Building Self-esteem series: The role of Accountability
Hi everyone! I hope you are doing well. Thank you for following our building self-esteem series. This week’s topic is the role of accountability in building self-esteem.
If you are wondering why accountability is relevant to this series, think of it like this: when you blame others or shrug off mistakes, you give away control. But when you step up and say "I own this," something magical happens. You transform from a passive observer to an active player in your own life, Ultimately, through enough practice, challenges become opportunities, mistakes become stepping stones, and goals become achievements you know you can reach.
How does a lack of accountability impact self-esteem?
- Blaming others or circumstances for your setbacks creates a feeling of powerlessness and hinders your ability to learn and grow.
- Avoiding responsibility for your actions, both good and bad, can fuel negative self-talk and self-doubt.
- Without accountability, goals often remain just wishful thinking. The absence of progress and tangible achievements weakens your belief in your ability to follow through and succeed
- Lack of accountability can erode trust in your personal and professional relationships.
- All of these things result in diminishing your self-esteem.
What happens when you start to hold yourself and others accountable?
- Accepting responsibility for your actions fosters a sense of control over your life. You become the driver, not the passenger, leading to increased confidence and self-belief.
- When you own up to your mistakes, you create opportunities for growth and improvement.
- Accountability helps you stay committed, track progress, and celebrate your achievements, reinforcing your belief in your capabilities.
- It helps you stick to your core values and that helps build self-esteem
- Setting clear expectations fosters a sense of fairness and reduces confusion.
- Addressing issues directly and fairly with accountability helps resolve conflicts constructively.
Let's see how this plays out in some real-life scenarios.
- Sarah recognizes that excessive social media scrolling negatively impacts her mood and self-worth. She sets a daily limit and holds herself accountable by using apps or tracking tools. This conscious effort empowers her to take control of her time and attention, improving her mood and boosting her self-esteem. Mark mindlessly scrolls through social media for hours, comparing himself to others and feeling inadequate. He lacks the awareness or accountability to break the cycle, further impacting his self-perception and well-being. Both have the same issue but their approach differs and therefore the outcome.
- Sarah, valuing honesty, admits a mistake at work, takes responsibility for its consequences, and proposes solutions. This builds trust and respect, strengthening her self-worth through integrity. Mark, fearing judgment, covers up a minor error. This creates anxiety and distrust, damaging his self-esteem and potentially leading to bigger issues.
Remember this quote by Tony Robbins ‘By changing nothing, nothing changes’
How to get started on exercising accountability?
- Begin with achievable tasks, like waking up on time or completing a small workout three times a week.
- Use a journal, app, or even sticky notes to monitor your progress towards goals. Seeing your efforts visualized provides a sense of accomplishment and motivates you to stay on track.
- Mistakes are inevitable. Instead of dwelling on them, analyze what went wrong and use it as a learning opportunity.
- Share your progress with a supportive friend/family member or a mentor. You can even make a forum post on 7 Cups to keep yourself accountable and keep on adding to it.
Remember that accountability closely relates to your core values. Using these two together can greatly improve your self-esteem. For example, if your core value is truthfulness, then you will make an effort to remain truthful and assist others when possible in doing the same.
Activity (Required participation for those who are working towards the braving self badge)
Reflect on one area of your life that you can improve upon in terms of accountability. This can be holding yourself accountable or others accountable for not treating you the way you wish to be treated.
Examples of such areas:
- Exercise/fitness goals
- Mental health goals
- Educational/work goals
- Career growth goals
- Core values strengthening
Once you have identified an area where you can benefit from accountability, reflect on 3 steps you can take to keep yourself accountable the same. Make sure these steps are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound.
Example:
Alex wishes to become more physically active. He narrows this down to meeting 8000 steps daily. This is achievable for him as he does some walking but not consistently or enough.
- He decides that he will go for a 30-minute walk first thing in the morning and sets his alarms for it. He then tells his wife to wake him up even if he wishes to sleep in.
- He buys a smart watch/fitness tracker to keep track of his steps.
- He also starts to part furthest away from his office in terms of parking and walks to his office.
- He avoids the lift and takes the stairs.
- In his afternoon lunch break, he goes for a 10 minute walk after lunch. He tells his co-workers about his fitness goals.
I do wish to be more physically active.
I went to the gym yesterday and almost died completing a small workout recommend to me by their occasionally on-site fitness expert, but complete it I did and took myself out for dinner to celebrate.
Today I invested in some accessories to further improve my gym experience, and put my gym bag by the door to prepare for when the gym opens again on Sunday (is closed for maintenance).
I also added 'go to the gym' three times a week on my Finch self care app.
@communicativePond1728
I am glad you were able to complete the workout. However gentle reminder it is perfectly okay to not be able to do beginner workouts at first. They are rarely beginner-friendly or often created by people who are so far from being a beginner that they have forgotten what that feels like.
I like the idea of creating a system that makes it easier for you to do gym. Do you like going to the gym or is there any other activity you can do with more ease?
@Hope
Reflect on one area of your life that you can improve upon in terms of accountability. This can be holding yourself accountable or others accountable for not treating you the way you wish to be treated.
I wish to become more confident in myself. I will do this by telling myself affirmations every morning. I will set a reminder on my phone so I will not forget.
@Hope
To take more responsibility around the house such as cleaning.
SMART targets:
Set a cleaning rota.
Set more tasks on the weekend where is more time available at home.
Set 2 Max a day so that it is achievable.
@Hope
I will hold myself accountable for my exercise/fitness goals. I realized that staying still does conserve my energy, but it doesn't really improve my mood in the long run. So I will change that by:
1. Doing stretches, yoga, and warm-up exercises for 15 mins after I wake up. Then spend another 15 mins under the sun.
2. Put on an alarm or reminder on my phone or watch every hour to stand up and do little walks for 5-10 mins when I've been sitting all the time. Must always keep moving.
3. Do another walk in the evening for 5-10 mins.
This is to be an everyday routine. Keeping moving will also increase my appetite and help me sleep early.
I am working on a diet change for diabetes. I've met with a dietician, but have struggled a lot to follow the diet guidelines. I think my three steps would be...
Finding three meals that I like and cooking them on the weekend. Having my mother expect this will help to keep me accountable.
Taking notes on my app about what I eat for the dietician to see.
Having the goal of using the diet fully before I meet with the dietician next month.
@Hope There's a lot of areas of my life were I can improve in terms of accountability, but if I choose one, I'd choose keeping up with school. Because everything else, like taking care of myself and my mental health, really revolves around that. So my three steps would be:
1. Make myself a timetable for school days, a timetable that actually considers all my needs and one that I'll actually be able to stick to. Meaning I need to set aside enough time for 7 Cups so that my Cups time does not extend into my study time, lol. Also, I need to make sure I give myself enough breaks to move around and stretch or exercise a bit. And actually follow this timetable right from the first day of school.
2. Have a long-term listener to keep me accountable. So when I come home from school, I can have a look at all the homework I got that day, make a list of it, decide how much I'm going to do that evening, and let my listener know about that. Then at the end of the day, I can go back and let them know how much I actually did that day. That might also help me stay organised and help me know how much I really need to do.
3. Not let my mother's behaviour affect me. This is a really hard one, because oftentimes her behaviour makes me feel so miserable that I just can't focus on homework. I don't know how, but somehow I really need to stop this from affecting me so much. Maybe I can try to remind myself that my amount of homework won't change just because she made me feel so terrible and that I still need to do the homework to prevent it from piling up.
i want to focus on improving my fitness. i feel very tired throughout the day and have unhealthily lost lots of weight.
1. i will prep my meals half an hour before having them so that i am able to make nutritious meals.
2. i will keep a water bottle filled with me at all times so that i remember to hydrate myself + i'll also set reminders on my phone.
3. i will go to the local market every other day so i am able to buy fresh fruits and vegetables and not depend on not so healthy stuff at home.
4. i will exercise for 20 minutes 3 times a week so that i can build strength.
for accountability, i have set reminders on my phone and i have a calendar where i mark when i have achieved my goals. seeing my progress visualised keeps me motivated. i will try to meditate daily, be compassionate towards myself and keep journaling about my feelings as usually when i do not follow through a task it is due to underlying feelings of self doubt.
i read this post 2 months ago and reading about SMART goals and seeing its examples described made me realise i was setting very unrealistic goals for myself. it sent me down a rabbit hole of why i was doing it and i've learnt and grown a lot along the way. thank you for this 🌻
@Hope
I'm willing to create a healthier routine that includes:
1. More spiritual practices.
2. Reading more about topics I like.
3. Making some time to spend with my family and help them.
4. Start journaling to organize my life and better manage my emotions!
Three steps I can take to hold myself accountable in my physical health goals:
- exercising at least 30 minutes each day, five times each week;
- drinking at least six glasses of water each day; and
- taking my meds before bed.
@HopeI'd like to think I'm pretty good at holding myself accountable, but I'm not very good at holding other people accountable due to the fact that I don't enjoy upsetting people and sometimes holding people accountable for their own actions might upset them