On the Road to Ourselves

Authentic Self-Esteem

We aim to develop the self-esteem of students by strengthening their self-awareness, building strong foundations on which to base their self-worth, giving them tools to understand and control their emotions (EQ) and developing their character.

In order to have an authentic self-esteem we need to have a good amount of self-awareness, we need to be able to intelligently control our emotions and we need to have a solid character.

“…by starving the sensibility of our pupils we only make them easier prey…a hard heart is no infallible protection against a soft head.”

– C.S. Lewis: The Abolition of Man

SELF-AWARENESS

To have the right self-awareness: first, we need to see ourselves as unique valuable beings; secondly, we have to realistically understand our strengths and weaknesses; thirdly, we need to accept the fact that both good and bad exist in us. To help our students with self-awareness we need to strengthen the following: their sense of worth, their sense of competence and their acceptance of themselves. If people are unable to accept themselves or they don’t know themselves, they will be unable to connect to others or discover their own goals in life.

EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE

Our students need to develop their ability to intelligently control their emotions. They need to be able to understand their own emotions and use them for their own advantages.

CHARACTER

We have to help develop a solid character in the life of our students. We must teach them the difference between good and bad, useful and harmful. We also need to equip them to be able to choose the good and useful instead of the bad and harmful. It’s not only our ability to choose well, but it is our character that determines who we are and how others perceive us. Our character is inseparable from who we are. Character is the ability to distinguish between good and bad and to choose what is good and not what is bad.