Key Step To Build Self-Respect

Identify and Meet Your Needs

A need is something a human being requires to survive, whereas a want is something that a person desires but is not essential for life. The basic human needs are food, water, air, and shelter. People also need to value themselves.

To achieve self-respect, you must first recognise your needs and then do all you can to meet them.

The Origin of Self-Respect

The self-respect movement started in South India in 1925 by S. Ramanathan, who then asked E.V. Ramaswamy Naicker, commonly known as Periyar, to lead the movement. It was a human rights movement to eliminate the Hindu social order and create a new, fair society without caste, religion, and God.

What is Self-Respect?

Self-respect means to know yourself, your values and your needs and taking steps to ensure those are met whenever and wherever possible. Self-respectful people are confident and assertive, enabling them to be successful, have good relationships, and improve physical and mental health.

How to Identify Your Needs

Identification of your needs is a process that requires self-analysis and deep thought. The process is valuable because knowing and meeting your needs will increase satisfaction, motivation, and happiness.

A critical part of the process is to consider your emotions and behaviours. Start a journal to track the outcome of your self-analysis, as this will help you to plan for meeting your needs. The following are tips to help you identify your needs.

Evaluate your actions that have disrupted your life or others’ lives. What are the emotions that you experienced? What thoughts led to the bad feelings? While doing this exercise, focus on yourself, not other people or outside influences. The goal is to know yourself. Start a journal to keep track of your self-analysis results.
In psychology, Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs is a well-known theory based on satisfying needs in a hierarchy order. The two higher needs are esteem and self-actualisation. The lower needs include love and belonging, safety and security, and physiological. These are principles that may help you to identify your needs.
Analyse your physical health. Good physical health helps you to deal with life’s challenges, reduces the risk of diseases, and boosts your energy. For example, do you need to lose weight or exercise more?
Your boundaries are the limits you set with others and within yourself. It is basically a set of rules you set that dictate how you want to be treated and what types of behavours you will and will not tolerate. Boundaries help to build healthy relationships and gain respect. What boundaries do you need in your life?
Are you feeling empty or as though something is missing in your life? Explore why you feel that way to identify the root cause.

How To Meet Your Needs

Now that you have identified your needs, what steps do you need to take to meet those needs? For example, suppose your self-analysis revealed that you need to improve your physical health.

In that case, you can work toward achieving that need by eating a healthy diet and exercising regularly. Only you can determine how to fulfil your needs. The following are several additional ideas.

Spend more time with your friends or meet new ones. Consider being a volunteer or organising a weekly hike with friends. This will enhance your connection to others and help you to be emotionally fulfilled.
Make time for yourself to relax, self-reflect, and learn about yourself. This will help to improve your mental and emotional well-being.
People need a sense of achievement to build and maintain their self-respect. Make a list of your accomplishments. For example, have you earned a skills or knowledge certification, won any awards, or lost weight? You need to be proud of your accomplishments and remember them regularly.
Communicate your boundaries to those who need to be aware. If a person steps over a boundary, remind them of the boundary that you have set.
Love is essential for your physical and mental wellness and a satisfying relationship. Communicate your needs to your loved ones and understand and respect the other person's needs.

Conclusion

Meeting your needs is the crucial step to achieving self-respect. Fulfilling one’s needs improves happiness, positivity, confidence, productivity, and outlook. Focus on your highest priority first. While your self-exploration journey may take some time, it is well worth it to enjoy living a healthy lifestyle.

“Don’t be dependent on others to meet your needs. They will let you down most of the time. And that’s because meeting your needs is not their job – that's yours”.

Robert Mack, Positive Psychology Practitioner

Tina Rose

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