What is the lie you’re telling yourself that you need to give up because it’s keeping you from being in awe of you? It’s keeping you from believing in how amazing you are.
Hello, my beautiful friends! How are we today? It has been a hot minute, hasn‘t it? you know sometimes life just throws it’s curves and you take a break and sometimes it’s hard to get back on the horse and continue to be consistent, so thank you for anyone who is still hanging in there with me, but today I want to talk to you about a scale. It is the human worth scale that we tend to put ourselves on. And maybe this isn’t a problem for you, but from a lot of people I have coached. It is. It comes from a feeling of not doing enough, not being enough. we somehow think we are less worthy than other people. For some reason or another, we hold less worth to the world. So, yeah, that’s what I want to talk to you about today.
Go back to a time when you just finished something you’ve been working really hard on. And now people are now seeing it for the first time. You have a situation in mind? Ok, now someone says, “you are amazing!”
What’s your first reaction in your head? Do you think “why yes, I am! Thank you!” Or do you think, “thanks, but I wish this were better.” Or do you run right past their compliment and respond with, “mmm, except here. I messed up here.” This can tell you a lot about how you’re seeing yourself on the human worth scale.
It’s easy to get caught up with the concept that there is a human worth scale. That some humans are better than others. Our criteria for that scale can be a little different from each other, but it’s still there. And it’s not that we purposely put it there either. It’s our primitive brain that’s trying to protect us and keep us at the top of the food chain, top in the pecking order. Sometimes its easier to catch when our thoughts are offering us ideas about this and sometimes it’s not.
Maybe we see it through the lenses of status when we earn titles like President, CEO, or maybe it’s through lenses which we see #1 in the world or best in their craft. These are all usually gained through hard work of some kind. Then we want our kids to be motivated, out of the best of intentions, but we tell them that they can have anything they want as long as they are willing to work for it. And it’s true. And I believe that, but then, for some of us, our brains translate that as, if I work hard, if I prove myself, if I prove I’m worthy of that position or title, if I earn my way to the top, then that means I’m on the top. and it’s easy for the brain to muddle the waters in comparing worth to accomplishments or worth to things I got done today. And that’s one of the places I struggle with on the human worth scale. Getting things done.
That a certain amount of things that I do, will equal my worth; how other people see me. I think they’ll see all of these wonderful things I’m doing and all this talent that I have and they’ll be thinking “wow! she’s amazing!“ First, how do I know what they’re thinking unless they tell me? So am I going to wait until someone offers something kind to finally believe I’m amazing? Second, why do I need them to think I’m amazing in order to feel amazing? I get to choose to think, that they are thinking I’m amazing. Did you know you can just decide to think that?
And what number of accomplishments or compliments am I going to place in front of the equal sign that signifies, yes amber, now you’re finally amazing! You’ve finally hit your worth. And yet I find myself in this rut quite frequently without literally saying your worth as a human being, Amber, equals and then a long list to be checked off.
This is how it sounds in my day when I’ve inadvertently placed my worth on the scale. When David asks me how my day was, the first thing that comes out of my mouth is I feel like I got nothing done. I was busy all day and yet I can’t even tell you what I did because I have no finished product to show for it. How do I know I’ve placed myself on the scale. Because I feel crappy inside when I’m telling him. That’s the sign to me that I’m making it mean something negative about myself.
There was a time when the story in my head was, If I’ve cleaned the house and it’s in order then I can feel good about myself. A phrase that resonates in my mind is, cleanliness is next to godliness. I mean where did that saying even come from? Was it from a mom who was trying to convince her children to keep their rooms clean and this was her last-ditch effort to convince them that they’re being like God if they can manage it? I don’t know.
And I know there’s a lot to say for order and simplicity and decluttering surroundings and our minds, but I took that concept and turned it into the thinking that I’m somehow a better person, a more worthy person or worthwhile person if my house is always clean. I used this against me. So every time my house wasn’t clean, this sneaky little thought would nag at me and shame me into thinking I’d be a better person if I could just check it off my list.
It was the same idea around my kids. If they always looked cute and behaved and were polite then that would allow me to think that I’m teaching them right. That somehow I was right as a mom. Can you imagine how exhausting it was just trying to check off these two items from my “I am a worthy” list? I became the nagging, complaining mom who either continually barked at my kids to pick up their things and stop messing with their hair and keep their faces and clothes clean or I played the martyr because it was easier to just do it myself and I was tired of them not listening and at least if I did it, it was done only once because it was done right. All for the elusive appearance that things were put together, things were right, and that meant to me that I am right.
This was my thinking. It sounds so obviously destructive, but where are we thinking in our lives that if-then lie? Have you convinced yourself in some way that staying busy, always progressing, is somehow tied to your worth? That it moves you up the human worth scale? Did you know that if you sat on the couch and ate cookies, ice cream, chocolate, chips, whatever your comfort foods are, and binged on TV, scrolled social media all day, everyday, you’d still be just as worthy of a human being as say Mother Teresa, or the prophet, or the savior?
It’s true. Because you were created from love, by perfect, whole, amazing, brilliant beings. You are amazing, whole, brilliant, and 100% worthy. Divine worth, we like to call it in our church. This worth is non-negotiable. Your worth is non-negotiable. And yet we feel awful about ourselves if we’re not always doing something.
I convinced myself that if I do a good enough job, then I can feel good about my job. But that only comes for me when other people have told me I’ve done a good job. It somehow means more coming from them than from myself. And the more people who compliment me then the better I feel. Because that’s one more in the, “yes I’m worth something“ bucket. Because now I’m a valuable part of the team, now I contributed to society. See how I’ve somehow placed my self-worth on that scale?
Problem is, when the compliments don’t come that leaves me questioning, did I do a good job? Ugh Where should I have done better? Maybe if I had done this instead of that. And it becomes a downward spiral of picking apart all my mistakes or where I may have fallen short. But then that feels awful so I start fishing for compliments. Did you like it? Or even put myself down by mentioning a mistake I made in the hopes that a person I’m talking to will come to my self-pity rescue and discredit that remark and fight for me because I haven’t practiced doing it enough myself. And even then I question if they meant it or if they just said it because they’re uncomfortable from my own pity party and just want me to stop feeling bad. All because I placed myself on this scale of worth.
We love progress as human beings. We’ve always been good at taking a challenge and adapting to it, always coming out stronger. So on the days when it feels like there was no progress, which I’m going to risk saying are more days than less, especially if what we’re working on takes time, on the days where it seems we haven’t moved forward and we feel bad about it, what’s the lie we are telling ourselves that inherently makes us question our worth? Is it fake it until you make it? Like what can you finally think about yourself now that you’ve made it? Is it I’m contributing to the greater good? With an unsaid belief that if you’re not contributing, if you’re doing nothing, you’re not good?
It’s easy for me to look at people with titles and money and know that they are no better or worse than me. But it’s just as easy for me to look at other coaches and all they know and how brilliantly they dance through a session and think to myself, I’m not as good of a coach. It’s easy for me to imagine their to-do lists and see all that they are accomplishing and then see my to-do list and all I’m not accomplishing and feel myself falling further and further down the scale.
Listen up, my friends. There is a scale, but it’s not what you think. There’s no up or down or greater than or less than. We are all on the scale and what it’s measuring is differences. Not good differences or bad differences, just differences. Maybe you’re great at this and I’m great at that, but we’re all great, we’re all just different and we’re all at different places in our lives learning different things.
What is the lie that you’re telling yourself that’s keeping you from seeing how truly amazing, and brilliant and whole and worthy how you really are? Is it cleanliness is next to godliness? Fake it until you make it? Is it I have no idea what I did today, but I know I didn’t stop all day long. Is it, I’m going to earn my way to the top. There’s nothing wrong with these sayings, until we turn it against ourselves and use it as a lie as to why we’re not enough just the way we are.
Maybe it’s just me who does this, but I don’t think it is. So if you find you are placing yourself on some kind of human worth scale. Start looking at the differences. Seeing the differences and how beautiful this world is with all these differences. Stop comparing yourself thinking you’re more than or less than and your lives will open up. Alright. I hope you have a brilliant day! And please remember, you are loved. Bye!
