was the slight layer of dust that was currently covering the mirror that was making me look so darn good! Basically, it softened my features. Imperfections in my skin and fine lines were no longer visible. My slightly dirty hair looked clean and perfect. My dusty mirror had become my own personal airbrush artist!

The experience got me thinking about the way us women look at the world sometimes. For the most part, our gazes tend to be squeaky-clean. We view our surroundings and ourselves with all the harshness of an overly bright florescent light bulb. And when we do, we realize that there are imperfections in almost everything, especially ourselves.

Maybe, just maybe, we need a slight layer of dust over our gazes. With a softened view of the world, we may see that all those glaring imperfections are no longer even visible. We might find that we look downright gorgeous and that the world around us does too. Maybe those rose-coloured glasses aren’t such a farfetched concept after all.

Self-esteem isn’t about attaining perfection. It’s about feeling good about yourself, your environment and your life in general. You don’t have to work your butt off to reach that point. You don’t have to stress about your appearance, your kids’ behaviour or the state of your house. It’s really just a matter of perception. All you need to do is airbrush your view of the world.

You’ll be amazed by how wonderful your life really is when you look at it through a slight layer of dust!

Share and Shine

January 17, 2012 by Kathryn 2 Comments

If there is one thing that I absolutely love, it’s learning new things. I love it so much that it almost doesn’t matter what I’m learning as long as I’m learning something. And thanks to the Information Revolution, I can usually find out about anything I choose with just a few quick keywords. Yes…I am a total Google diva.

I love the fact that information about any topic is so easy to find and I am incredibly grateful that so many people took the time to share all their learning just so that other people could benefit from it. So when I see other women hiding tidbits of knowledge to themselves, it makes me think…

I believe knowledge is meant to be shared. It doesn’t matter what the knowledge is. If somebody can benefit from it, it should be passed along. But I didn’t always believe that. There was a time when I guarded my knowledge more fiercely than a Doberman guards a junkyard.

The memory that comes back to me most often is one from high school when I happened to bring a homemade snack for my lunch. I shared it with my friends and one of them mentioned that she would love to have the recipe. I smiled politely, but the only thought in my head was, “No WAY am I giving out my recipe!!”

That’s something I would never do today. After all, if I give somebody the instructions for making the same dish, does that make the dish I create any less delicious? But thinking about that time got me thinking about WHY I had been so unwilling to share my knowledge.

And the answer to that question, I soon realized, was my lack of self-esteem. I didn’t believe that I had any value. So when somebody expressed a desire for something that I knew, for something that I HAD, I felt validated. Even if I didn’t have any value, something I knew was valuable and if I kept that knowledge to myself, then nobody else would have that little grain of value that I had. Sure, I might be worthless. But I knew something that wasn’t worthless and if I was the only one that knew it then that was almost the same as me being worth something myself.

Getting over that crippling lack of self-esteem wasn’t easy. It took lots of effort, lots of tribulation and, yes, lots of learning. Today I am proud to say that I am a strong and self-confident woman and as a result, I am not only willing to share knowledge with others, I am happy to do so. In fact, if somebody asks me a question that I can’t answer, I will go and find the answer for them if I possibly can! I love helping others and I’m so glad that I’ve grown to become the type of woman that can do so without a second thought.

Wouldn’t the world be a wonderful place if everybody did the same? If we could ask anybody anything and know that they would be willing to answer, or maybe even help us find the answer? Wouldn’t the blogosphere be a better place? I like to think that the blog community is, by nature, a community that shares more freely. After all, we share our stories and ourselves on our blogs each and every day! But every once in a while I notice a return to that mindset that I saw so much of in high school, a comment or a conversation that practically screams, “Well, if you don’t know then I’m not going to tell you!” And it breaks my heart because I know that the motivation behind the attitude is that old enemy of so many women in the world, low self-esteem.

So how can a woman rid herself of that fear, that prevalent, horrifying fear that she isn’t good enough?

It isn’t easy.

But it isn’t hard either.

What worked for me was constantly telling myself that I was a wonderful person. I told myself again and again and again. When you repeat something like that long enough, it becomes a reality. But it takes time. And it takes work. And when you’re feeling depressed, hurt or inadequate, telling yourself something like that is difficult. But when you do it enough, you really do become the person you keep telling yourself you are.

And when that happens, you realize that your worth doesn’t come from what you look like, what you have or even what you know. In the end, your worth is maybe just measured by whether or not you shine a little bit more light into the world.

Let’s light up the world together. We all have gifts we can share, if we’re not afraid to share them.

And when we do…we all shine.