The way we relate to ourselves shapes the way we relate to others and the world around us. When you live with a sense of being “not good enough,” it changes what you reach for, and who you let get close. Self-esteem work is about learning to be on your own side.
You May Relate If:
- you carry a sense of being “not good enough,” even when there’s no real evidence for it
- you struggle to ask for what you want or need in relationships
- you hold back from opportunities because you don’t trust you can handle them
- your inner voice is more critical than you’d ever be of someone else
- shame or self-judgment take up more space than you’d like
Understanding Self-Esteem
Low self-esteem doesn’t usually start as a decision you made. More often, it’s the voice of someone who criticized you early on, absorbed and carried into adulthood. Sometimes it’s a message you picked up from an environment that didn’t make room for you. Either way, the voice becomes familiar enough to sound like truth.
When you live life with a sense of being “not good enough,” a lot gets distorted. You overestimate the possibility of failure, and underestimate your ability to cope with the inevitable obstacles in life. You make assumptions that others see you the way you see yourself. It becomes a loop.
There are three simple questions every person should ask themselves when evaluating how they feel about their own self worth:
- Do you believe in your ability to reach your goals and dreams?
- Can you ask for what you want and need in a relationship?
- Do you have the confidence to accept new challenges and opportunities in life?
If you answered no to any of these, counselling can help you understand why, and start to change it.
Counselling can help you understand:
- where the critical voice in your head came from
the core beliefs you’ve been carrying about yourself, often since childhood - how shame shapes what you let yourself want
- why self-criticism doesn’t actually motivate you the way you were led to believe
- what a different relationship with yourself could look and feel like
By better understanding your self-esteem, and where it comes from, you can begin to build a different relationship with yourself.
How Counselling Can Help
Counselling can help you:
- Identify the core beliefs that contribute to low self-esteem
- Become more compassionate towards yourself
- Be more assertive in relationships, and ask for what you want and need
- Discover new ways to meet your own emotional and spiritual needs
- Learn to trust your own strength and resilience
- Find freedom from shame
- Dare to dream, and say no to the negative internal voices that get in the way
- Connect with your authentic self
Self-compassion is an essential building block for self-esteem. The work isn’t about inflating how you see yourself. It’s about learning to treat yourself with the kind of steadiness you’d offer someone you love.
Related resource: You can take Kristin Neff’s Self-Compassion Test to get a sense of where you are.
Our Therapeutic Approaches
We draw on a range of evidence-based approaches, grounded in a flexible, collaborative, and client-centred way of working that adapts to what is most helpful for you.
This allows us to shape our work around your needs, experiences, and goals, drawing from different therapeutic modalities as needed. Learn more about our approach to care.
Compassion-Focused Therapy
Compassion-focused work is built for situations where your inner voice has gotten too harsh to live with. It helps you build a different voice alongside the critical one. Not to argue with the critic, but to hold what it says with more kindness and less panic.
CBT (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy)
CBT looks at the core beliefs you’ve been carrying, often since childhood. Things like “I’m not enough.” Or “I’m too much.” Or “I don’t deserve good things.” These beliefs usually feel like facts until you examine them. CBT helps you see them for what they are, and start to question them.
Narrative Therapy
Narrative work explores the story you’ve been telling about yourself. Often, that story wasn’t one you chose. It was given to you. Re-authoring it can change a lot more than how you feel about yourself.
Internal Family Systems (IFS)
IFS approaches self-esteem by looking at the different parts of you. The harsh inner critic. The part that carries shame. The part that wants to be seen. IFS helps each of those parts feel heard. Over time, you relate to all of them with more compassion.
Psychodynamic Therapy
Psychodynamic therapy explores the early experiences and relationships that shaped how you came to see yourself. Often, low self-esteem isn’t something you chose. It was absorbed from someone else, usually before you had language for it. When you understand where it came from, it starts to loosen its hold.
ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy)
ACT helps you clarify what matters to you and move toward it. The inner critic will usually have opinions. With ACT, you don’t need to silence the critic to live the life you want. You just need to take the next step anyway.
Counselling can help you build a kinder, more compassionate relationship with yourself. Book an appointment when you’re ready.
Meet Some of Our Counsellors Who Work with Self-Esteem
Amy Wolgemuth
Viktoriia Brzhezytska
Over the last 13 years of her practice, Viktoriia has learned to develop safe and trustful relationships with clients that she strongly believes is a foundation of good therapy. She primarily draws on CBT and Schema therapy .
Allison Paré
Erica Burdzy
Sabrina Roach
Andrea Black
Andrea has supported children, teens, families and adults for over 20 years across community settings, doctor's offices, and schools. She believes healing happens through connection and relationship — which is why she brings her genuine self to each therapy session. Her approach is client-centred and strengths-based.
Compassionate Road to Building Self-Esteem
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Frequently Asked Questions About Anxiety Counselling
Yes, it can change. Self-esteem isn’t a fixed trait. It’s been built over time, and it can be rebuilt. The change isn’t usually dramatic. It’s usually steady. You notice different thoughts. You respond differently when things go wrong. Slowly, you start feeling different about yourself.
Affirmations have their place, but they often don’t work alone because the deeper beliefs underneath don’t actually change. Self-esteem work goes to those deeper beliefs. Where they came from. Why they’ve stuck. What it takes to build new ones that actually feel true. The work is slower. And more lasting.
There’s no single cause. For most people, it’s a mix of early experiences and messages you absorbed along the way. Sometimes you can name exactly where it came from. Other times, it’s more like the atmosphere you grew up in. Either way, counselling usually makes the causes clearer.
That’s common. Most people don’t arrive with a clear story of where it all started. A big part of the work is finding out. You don’t need to bring in a backstory. Just bring in what’s happening now, and we’ll trace it together.