This was first posted on my Facebook account on the: 21 September 2016
For most of my formative years, my family (in conjunction with my faith) helped affirm my self-worth. Sounds easy enough in a family setting right?! Not so much, because (from the little that I’m able to recall) I didn’t really make it easy.
Family and Faith, those are just two of the things which sustained me when I was questioning the meaning of my very own existence (because, I tend to thoroughly apply — Question Everything). I hope I get the opportunity to share some of the findings which came (and still do come) from questioning one’s very own existence at a later stage of this lifing thing.
So back to the whole self-worth thing. My faith and family helped shape, not only how I viewed and still view myself, but also what I believed about myself. Which couldn’t have been an easy task because, having alluded to this before, I’m far from being an easy being overall. Anyway, my faith and family have been (are) part of the foundation on which I began building this house — my life / my existence = my overall experience. The foundation has been a solid one, despite some of my numerous self sabotage attempts, both intentionally and unintentionally. I was the one who, at the mercy of life’s happenings, started to not only question the point of my existence but also simultaneously devalue what it is that I bring/brought to anything. I gave in to the things that life threw at me and I let those things replace the two things that are essential to my foundation. I didn’t understand why things were starting to crumble till I was hit with the obvious realisation of what was causing the destruction. This soul, that’s currently stuffed into this (under the right light) handsome meatsuit.
As part of an ongoing Self-worth Reclaim Process (SRP), I decided, earlier this (that) morning, that I was going to wear the first pair of formal shoes ‘I’ ever paid for with earnings from one’s very own (hard) worked for remuneration. I chose these shoes because at the time of their purchase, self-doubt wasn’t really one of my core issues. At the time, my self-worth had its roots deeply planted into all the things that really mattered/matter in life. Said things that are defaults or even mandatory things to being alive.
I was scared at the time, not just of failure, but I was scared of missing any opportunities presented to me. I was more of the ‘Yes man’ that I’ve now come to miss. See, missing opportunities scared me because missing an opportunity meant I was still so scared of failure that I let it decide what I ought to do or not. Previously, it had gotten so bad that I was comfortable with it hindering even the best kind of progress in my life. Missing an opportunity meant I never really succeeded but I also never really failed because I never tried (which I have come to learn that in some instances that’s just another word for failing). I was still enjoying being in the unknown or the limbo of life though. This, for me, meant that I lived by only reacting to what was happening to and or around me. I was never creating and or making things happen. Lord knows he gave me the ability to make things happen.
The main lesson to share from that part of my life is to never allow subtractions to your self-worth, allow no recession to devalue the personal currency that is you — You are worth much more.
However, first and foremost, be worth much more to yourself!
In the words reverberated by the already legendary Kendrick Lamar
“I LOVE MYSELF”
OPPOSED THOUGHTS 