above average. There is general consensus that self-esteem is essential for good mental health,
while the lack of self-esteem undermines well-being by fostering depression, anxiety and other
pathologies
There are potential problems with high self-esteem, however, not in terms of
having it, but in terms of how you get it and keep it. Research increasingly shows that people may
engage in dysfunctional behaviors in order to obtain a sense of high self-worth, such as prejudice,
narcissism or putting others down
. Self-esteem also tends to be contingent on particular
outcomes such as being smart, attractive or popular, and it fluctuates up and down according to
our latest success or failure
. In contrast, self-compassion is not based on positive judgments or
evaluations – it is a way of
relating
to ourselves. People feel compassion for themselves because
they are human beings, not because they are special or above average. This means that with self-
compassion, you don’t have to feel better than others to feel good about yourself. Self-compassion
also offers more emotional stability than self-esteem because it is always there for you – when
you’re on top of the world and when you fall flat on your face.
Research indicates that trait levels of self-esteem and self-compassion are moderately
correlated
This is unsurprising given that both constructs represent a positive emotional stance
towards the self. Similarly, self-esteem and self-compassion are both associated with emotional
well-being – for instance, less anxiety and depression, as well as more happiness, optimism and
life satisfaction. Unlike self-esteem, however, the healthy states of mind associated with self-
compassion do not depend on positive evaluations of the self, on meeting set standards or on
favorable comparisons with others. Rather, they stem from recognizing the need to be kind to
oneself in instances of suffering and framing one’s experience in light of the shared human
experience – fragile and imperfect as it is.
Self-compassion appears to provide emotional resilience over and above that attributable to self-
esteem. For example, when controlling for self-esteem, self-compassion is still a robust (negative)
predictor of depression and anxiety
and of happiness, optimism and positive affect
And
while high self-esteem depends on successful performances and positive self-evaluations, self-
compassion is relevant precisely when self-esteem tends to falter – when one fails or feels
inadequate. In the Neff, Kirkpatrick and Rude
mock interview study asking people to describe
their greatest weakness, for instance, self-compassion provided a buffer against anxiety while trait
self-esteem did not.
Leary et al
found that when considering hypothetical scenarios involving failure or
embarrassment (e.g., being responsible for losing an athletic competition for their team),
participants with greater self-compassion reported less negative affect (e.g., sadness or
humiliation) and more emotional equanimity (e.g., remaining calm and unflustered). In contrast,
global levels of trait self-esteem predicted no variance in outcomes after controlling for self-
compassion levels. In another study, participants were asked to give a brief introduction of
themselves on video (describing interests, future plans, etc.), and were then given positive or
negative feedback about the introduction that was ostensibly made by an observer. Participants’
reactions to the feedback were then assessed, including their attributions for the observer’s
feedback. Individuals with low self-compassion gave defensive attributions – they were more likely
to attribute the observer’s feedback to their own personality when the feedback was positive rather
than negative. High self-compassion individuals, however, were equally likely to attribute the
feedback to their personality regardless of whether the feedback was positive or negative. An
opposite pattern was found for self-esteem. Low self-esteem individuals were equally likely to
attribute the feedback to their personality when feedback was positive or negative, but high self-
esteem participants were more likely to attribute the feedback to their own personality when the
feedback was positive rather than negative. This suggests that self-compassion enables people to
admit and accept that there are negative as well as positive aspects of their personality. The
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