Overcome Low Self-Worth Without People-Pleasing
Pleasing others can feel like who you are but it is something you’ve learned to do.
Maybe you were in a relationship with a boss, partner, or parent who expected you to ignore your own needs & feelings and cater to them. Or maybe you felt a lot of pressure to be the strong, nice, or put-together one in your family, so you didn’t stop to ask yourself what you desire too.
Until pleasing and caretaking others started to cost you your health, happiness, and/or life and relationship satisfaction. So, here you are, wondering how to rebuild your sense of enoughness and worthiness without needing to disappear and please.
If you are tired of people-pleasing being what defines you, then let’s explore what it means to build self-worth without being overly pleasing and/or agreeable all the time.
The Meaning of Self-Worth
For starters, let’s clear up what self-worth is and is not, because there’s a lot of confusion out there!
Contrary to popular opinion in our dominant culture, our worth isn’t based on anything outside of us. This means self-worth is not defined by our salary, weight, relationship status, or others’ opinions.
To me, self-worth is an inner knowing that our value & worth is innate. In this way, nothing and no one can add or take away from our worth, because it already exists!
At the same time, the strength of your self-worth can vary in different areas of your life. You may feel worthy in some situations and not in others.
Examples of Strong Self-Worth
What does strong self-worth look and feel like? Here are some examples of how someone with strong self-worth may be or feel.
You recognize your value instead of trying to prove it to others. (Learn more about why you don’t need to prove your worth here.
You own how you are making a difference, instead of comparing yourself to others or your past.
You feel successful based on your own definition of success, not what the world or others say it is.
You feel like who you are at the core is enough.
What Causes Low Self-Worth?
I believe we are born connected to love and knowing our worth, then through emotional wounding and/or internalizing cultural and family messages, our self-worth lowers.
For instance, in the dominant culture, there is a belief that our worth is based on what we do and/or how much money we make. At a young age, we can internalize these messages and start feeling unworthy or not enough if we aren’t achieving and doing more, more, and more.
Self-worth can also lower after we either put up with disrespect in our relationships for far too long, or we were mistreated by another person. When we try to make sense of why this happened to us, we may interpret it as, “We aren’t worthy of love, respect, and/or care.”
The good news is that no matter how your self-worth was lowered, it can be rebuilt.
3 Ways to Overcome Low Self-Worth
I believe there are three ways to build and strengthen self-worth:
Self-Worth Building: Notice when you are acting from a place of unworthiness or not-enoughness. Shift your thinking to the truth that your worth already exists. And take action from the truth.
Self-Love Growing: Intentionally strengthen other types of self-love, and you reinforce that you are worthy of care, love, respect, joy, compassion, etc. (Learn more about what self-love means here.)
Inner Healing: Be guided by someone who can help you heal the inner wounded part of you that interpreted the past hurt/trauma as unworthiness. In doing so, you can release old ways of thinking about yourself, and free parts of you that are stuck in the past.
To hear me speak on “how to strengthen self-worth”, you can view the following 8-minute video:
Which of these ways of strengthening self-worth resonates with you? If you need support, I have several services that help you identify what messages you have internalized about yourself and how to begin re-defining and rebuilding your self-worth. (See links below.)
I’d love to hear your takeaways or aha’s from reading this article. Comment below!
Marci Payne, MA, LPC
Learn more about the Redefine Your Worth program here.
Learn more about Individual Therapy for people-pleasers in Kansas City & Missouri