Increase your self-esteem by understanding slightly more mature strategies we use to manage strong feelings (1 minute read)

This post “Increase your self-esteem by understanding slightly more mature strategies we use to manage strong feelings” continues with how you can increase your self-esteem by managing your thoughts and feelings.

Increase your self-esteem by understanding slightly more mature strategies we use to manage strong feelings:

It is about the second of the 4 levels of defense mechanisms. The levels mirror different levels of maturity and hence are increasingly constructive ways of dealing with difficult feelings.

Level II consists of immature and narcissistic defense mechanisms that annoy the observer but comfort the user. The last post was about dissociation and splitting.

Slightly more mature defense mechanisms are:

Acting out is using an extreme and often immature behavior in order to manage unacceptable thoughts or feelings.

Devaluation is putting yourself and others down as terrible persons. A version of this is hypochondriasis which is having an extreme worry about having a serious illness

Idealization is putting yourself and others on a pedestal as if being flawless

Passive-aggressive behaviour/Turning against the self implies redirecting feelings towards oneself that were originally directed towards someone else such as criticizing, punishing or harming oneself instead of the responsible person.

Autistic fantasy is dealing with emotional conflict and stressors by escaping into daydreaming and an inner fantasy world as a substitute for problem solving of the current situation.

To be continued in the next post.

See also the free blog or the course How to develop self-esteem and boost your confidence at https://jennyrappbefree.com