Talk (The good times and the bad times / Self esteem)

Tonight we are going to talk about the good times and the bad times…
What makes us feel good about ourselves and what makes us feel crap
I guess that most of us would like to go through life feeling good about ourselves, but that doesn’t happen in reality
I’ve got a clip from Bridget Jones’s diary, in which Bridget, the main character makes a complete fool of herself
- 16min Walking down the street, to the book launch
- 20min “come on, get your stuff”

At the end of that scene, we saw Bridget standing at the back of the room by herself.
What do you think she was thinking about?
If you were her, how would you feel?
- Stupid / foolish / thick
It seems to me that Bridget was feeling pretty low…
What kind of things make people feel bad about themselves? What about:
- Being thick...often I feel put down when I meet people who are cleverer than me…
- Looks / body image
- Parents / family / friends
- People
- School / work
- Pressure / stress
- Embarrassing things / been clumsy
- People saying stuff about you…ever good stuff
- Feeling lonely
- When we’re done wrong / upset people / sin
- Hormones
So what makes people feel happy?
People have different ways of coping with their feelings…
- Some get emotional…
- Some keep it inside
- Some turn it in on themselves (self harm, putting yourself down etc.)
What do you do?

Whether we feel happy or sad, the Bible tells us:
- God is there for us
- He cares about us, no matter what we feel or do
- We might feel like the stupidest person alive or hate who we are or what we look like
- He still cares for us
Heb 13:5 “…I will never leave you; I will never forget you…”
1 Sam 16:7 P258 “…God does not see the same way people see. People look at the outside of a person, but the Lord looks at the heart”
John 15:9 “I loved you as the father loved me…”
Later on in Bridget Jones’s diary there is a scene which sums all of this up
- 48mins “excellent, am national laughing stock…”
- 50mins “whole body covered is scales”
- 50mins “I very much enjoyed your Lewisham fire report by the way…”
- 52mins “I like you very much, just as you are”
- 53mins “I must go…”
In many ways, that is just how God sees you
He knows your weaknesses, how you feel, your bad habits…but he loves you “just as you are”

To close, we’re going to pray about how we feel
To help us do that, I’ve got some words (see list below) that represent different feelings about ourselves
I’d like you to spend a moment, and choose a word that best describes how you feel about yourself
[Pray]

Word list