I hold a Masters degree and could not get a teaching job in my field. I was devastated. I mean how could you spend so much time investing in something so important to you and end up in jobs where you are barely making above minimum wage. To top it off I ended up fired from two of those lower grade positions. It all left me questioning my skills, talents, and my worth. During this time I also had some serious life altering events that sent me spiraling into a deep depression. I was totally questioning myself, my dreams, and feeling no way out.
I am not saying this is all of us. It doesn’t always get to these depths of issues but sometimes negative events can cause us to create a negative perception of ourselves. This especially happens to professional women who can tend to equate what they DO with who they ARE. This is a serious mistake, but hard not to do in a society that constantly begs you to equate your worth with your professional status. Know my sisters that I struggle with it too- until one day I decided to make my own way and determined to NEVER let an event reflect my worth.
This one move lead to dramatic results. It lead to me opening my own communication consultant business, a new book, a wonderful man in my life, and most importantly all were a reflection of my work to make sure that I valued myself and who I was no matter what was happening around me.
How? How can you move forward in believing in your worth when everything outside of you is trying to make you feel unworthy? Below is a practical guide to making this happen– because what is the point of an article if it cannot help you.
1. BREATHE: We underestimate the power of breath. Sometimes you need to just stop and breathe into the experience. Take a hot bath, light a candle, and just sit. Nurture yourself. So many times something occurs and we go directly into beating ourselves up. STOP. That is NOT helpful. This is the time where we need to be kind to ourselves and take a moment to recenter.
2. Accept and feel: While you are taking that nice hot bath and breathing, do not bypass the initial feelings you have over a particular event. Professional or personal. Understand that this is going to be crucial to you being able to process in order to move on. Stop your mind. Stop your worry. Stop your analysis. Just FEEL. Release those emotions inside of you.
3. Disengage: Now that you have let your emotions have some space, you need to disengage. Do not start down the road of what is wrong with you or use this as an event to “kitchen sink” your negative experiences. Sure many negative events may have happened to you- but these could be more a reflection on how you have devalued yourself rather than your worth.
4. Do not cast a shadow: Much like disengaging, you do not want to allow this event to cast a shadow on your future. Do not totalize and catastrophize. “It will always be this way” or “I will NEVER have that again” are not helpful, useful, or most times accurate. Take it as the one event and then use it to determine to become better, stronger, and more successful because of it. You can get a support group in this process or start to access motivational videos and personal development courses.
5. Realize: Many things. Namely, your own potential that you may have not been living up to your best. Maybe you have been settling? Maybe this is not where you were necessarily supposed to be? Or perhaps you just needed to realize that no matter what you are the very best you that you can be. This may also be a wake up call to behaviors in yourself that you need and want to change. Approach that gently.
6. Open your mind: So you begin to think that this isn’t you. That maybe this is not what you were meant to do. Use this experience as an opportunity to reflect on who you are, who you want to be, and what is real for YOU. Then start to look for non-traditional ways to fulfill your passion. We are in the land of the worldwide web. When doors were shut for me traditionally, I began to search for non-traditional routes and found them.
7. Get Real: The truth is that realistically there are a lot of things against us. As much as I wanted to beat myself up I had to look honestly at the things against me: A WOMAN of COLOR in ACADEMIA. Yep. This helped take a lot of the pressure off of myself. Now that is not to say that you do not challenge those outside barriers, but it is to say that you take a little bit of pressure off of yourself in the process.
8. Get yourself up and start fresh! Yes. things happen that can bring us to our knees- but only if we allow them. So take your time to heal, but not too long. Just enough time to to get your armor back on, brush yourself off, and use this event to propel you further!
Negative things are going to happen, it is inevitable. But when we attach events to our self esteem it is detrimental to our emotional and mental health, as well as our overall well being. Many times by becoming consumed we become stuck and are unable to move forward. So take some time to step back and remember what that fabulous diva Eleanor Roosevelt taught us: “ No one can make you feel inferior without your consent.”