Self-Esteem Therapy in Chicago
For shame, self-criticism, and the pressure to be enough.
Difficulties with self-esteem may show up as harsh self-judgment, achievement pressure, difficulty receiving care, fear of failure, or the feeling that approval never settles into a lasting sense of worth.
Therapy can help examine the internal standards, early experiences, relational patterns, and cultural expectations that shape how a person comes to regard the self.
Self-worth is often formed in relationship.
A person may appear capable and accomplished while privately feeling fraudulent, inadequate, unseen, or difficult to care for. These feelings can shape work, intimacy, ambition, disappointment, and the ability to rest.
Psychoanalytic treatment makes room to consider shame, pride, criticism, desire, envy, dependency, and the ways a person may protect against vulnerability. The aim is not a slogan of confidence, but a more complex and durable understanding of oneself.
Questions of self-worth may be shaped by family history, race, culture, class, achievement, intimacy, and the experience of being evaluated or unseen. Treatment can help examine how these pressures become internal standards and how they affect the capacity to receive care, set limits, and pursue desire.
Book an appointmentSelf-worth is shaped by standards that may go unquestioned.
Therapy may explore the voices and expectations that have become internal: the demand to be exceptional, agreeable, independent, pleasing, impressive, controlled, or untouched by need. These standards can appear protective while also leaving a person lonely, tense, or unable to feel satisfied.
The work can also consider how self-worth is affected by race, culture, family history, professional life, gender, class, and experiences of being seen or unseen. Over time, a person may begin to understand the origins of harsh self-judgment and develop a less narrow relationship to desire, care, and limitation.
This may be especially important for people who have learned to measure worth through usefulness, achievement, composure, or how well they can anticipate the needs of others.
FAQ.
Is self-esteem therapy only about confidence?
No. This work can explore shame, self-criticism, pressure to perform, difficulty receiving care, and the early or ongoing experiences that shape self-worth.
Can therapy help if I seem successful but feel inadequate?
Yes. Many people seek therapy when outward functioning does not match their private sense of worth, safety, or belonging.
Do you work with shame and self-criticism?
Yes. Shame, criticism, comparison, and internal standards can be central concerns in psychodynamic and psychoanalytic treatment.