I’ve come to the conclusion that all the conventional wisdom of the past 40 to 50 years that says girls lose their self-esteem in middle and high school is off the mark. It simply misses the forest for the trees. Author Ken Robinson, in his book The Element, tells the story of an 8-year-old girl in the 1930s who was taken to a psychologist because of poor academic performance, unruly behavior and the inability to sit still and learn like the other kids.
When the therapist left the girl alone in his office and turned on the radio, he and the mother watched through a two-way mirror as the girl started gracefully dancing around the room. He turned to the mom and said, “She’s not sick, she’s a dancer!” He encouraged her to enroll her daughter in a dance school, which she did, and the rest, as they say, is history. Gillian Lynne grew up to become a world-class dancer, and eventually the choreographer for Andrew Lloyd Webber plays like Cats and Phantom of the Opera.
There is a big lesson here. We need to reframe how we view teen girls and their ‘signs of poor self-esteem.’ I can’t tell you how many preteen and teen girls have come to my retreats and camps with labels likes ‘low self-esteem,’ yet they shine at camp. It was a matter of being in a non-judgmental environment where they were accepted for who they are. This allowed their best selves to emerge and shine. The girls blossomed.
My point is that girls don’t necessarily have low self-confidence just because they are afraid to speak up or ‘put themselves out there’ in certain group situations. When they do not feel that they fit in or feel like they are not appreciated for who they are, they tend to fade into the background. Or they might behave oddly, like Gillian Lynne. It is a pretty safe bet that girls will not feel ‘safe’ enough to be themselves in school hallways and lunchrooms. There is simply too much judgment and drama. They often don’t trust even their best friends with their vulnerable side.
Girls have been conditioned to believe that ‘good girls’ don’t stand out, disagree, have conflicts in their relationships, or lead from out front. So it’s no wonder they don’t look like they have high self-confidence in most settings. But put an actress in a play, an athlete on the field of competition, a bright girl on a debate team, or a dancer in a troupe, and voila! They are immediately transformed.
A fish out of water—outside its comfortable environment—can’t breathe. That goes for adolescent girls as well.
[Tim Jordan, M.D., is a Behavioral Pediatrician who specializes in counseling girls ages 6 through college. For more information, go to drtimjordan.com.]