How Low Self-Worth Limits Us

How Low Self-Worth Limits Us

In the not-so-distant past, I was struggling profusely with my self-worth. I was in middle age and just couldn’t figure life out. Other people seemed successful; I was stuck in mediocrity. I really began to despise myself for my ineptitude and time only made it worse. With every turn of the calendar, I realized I was losing time to turn things around.

There came a point when I pretty much just gave up. I told myself I was never going to make anything of my life so why bother. As I took on the badge of not only failure but quitter I felt ashamed and angry about who I was. It’s not hard to imagine that with this kind of mentality I wasn’t going to be going anywhere in life soon. I shut down all possibility because I wasn’t looking for it. In all of this self-pity, I willingly created a limited future.

My self-imposed limits were strong. For when any one of us decide that we aren’t worth it, we stop trying altogether. Even if we try we tend to sabotage our results. Why, after all, would we want to do anything beneficial for our lives if we hate ourselves so much?

It took an external event to begin the process of waking me up. And all I can say is, I thank God that He used the suffering in my life to set the stage for it. I didn’t have it in myself to try to create the necessary change.

I’m so gracious for that initiation into my awakening for the first wave of it was actually a calling—to be a communicator and motivator. I can’t express the joy that realization brought, to know what to do with my life and how to make a difference.

With my new understanding, I started releasing the hatred I had for myself. I no longer needed to feel the way I did—I was set free of myself. And in that release, my self-worth began to blossom again. It broke through the hard, barren earth and found reason once more.

As my low self-worth began to fade so my limits began to dissolve as well.

The new self-worth I found as I realized my future (and eventually things like who I was and how I related to all of life) I found that I really had no substantial limits at all. When we have a greater sense of worth we inherently believe we deserve success more. It becomes easier to see our potential when we not only believe we can achieve it but that we deserve it. This kind of optimism causes us to push past any limits that we thought we had (or deserved).

This is what makes an awakening so powerful. We come out from behind limits created by low self-worth and find the desire and opportunity to reach our potential. Our biggest limits disappear when we finally believe we deserve success.

 

Closing Thoughts and Questions

Feel free to journal your thoughts or leave a comment or comments below to generate further discussion:

  • How do you feel about yourself right now? What is your level of self-worth on a scale of 1 to 10? The answer to this question is sure to give you some insight into the level of success you are reaching in your life. As you write down your honest answer consider how you feel about yourself may be limiting your potential.
  • There are so many reasons to have a high sense of self-worth—you don’t need an awakening to trigger it. There are times, of course, that we feel like we have nothing left in us to fight for it. My hope is that you don’t let yourself reach that point. Your worth is apparent to so many. You are created in the image of God. You have an impact on so many people. You have so much potential. Stay the course. If you need greater understanding continue to seek and ask and it will find you.