Dating with Power: Is Your Low Self Esteem attracting Bad Relationships?

Indecisive mental fog of how you see yourself can be critically blinding in the way you live your life. Critical in the sense of leaving you vulnerable for the worst of the worst to hunt you out as their prey and manipulate you into their selfish ambitions before you even realize you were fair game.

This happens all the time and unfortunately many people both men and women have countless stories of bad relationships, some worse than others and some unfortunately that no longer live to tell their story as their vulnerability lead to a tragic end. As with everything else in life there is a root cause, a foundational behavior that drives our actions and decisions, poor habits, and less than surroundings that mold us into what people see. Self Esteem is the activating force behind the decisions we make and why we make them. If we feel in control of our lives our Self Esteem is higher and we make decisions from a healthy clear headed place.

We think about how the decision will possibly alter our wellbeing, tear us down, or build us up. We give more thought and planning to who and what we are engaging in and are fully present in the moment of decision. We don’t feel threatened or needy and have an air of confidence that others can smell. You see our thoughts become actions that are displayed before the world even when we don’t realize it. When we have high self-esteem it is coupled with courage and a sense of fearlessness of the negative things in life. We set the tone for good relationships and fair treatment because we love ourselves and expect others to do the same.

But…

What if you are on the other end of the spectrum and positive self-esteem has eluded into the dark remnants of dissatisfaction with how you look, talk, achievements you haven’t yet made, or expectations of others you can’t seem to meet. What if your shape is out of whack or your hair isn’t like what you see praised on social media, or you don’t have the latest fashionista outfit well because aside from confidence, money has passed over your door step too. Think about who you are as a person in this state verses that previously mentioned in this blog. Even just by reading this the sense of control has somewhat left you. Left powerless, weak minded and unstable, bruised by your own mental harshness but still functioning and scary enough still engaging with others.

With low self-esteem however, you are not engaging with others for what you can give as with a confident mindset, you are engaging with others in desperation for what you can get. Like a panting dog on a hot summer day you seek out validation in others and in things, anything to jolt you into feeling on top again. Your daily decisions are driven by the need to receive a compliment on your outfit choice, or job well done at work. You live in a prison of fleeting compliments, like a drug addict after their next fix you seek out recognition to make you feel relevant. This is why in a relationship with someone who has low self-esteem one “I Love you” will never be enough as it is like the crack smoked away in a pipe and the abuser is off for their next euphoric escapade.

Let’s think about this and how easy it is to manipulate someone who is not in a right frame of mind. Someone fails to make ethical decisions because they are attempting to find their next high and are one track minded dropping all other defenses. Things go undone and begin to unravel in their lives, and onlookers who are fully coherent can see the vulnerability of the addict. Some look on in empathy, but some look on with lustful intent to further manipulate the weak. Calculating their approach they lure the weaker person in with the bait of compliments and proposals of love and affection, but really they are attracted to the weakness of mind and defenselessness. The need for control meets the need for love, what a lethal combination.

Both suffering with low self-esteem in their own rights, but from different forms of expression that is totally combative to one another. If Like attracts Like then it should all be too easy to understand that if we lack self-love then there is the alternative, self-hate and self-hate only begets self-hate. Based on this principle a bad relationship should be examined not for the offender of the relationship, but the one who feels victimized. Has your low self-esteem been the open door for chaos in love? Have you invited in the thieves of opportunity who saw your weak and unstable mind and capitalized off your lack?

Low Self Esteem is more dangerous not for the internal struggle, but for the struggle we don’t realize we invite. Before you can promise love to someone else, you must first know love within. You must know what self-appreciation feels like for you to know you are being appreciated. How can you position yourself to give away that which you do not have? If you cannot honestly profess love for your own self, where will you draw on the love to share with others? No one can get blood from a turnip and the human heart is no different. If you are empty your heart is like a fasted body that absorbs all the nutrients of its first bites of food – whether good or bad.

You place yourself in this same situation and this concept is why low self-esteem is the primary reason for bad relationships. Someone is lacking and someone is using, someone is empty, and someone is manipulating…. This vicious cycle of recycled hate between two people who can’t help one another is the answer of relationship failure. Get out before you get in by learning to love you first. Spend time in love, go through all the phases of love with yourself as no real love will never be tested. On the days you aren’t your best do you still love that person looking back at you in the mirror? If yes, you understand love. When you can forgive yourself, you can forgive others – when you can enjoy spending time with yourself – you can enjoy the company of others, when you can speak kind words to yourself you can understand the power behind a compliment given to another…

Teach one (oneself)… then reach one. Never the other way around.