Self Respect - How Do We Teach This To Our Children?

What is Self Respect?

It is to have pride and knowledge of one's own worth, to value one's self. To have due respect for oneself, one's character, and one's conduct.
With self respect we like ourselves because of who we are and not because of what we can or cannot do. Respect is earned, not given.

Those with self-respect are less prone to regret, blame, guilt, shame, and secretive behaviour.

It is the cornerstone on which many other attributes are built such as honesty, confidence, and integrity.

How do you learn to respect yourself?

Children learn from individuals who have a high respect for themselves. The more children are around people who feel good about themselves, the more they can emulate this important truth.
It is not about what we do but who we are. It is about feeling valued and knowing others value us also.

Teaching children about self respect

Children need to be taught right from the beginning that this is part of their personal armoury of positive attributes.
We can help them to do so by naming it for them.
For instance, when we see our child do a respectful act, either for himself or for another, we can highlight this for him in language by saying,

"I noticed your self respect as you took such good care of yourself today".

"You obviously have respect for yourself as you were able to say no to your friend so clearly".

"Making the right decision will confirm your self respect".

Self respect is the benchmark upon which our values and morals are shaped. It is important to teach our children to be true to themselves.

How many of us know the rest of this quotation from Shakespeare's Hamlet, to thine own self be true?

"To thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man."

The importance of self respect

If we find it difficult to love and cherish ourselves, we find it hard to love and cherish others.

It follows that if we have no self respect it is difficult to respect others. These positive emotions such as self esteem, self confidence, and self respect are part of the whole sense of our self image.

Having self respect allows us to be more accepting of others' differences, to see people as people regardless of culture, class or creed and to understand the golden rule, "Do to others as you would have them do to you".

If we are 'topped up' emotionally, we are able to give out to others from the overflow.

No self respect

People with no self respect find it difficult to have respect for others, for property, boundaries, animals and for values and morals.

If we have low self esteem and little respect for ourselves it follows that our presence around others tends to be filled with a need for attention. We 'need' others to fill our emotional vacuum and then we blame them when they leave us feeling unfilled.

Only we ourselves are able to top up our emotional tanks. Others can help us to feel good about ourselves but unless we actually take it on board as a personal belief, actually make it our own, then we are left feeling empty.

Dostoyevsky
If you want to be respected by others the great thing is to respect yourself. Only by that, only by self-respect will you compel others to respect you.