Self-esteem is essential to mental and emotional health. It’s important to cultivate high self-esteem to lead a happy and successful life.

High self-esteem can help you make better decisions, build stronger relationships, and take on challenges with confidence. Here are ten habits you can cultivate to improve your self-esteem.

1. Practice Self-Compassion:

It’s easy to be hard on yourself when things go wrong. Instead of criticizing yourself, practice self-compassion. Treat yourself with kindness and understanding. Acknowledge your struggles and pain and offer yourself comfort and support.

2. Surround Yourself with Positive People:

Surround yourself with people who lift you up and support you. Positive people can help you develop a positive outlook on life and help you build your self-esteem. Stay away from people who bring you down and make you feel bad about yourself.

3. Develop a Growth Mindset:

A growth mindset is the belief that your abilities can grow and improve with effort and practice. The opposite is a fixed mindset, which is the belief that your abilities are set and cannot be changed.

Cultivate a growth mindset by focusing on your efforts and progress rather than just your accomplishments.

4. Set Realistic Goals:

Setting realistic goals can help you build your self-esteem. When you achieve your goals, you feel a sense of accomplishment and pride.

Set goals that are challenging but still achievable so that you can stretch yourself without setting yourself up for failure.

5. Take Care of Yourself:

When you take care of yourself, you feel good about yourself. Practice self-care by eating healthy, exercising regularly, getting enough sleep, and doing things that make you happy.

When you take care of yourself, you send a message to yourself that you are worth the effort.

6. Practice Self-Acceptance:

A self-acceptance is accepting ourselves for who we are, including our flaws and imperfections. Practice self-acceptance by acknowledging your strengths and weaknesses and accepting yourself without judgment.

When you accept yourself, you build self-confidence and self-esteem.

7. Learn to Say No:

Learning to say no is an important part of building self-esteem. Saying no to things that don’t serve you or don’t align with your goals and values is an act of self-respect.

When you say no, you make space for the things that matter most to you.

8. Focus on Your Strengths:

One way to build self-esteem is to focus on your strengths. We often focus on our weaknesses and flaws, but focusing on our strengths can help us feel good about ourselves. Identify your strengths and find ways to use them in your daily life.

9. Challenge Your Negative Self-Talk:

We all have negative self-talk that can bring us down. Challenge negative self-talk by questioning whether it’s based in reality and whether it’s helpful. Replace negative self-talk with positive and affirming statements.

10. Practice Gratitude:

Gratitude is the practice of being thankful for what we have. Practicing gratitude can help us focus on the good in our lives and build our self-esteem.

Make a gratitude list or start a gratitude journal to remind yourself of the good things in your life.