Most of us have experienced a time when someone we thought highly of said something negative that made us doubt our self-worth in the moment.
If it happened often enough, though, especially from those closest to us, it might have had a lasting impact. In fact, going forward, we might have centered our choices and behaviors around proving our worth in their eyes instead of living authentically.
But this self-abandonment comes at a high cost.
As such, should you find yourself constantly feeling the need to prove your worth to others, try doing some of the following things. They can help you remember who you are and why you’re amazing simply because you exist.
7 ways to start building your worth from the inside out:
1. Determine whose voice from the past you hear when you feel that you’re not enough.
Children aren’t born thinking that they’re lacking in some way. In fact, research shows that the average preschooler thinks positively about themselves and has pretty high self-esteem.
It’s only as they get older and are exposed to people who insult them and speak poorly of them that their self-confidence starts to flag.
As such, whenever you feel that you aren’t enough, that you need to prove your worth in others’ eyes, ask yourself whose voice you’re hearing. Take some time to determine when it was that you stopped trusting your own abilities and innate value, and placed that power in someone else’s hands.
When did someone else’s harsh criticism undermine your trust in yourself? Whose words made you feel that you aren’t good enough?
Was it a parent who was never satisfied with your efforts? Peers who insulted your appearance? A partner who compared you to one of their exes? What phrase or cruelty was leveled at you that tore away your self-confidence and put the measure of your value on someone else’s scale?
Once you determine whose words are influencing your lack of self-worth and when it began, you can choose to tell them to pipe down and butt out when those feelings arise.
What’s more, you can begin to mentally go back and rewrite that experience to take your power back.
2. Ask yourself, “Who would I be if no one was watching?”
I read a novel a while ago in which a character asked a friend of theirs who they would be if everyone in the world was blind, and it stopped them in their tracks.
This individual’s entire existence revolved around what others thought about them. They constantly sought external validation and drained themselves with perpetual overachieving — both in their professional life and in their appearance.
So I ask you a similar question: if no one could observe you, who would you be? How would you dress? What would you eat? What would your values be with no one watching? If you no longer felt that others were judging you and weighing your worth, how would you define your value?
Get in touch with who you are deep down, away from anyone else’s value system, and you’ll undoubtedly feel much better about yourself before you realize it.
3. Spend more time alone so you can better choose who to spend time with in the future.
When you spend time by yourself, without being perceived or judged by anyone else, you have the freedom to be your beautiful, authentic self without any need for performativity or pretense.
When you spend time alone, in your own company, take note of all the ways in which you feel you need to pretend to be something you’re not in order to keep others happy.
Should you discover that you need to maintain a facade or certain types of behavior in order to keep certain people in your life, then you may wish to reevaluate your social interactions in general.
This may include a workplace that doesn’t value you for your contributions unless you behave a certain way, or a social group that expects you to follow their norms while giving you very little in return.
4. Take a walk among the trees to remember your place in the world.
A being’s intrinsic value isn’t dictated by what it can provide or do for others.
Take a tree, for example. Yes, it does provide for others. It provides shelter for little animals and feeds the forest floor, but it is majestic in and of itself. It grows, rests, reaches for light, and takes up its own rightful space in the world.
Getting out into nature can do wonders for reminding you of this, and of your place in the world.
Of course, we are all connected and should care for and nourish one another, but we deserve to take up space and are worthy of respect just because we exist on this beautiful planet.
Understand that if you were the only person left on Earth, free to do whatever you like, whenever you like, without anyone else’s judgement, validation, or condemnation, you would still have immense value simply because you are you.
Sit amongst the trees, bring some nuts and seeds to share with little creatures you may encounter, and enjoy simply Being.
5. Analyze your closest relationships while taking distance from them.
Ascertain which of your friends and family members are helping you to become fully self-actualized, and which are eroding your self-esteem in order to benefit from keeping you small and compliant.
For example, some people have parents who cut them down and tell them they’ll never achieve their dreams. They do this in order to keep their adult children close so they’ll take care of them.
If you feel that you keep needing to prove your worth to those closest to you, one of the best things you can do is take time away from them.
In many cases, a person only starts to recognize their own value when they’re far away from those who give them the impression that they don’t have much of it.
When you go it alone, you often develop a lot of self-confidence and faith in your abilities through your adventures and your interactions with others. You can then use this newfound self-assurance to stop feeling like you need to prove your worth in other people’s eyes.
6. Write down all the things you’re proud of.
Make yourself a delicious beverage, grab a notepad and a pen, and write down a list of all the things you’ve done in your life that make you proud. Not what makes other people think you’re cool or accomplished, but the things that mean the most to you.
Have you achieved things you never thought were possible?
Overcome great obstacles?
Cultivated great relationships with people and animals?
Helped those in need?
Made a difference in your community?
Created something beautiful?
Even if those achievements were “small” in the grand scheme of things, they’re all important and are building blocks in the story of the magnificent being that is you.
Furthermore, should you find that this list is shorter than you’d like it to be, then transform it into an action plan of things you want to do and achieve.
7. Remember that not meeting another’s expectations isn’t a failure on your part.
It’s a sad fact that a lot of people have been raised with conditional love rather than unconditional.
Essentially, they were taught that they only deserved love, praise, and other rewards if they behaved as expected.
If they didn’t get good grades, perform on command, or do as they were told quickly enough, they were punished. Part of that punishment might have included withheld affection, the silent treatment, or even neglect of their basic needs like food.
This instability teaches what’s known as “contingent self-esteem,” in which a person’s self-worth is entirely determined by their success or failure by external standards. If they aren’t perfect at something, then they feel like they’re worthless, stupid, undeserving of love, and so on.
If you fall into this category, consider how you would treat someone you love if they did poorly at something. You would love and support them unconditionally, right? Well, you deserve the same.
Learn the art of self-compassion and treat yourself with the same loving kindness that you’d offer a dear friend.
Final thoughts…
When you think about the people you love the most, do you only value them for what they can do for you? Or because they’re wonderful people? I’d say it’s highly unlikely that you only cherish these beings for how they can serve you.
Now, remember that others feel the same way about you.
You hold immense value in other people’s lives simply because you’re a great person and they enjoy you for who you are. Furthermore, you hold that same value in your own life, simply by existing.
“Today you are You, that is truer than true. There is no one alive who is Youer than You.”
― Dr. Seuss
