Happiness

Loving ourselves and loving others. What we know as self esteem begins, originally, in the esteem parents have for their children. Since, to a child, a parent is God, parental abuse and neglect (including insensitivity to feelings) is experienced as justified. Children are masters at devising strategies to get love or prevent abandonment. "If I'm perfect, then mommy or daddy will love me." Nothing can replace self love.
If our parenting was primarily supportive, our self talk will be so also. If our parenting was primarily negative, we will tend to be self critical much of the time. Once we realize that people with high self-esteem talk lovingly to themselves -- especially when under stress, and those with low self-esteem are self critical, we create for ourselves a pathway to change. There are 3 basic steps to changing our self talk to increase happiness.
In my experience, when our mind is full of anxiety, and general static, we are often re-experiencing a "child state of mind."

When ever we shift into an insecure child state of mind (we all do at times), we each "go home" to specific inner experiences of support, abuse, or neglect. Depending on our particular childhood, we will be able to generate self love and self care at such times, or not. We can undertake authentic adult action.

In a child state of mind, we often feel passive and helpless. Once we recognize that we're in a child state, and have compassion to our unique childhood experience, we need to actively assert our adult energies. Often, too, authentic adult action involves challenging our stream of negative self talk. The three keys to self love and truer happiness are awareness, compassion, and authentic adult action.