Yes. The first 40 years of my life were marred by low self-esteem. I was verbally and sexually abused as a child, and thus believed myself to be the lowest life form on the planet. There was no one in my life – even in childhood – who had given me a sense of being loved and accepted for who I am. I made many poor decisions because of this and was extremely miserable.
At some point it dawned on me that I was letting my perpetrator win by continuing to be a victim. I made a conscious effect to focus on what was good in my life and the world, and the positive things I had accomplished despite him and myself. I stopped defining by the way some people had treated me and stopped my wishful thinking; and in that regard, I let go of the unchangeable past. I took accountability for the choices I make in the here and now and made a point to consider my future, rather than my past, when making decisions. I learned to accept and forgive myself for the mistakes of my past, and eventually learned to like and even love myself as a flawed human being.
No one is perfect, and no one should place unrealistic expectations on themselves or others. We don’t get to choose when and where and into what family we are born. We don’t get to choose our DNA, or the environment in which we spend our ‘formative’ years. But once we reach an age where we have some degree of autonomy, we do get to choose what to do with what we have been given to work with; what lessons from earlier years are valuable, and which are harmful or useless to the person we intend to be.