Don’t be too harsh on yourself

Do you have trouble standing your ground? Do you weigh both sides of every single situation? How often do you advocate for yourself or rather how often do you criticize yourself? Well, if you often criticize yourself then it means you lack self confidence.

Most people do not see anything good in their selves and tend to be their own toughest critics hence making life difficult for themselves. So why do we often give ourselves unnecessary conditions that ordinarily we would not give to others? Shouldn’t we be our own self motivators? So why criticize yourself badly?

How does one learn to advocate more for himself? Self-promotion or advocacy doesn’t mean being cocky or over-confident. But maybe next time someone offers you a compliment, just smile and say thank you, instead of following it up with a “but …”

I’m definitely my toughest critic. I’ve made many mistakes in my life and I am always the one that can’t forgive me for them. I think it’s partially because I’m terrified of what other people would think. Sometimes I give up so easily on myself that I ever wonder if I would be of any general good to the society.”

“Time over, people have said if I do not believe or give credit to myself, no one will do it for me. Then I realize that if I continue to criticise myself then where do I intend to get the desired encouragement to move on in life? I am living a better and positive life now but it all started with me being my own best advocate. I tell you if you do not advocate for yourself no one will do it on your behalf. There are very few people out there who claim to be your friends that will really stand up and advocate for you” says Amina Bello Usman.

Being your own advocate does get easier with time. Know that if you don’t stand up for yourself, no one else will. Realize that things are solved much more quickly when the communication lines are open within you.

Yes, communication within you goes a long way in easing some of the stress. You talk to yourself and try to see reasons and adjust to some of the facts and realities of life. Understand that not all realities are facts and not all facts are realities. You and only you can decode these things for yourself.

Ultimately, our husbands, boyfriends, best friends, parents, sisters, children can love us and advocate for us all we want, but if we don’t love and value ourselves enough to advocate for us … then we’re only hurting ourselves — be it personally or professionally.

So today at work in particular, I’m going to try to focus any “critical” energy towards creating “advocacy energy.