How to find your Worth in Yourself

Many desire to see themselves as good and of value, yet many struggle each day to view themselves as worthy—worthy of love, success, grace, acceptance, and more. Perhaps you or someone you know is one of these people, and that is what drew you to reading this blog. You have felt a sinking in your heart when someone you love fails to show up for you in the way you desired, and you attribute that to a deficit in your worthiness. “Why am I not worthy enough for you to show up for me?” Maybe you have been applying for job after job and haven’t been extended an offer. Consequently, you wonder, “I’m obviously not good enough because I can’t get any of these jobs.” Or perhaps you have a self-defeating narrative that plays on a loop in your mind whenever something goes wrong, sounding a little something like, “What’s wrong with you? See! You can’t do anything right. All you do is mess things up! No wonder your life is the way it is. You’re the problem!”

Unhelpful thinking has grabbed hold of your self-worth and has done all it can to anchor it with lies. The way to free your self-worth from the weight of this anchor is to undo the lies. You have to chip away at the lies that make up this anchor until there is nothing left to hold your self-worth down, making it free to live above water, breathe, and grow as it is intended to.

So, how does one begin to chip away at lies? Well, you identify what’s true about you. This can be done in many ways. Create a list of qualities you love or admire about yourself that do not involve being of service or doing for others. Find quotes, song lyrics, or scriptures that connect you to a positive sense of self and write them someplace you can see them throughout the day (a notes app on your phone, sticky notes on your mirror or bedroom door, index cards in your bag or car, etc.). Create a short list of affirmations that you can repeat to yourself out loud when that unhelpful narrative starts playing its loop in your mind.

Another helpful step is to dig a bit deeper to discover the root of the thought. “Where did this pattern of thinking come from? Where did I learn to speak to myself this way? Did someone speak to me like this for so long, and now, even though they have stopped, I am continuing the narrative? Where did I learn that this was okay?” Ask yourself these questions and be honest about the answers.

After you have been able to uncover some of the roots, take a personal inventory. Ask yourself how you feel when you have these thoughts about yourself and your worth. What happens in your body and in your heart when your mind tells you that you are not good enough or not worthy? How do these thoughts influence the way you show up for yourself and in your relationships? Do they make you feel like nothing you will ever do is good enough, so why try? Or do they make you feel like you have to do more and be more because that is the only way to attain worth and value—by proving you are worthy? Then ask yourself what you want your thoughts about yourself to sound like and how you want to feel when you think about yourself. Consider how this would influence the way you show up for yourself and in your relationships.

The truth is, we are filled with so much worth and value just by being who we are! Our value does not reside in what we do or don’t do, how “perfect” we are, or how we perform in life. Our worth is in our being. Our worth is in that before we ever did or did not do anything, we were of so much value. Think of a baby. They enter this world unable to contribute anything (except amazing baby cuddles), and I have never heard anyone say that babies have no value or are worthless. Just because we grow up and gain the ability to do more, that does not mean our worth is determined by what we accomplish. We have to choose to believe that we are valuable and worthy of every good thing. From there, we can be more intentional about how we speak to and over ourselves, and then we can watch and see how our lives are transformed by this positive influence of believing in our own value!