When I was a teenager, I was a needy/lustful man who had this idea of approaching a woman and her saying yes. Built this idea up for myself and when I wouldn't approach I would just berate myself which would create a cycle of not approaching and continuing to demean myself. When I finally approached a girl I realized it was not all I built it upto and they are people as well.

I am in my cycle of improving myself (dress better, work out, learn some stuff) this has helped some of my self esteem but I still feel like I hate myself and just have terrible self esteem overall. I compare myself to people (mainly better looking guys) a lot because of their success with women and just because they seem so confident with themselves. An example of this is yesterday, I'm back home from Uni due to COVID studying for the MCAT, and my neighbor is a very handsome guy (could be a model) whos my age with a job as a mechanic, a hot girlfriend, etc. my dad commented on some things (how he has so many passions - car building - and helps his parents out) and I started to notice that I'm not all these.

I could write a novel about all this shit but TLDR - I'm improving myself but I haven't felt better about myself. How do I improve my self esteem in order to just be a happier person (and better with girls)?