Self-esteem means feeling good about yourself: people with it feel liked and accepted, are proud of what they do, and believe in themselves. It comes from the people around you, the voice in your own head, and learning to do things. Self-esteem often involves comparing yourself to others. Greater Good reports that too much of this can lead to narcissism and avoiding chances to grow.

When adults are patient with mistakes, kids learn to accept themselves, while harsh words can stick and become part of how a person thinks about themselves. Serve and return interactions reinforce brain circuits that are at the core of early emotional well-being and social skills. Self-esteem grows when kids see that what they do matters to others.

In one study, fifth graders praised for being smart did worse after failing than those praised for effort or not praised. They were more likely to blame things other than ability and to give themselves excuses. Praising ability can put children in a fixed mindset, while praising effort tends to put them in a growth mindset. Effort praise leads children to focus on the process of work and the development of learning skills, leading to greater persistence after setbacks. Praise feels real when it is honest and fits what happened. Modest praise acknowledges performance without setting a very high bar.

A growth mindset means thinking that abilities can grow. People who think this way tend to see effort as something that helps them learn and see setbacks as chances to build new skills. A fixed mindset can lead people to avoid challenges, because they think that having to work hard or making mistakes means they are not able. No one has a purely fixed or purely growth mindset; most people hold some of each.

In a nationally representative US study of 12,000 ninth graders in 65 schools, a 45-minute online growth mindset session cut fixed-mindset beliefs. Lower-achieving students who got the growth mindset lesson saw their grades rise. Students at all achievement levels were more likely to take advanced math the next year. Researchers found that when growth mindset is taught alongside a supportive school culture, it is more likely to take root.

In a Michigan State University study of 25 college students, those with a growth mindset showed stronger brain responses to their own mistakes than those with a fixed mindset. In that study, the stronger brain response to errors went with doing better right afterward. This suggests that growth-mindset students processed mistakes more deeply and corrected them right away.

A researcher named Kristin Neff defines self-compassion as three parts: treating yourself with kindness rather than judgment, being mindful of your own painful feelings, and understanding that suffering is part of being human. Self-compassion differs from self-esteem because it lets people accept their shortcomings with kindness instead of judging themselves or avoiding their flaws. When we struggle or make mistakes we often feel alone, as if we were the only one, but struggling is part of being human.

Some teens worry that being kind to themselves will take away their motivation to do their schoolwork. Self-compassion researchers say being kind to yourself is a more effective motivator than harsh self-criticism. We try to achieve out of care for ourselves, not to avoid self-judgment. In a study of over 2,000 ninth graders, students with low self-esteem who were kind to themselves did better a year later on well-being measures than students with low self-esteem who were not.

In a study of middle and high school students, self-compassion was linked to higher life satisfaction and lower perceived stress and negative feeling. In research, the usual way to prompt self-compassion is to ask people to write three short paragraphs about a struggle: one noticing the pain, one about how others share such struggles, and one with warmth and kindness for themselves.

Over four weeks, 9- to 11-year-olds in 19 Vancouver classrooms were asked to do three acts of kindness each week, compared with others who were asked to visit three places each week. Students who did kind acts gained more in how much classmates accepted them than students who only listed pleasant places they visited. The study's authors described it as the first longitudinal experiment to prompt preteens to do a simple kind act and measure the change in peer acceptance. Peer acceptance matters because it is related to academic and social outcomes, including a lower chance of being bullied.

Research finds the link between happiness and kind acts goes both ways: happy people have the resources to do good for others, and prompting kind acts increases well-being. Gratitude has two parts: noticing that there is goodness in the world, and recognizing that its sources are outside ourselves, in other people. In a 10-week study, people who wrote each week about things they were grateful for were more optimistic and felt better about their lives than people who wrote about daily irritations.

Psychologist Martin Seligman tested positive activities on 411 people. Writing and delivering a gratitude letter to someone who was never properly thanked brought a big, immediate rise in happiness scores that lasted about a month. A study found that children and adolescents who wrote and delivered a thank-you letter may have made the other person happier but did not improve their own well-being, which suggests gratitude may grow with emotional maturity.

Sleep affects alertness, attention, mood, resilience, and learning and memory in children. The National Institute of Mental Health suggests sticking to a sleep routine as one way to handle everyday stress. In a Harvard Center on the Developing Child guide, learning to cope with manageable stress, called positive stress, is described as critical for developing resilience.

If a person feels they must never make any mistakes, the KidsHealth teen guide suggests asking a trusted adult, like a parent or teacher, for help. A grown-up you trust can help.

Words to know

• mindset: way of thinking
• narcissism: too much self-love
• longitudinal: over time
• resilience: bouncing back
• optimistic: hopeful