Hey there, Sweetpea :)
So, I think I have a pretty healthy sense of worthiness. I generally think I’m awesome and I feel quite worthy of great things. But somehow, there’s still a but involved somewhere, and it’s taken me a long time to figure out some of the wheres. Here are a few of them. Perhaps you’ll recognize some.
I feel worthy of compliments, but I’m often uncomfortable receiving them.
I feel worthy of successes, but I’m often uncomfortable when they’re highlighted.
I feel worthy of my achievements, but I’m often uncomfortable being praised for them.
I feel worthy of kindnesses, but I’m often uncomfortable accepting them.
I feel worthy of love, but I often question it when it comes.*
Hmmm… What is up with all those buts?**
I mean, I definitely feel like I’m enough of a quality individual to be worthy of many things, those I listed above and more.
So it seems that the question isn’t Do I feel worthy? or Do I struggle with feelings of worthiness?
I pass those tests easily and legitimately.
Unlike Wayne and Garth, I don’t suffer from I’m-not-worthy Syndrome
It occurred to me last night, as I came up against this idea of worth yet again, this time in doing some work from Kate Northrup’s fantastic book Money: A Love Story, that the question isn’t Am I worthy?
It’s Am I worth it?
Much to my surprise, once I changed the question, the answer was not such an easy obvi-yes.
Meredith Baxter(then)-Birney tells us why she’s worth it in this short video on the ad campaign.
I feel worthy in every area of life I can imagine. Ask me if I am worth it, and you’ll get an immediate, wholehearted, absolutely kind of yes. Quite possibly a no shit I’m worth it kind of yes. But ask me if I feel worth it, and I suddenly clam up. Like I got nothin.
I mean yeah, I’ve always been one for nuance and shades of meaning, but the import of this subtle difference even surprised me! Exploring a little more, I realized the following:
Though I feel worthy of plenty, I shrink at the idea of someone, an actual person, spending their own money, time, attention or affection on me. Just re-reading that sentence got me all constricted in my belly. I have issues around people giving any of what is theirs to me. I fear that they’re doing it because they think they have to for some reason, and all I want in this world is love (and gifts!) given freely and truly, simply and only because the giver wants to give it, can’t help but to give it, with no underlying implications of reciprocation necessary.
(Which for the record doesn’t mean that I don’t want to reciprocate!! I just don’t want to be bound and beholden to do so or to do so in a particular way that may or may not feel right.)
We could flit around all day among the ins and outs of whys, but at the end of that day, it doesn’t really matter. What matters is the blessing to see it, the boldness to speak it, the courage to dare to assume, from this moment forward, that any gift or offer of time, money, affection or attention is genuine, stringless, and true, and the fortitude to vigilantly check my own offerings before I make them, to make sure that they are just as genuine, stringless, and true.
Because I’m worth it, Sunshine.
All of it.
And so, most certainly, are you.
If you’re game to humor me or know you need it, go ahead and repeat the following after me, every time I say it. Let it wash over you and inhabit you, fill and nourish you. If you’re not down with repeating it (yet), please let yourself receive it, stay here with it for a minute and really hear it.
I’m worth it.
I’m worth it.
I’m worth it.
I’m worth it.
I’m worth it.
I’m worth it.
I’m worth it.
Here’s to all our beautiful worth-it-ness!
I’d love to hear from you. Reply to this email or come say hey on Facebook or Instagram!
xxoo, cc
* The pattern would certainly suggest that this might be because I’m uncomfortable with it. It’s not important to this conversation, so I’ll set it aside and examine it more closely if or when it’s needed.
** They got me like Sir Mix-a-Lot up in here lol
