Neuroticism
Scoring high here means we are more prone than others to negative emotions like anxiety and we are easily frustrated. High self-worth tends to be associated with a low score in neuroticism as it reflects natural emotional resilience. If you feel particularly sensitive to negative emotions, this may be, in part, the natural slant of your personality. Nonetheless, neuroticism is also a reaction to circumstances, which a person has an inability to deal with. Normally, when a person feels frightened, unheard, out of control and incapable it’s quite normal that the shade of emotions they are going to experience will adhere to the negative spectrum. If this is just your natural perception of reality however and it’s not affecting you or others , there is nothing you need to do. If this trait impacts your life, or the life of others around you, in a negative way, maybe it’s wise to search for the reason and correct it. Remember, the human being is not accommodated to experience negative emotions for a prolonged period of time. The body reacts to these emotions by releasing chemicals, which in turn have a harmful effect on our whole system, so investigating the reason for that type of mindset is always useful.
If you recognize that your personality has made you more vulnerable to low self-worth, don’t despair. These traits are not your destiny. Our self-image is a delicate and complex combination of the slant of our personality and the unique mix of our experiences. You may have a resilient personality but still find yourself struggling to feel deserving of a better life. This is just information to help you understand what may be making you vulnerable to a poor relationship with yourself. And knowing the building blocks of your personality can help give you a road
map to what kind of strategies you will need to heal. For example, if you are particularly high in neuroticism, you may want to focus on methods for coping with emotions and building resilience. Nevertheless, we should not forget that by being able to affiliate ourselves with one trait more than the others does not mean that we do not experience or display the rest depending on the given circumstance. It simply means we are predominantly entrenched into this specific set of characteristics and behaviours most of the time, but that we can demonstrate all of the rest in a situation calls for it. We have all had this friend who is very outgoing and social, always chatting and in certain circumstances we see them in a different light- being withdrawn, quiet, docile. This is an evidence that our personality does not have a clear definition, because we are constantly changing. We may have more of one, but that one does not validate the whole of us, neither it means that it can’t change.
No matter the predisposition of our personality, our experiences, especially those from childhood, have a profound impact on how we view ourselves. Our self-image is easily influenced when we are young because we have yet to develop a mature understanding of
ourselves and our place in the world. Our experiences- both positive and negative are crucial for the development of our worldview. Since our parents, guardians, or caregivers are the ones with whom we interact the most at this age, they play a vital role in shaping our relationship with ourselves. While feelings of inferiority can manifest at any age, there is a strong correlation
between low self-worth and childhood trauma and stress. The explanation for this is due to the overlap with emotional projection and recognition. For example, if you grew up in an abusive home or one marred with neglect and mistreatment, the likelihood that you will struggle with feelings of worthiness as an adult is high. Moreover, a childhood trauma could have a more devastating effect in the manifestation of low self-worth, because the information about “self”, which the person receives at that time is accumulated as a substantial knowledge rather than an altered state. In plain terms, people who have experienced early childhood trauma are more accommodated to think that their perception of themselves is “what they always have known to be”, versus the people who have had some awareness of themselves after which they have experienced trauma, as a result of which they are more inclined to think “I was...but then”.
But low self-worth can arise from les extreme situations: it may be a product of difficulty in our social lives, a feeling that we just don’t fit in with our peers and friends; it may be a chronic feeling of never living up to the expectations of others, or ourselves if we have perfectionist standards; it may also be the result of long-term stress. The media can also have a significant
influence on how deeply we value ourselves. Even though we know, intellectually, images in the media are highly manipulated and staged, emotionally we still yearn to live up to the ideals of youth and beauty. If we feel we don’t measure up, many of us fall into the trap of adopting unhealthy habits and attitudes toward food and exercise. A consistently negative relationship to our bodies fuels the belief that we just aren’t good enough.
Then there is our unique life experience. We tend to look at our experiences, reflect on how they have made us feel, and take it as conclusive evidence of what we deserve. If we find ourselves in consistently unwanted or painful experiences, we are probably going to conclude we don’t deserve better. Our self-image is also influenced by the opinions others have of us, both what we directly hear them say to us, and what we indirectly believe they must think of us.
The estimation of how much we are worth is a notion, which is a direct reflection of our experiences and social interactions- some of them build it, some destroy it. I have went through thick and thin in the search for my true self and I do not regret it. We only have ourselves, and sadly we find that out when we have no one but ourselves left.
