Low Self Esteem

IN THE NAME OF ALLAH, THE SOURCE OF MERCY, THE MOST MERCIFUL.

One of the major reasons we don't ask for what we want or need is the barrier called fear. And its roots can run deep. Sometimes where it all comes from is that we were shamed as children. We asked for something, and we got, "Don't you care about this family? How could you possibly ask for that? Don't you see how much we're struggling?" It goes on. Or we got laughed at or we asked for something in class, and the teacher put us down, and then we thought to ourselves. "I'll never let that happen to me again." "It's not safe." "I'll be hurt." So we stayed inside, and didn't ask.

There's a research study that was done in which they sent leads to salespeople. They were actually bogus leads that were prepared by the company to find out whether or not these people would ask for the order. Now some of these people would drive an hour across to this desert city out in the middle of nowhere, make this great presentation for the insurance, and then they wouldn't ask for any action from the customer. As they did this study, they were shocked when they found out only about 3% of the people were asking for the order. They were waiting for the person to say, "Okay, I'll buy it."

So they brought in all these great sales trainers that taught them all the 35 ways to close the sale. Then they sent them back out. And what happened was the number of people who actually asked for the order, you'd think it would go up to something like 99%! But it stayed relatively low. They realized it wasn't because people didn't know how to ask for the order, rather people are afraid to hear the word "NO."

Another barrier to asking for what we want is low self-esteem. Most people don't know this, but two out of three people have low self-esteem; only one out of three have high self-esteem. We often say at our seminars, "Look to your right; look to your left. One of you is okay; two of you are in trouble." When you think about that, it's pretty amazing. And what happens when you have low self-esteem is you don't feel worthy of asking; you don't feel worthy of receiving.

Turns out during World War II a Commander had taken a whole troop up the Rhine River, and as they got up the river, they were attacked. He was the only survivor out of several hundred men. Because he felt so guilty that he had been responsible for this troop and he was the only survivor, when he got out of the war, he went on a two-week drinking binge and then joined the monastery. He'd been there for almost 40 years and he was there because he didn't believe he deserved to have any happiness in his life.

Many of us are running that same game. I don't deserve, and therefore, why would I ask for something I don't believe I deserve? A lot of people believe their needs aren't important. Never got what they wanted; therefore, they never felt that they were validated in their importance.

Another barrier to asking for what you want is pride, and it's that we're afraid that we're going to appear helpless, weak, needy. There's a threefold model of most people's evolution. We start a need, "I need this. I need that." Then you go into greed, and you start getting it, and you become a little avaricious.

When you get your consciousness right, when you really know how to ask for yourself and you really know how to balance your life, then you're freed. And the whole goal here is to go from being needy, greedy, to being freed. Because once you're freed, you can go out and free other people.

We saw a cartoon recently. It showed a man, and his wife asked him the question, "Why don't you stop and ask for directions?"

And he says, "Because my genetic program prevents me from stopping to ask for directions, that's why." We men have to look as if we have it all together. We have to look as if we're totally self-sufficient at all times.

And so the reality is there's a whole deal of programming for men that it's not okay, so our pride as men is at stake; it stops us from asking.

Remember, all you have to do is ask!