The illusion of self-worth

In my role as a therapist, I have had many conversations with people regarding their beliefs about their worth as a person. Most of the time, when clients talk about their worth, they express a belief that their worth is a variable – that it can go up or down, or that their worth is less than that of another person or group of people. I think most people think this way, and if one believes their worth is less than that of others, it causes feelings of shame. Or perhaps, it’s the other way around. Their feelings of shame lead them to believe their worth is less than other people. Which came first, the shame, or the belief? Ultimately, it doesn’t matter, because the entire concept of worth as a variable is an illusion.

Here’s the truth: Real self-worth isn’t earned or lost. It just is. The illusion lies in believing otherwise.

You might find that statement hard to believe. If so, you’re not alone. Most of us learned to believe that our worth stemmed from behaving the right way – from “being good.” As children, we were told by our parents that we were “being good” when we behaved the way they wanted us to, and “being bad” when we misbehaved. We were bombarded with messages about our goodness and our badness, so it’s no wonder we learned to tie our sense of worth with our behavior.

Consider this question: What does a newborn child have to do in order to be worthy of love? I have asked many clients this question, and everyone answers in pretty much the same way: “Not a damned thing,” which is the correct answer. The child doesn’t need to earn love from its parents. All it has to do is be, which it already does. Can you imagine the parent of a newborn saying, “I’ll love that little baby girl, once she starts pulling her weight around here.” Hopefully, that never happens.

So, most of us agree that a newborn needs only to exist in order to be worthy of love. But if we also believe that our own worth must be earned, that raises a couple of questions, like, “When did that change?” and, “Why would it be different for me than for anyone else?”

Basically, there are two theories about individual worth. The first one, which is the one most people have learned to believe, is that worth is a variable, that it can go up or down. The second theory is that everyone’s individual worth is exactly the same as everyone else’s, regardless of behavior or circumstances, one-hundred percent of the time. This is the theory that most people struggle with, because it goes against what they were taught.

In spite of the fact that the first theory is more widely accepted, it has a major flaw, which is this: there is no consensus regarding how one’s worth is measured. Some people believe it is measured by good deeds, while others believe it is measured by productivity, and others believe it is measured by wealth, and others believe it is measured by how many “likes” one gets on social media, and so on. There is no agreement, and even if there were, how do you measure the goodness of a behavior? There isn’t agreement on that, either.

When I was in grade school, one of my science teachers made a statement to the effect that, if something is immeasurable, and not because it is so big, then you have to consider the possibility that the thing in question exists only as a concept. Take, for instance, this thing we call status. Basically, status means “social standing.” It is similar to rank, but there is a major difference between the two. “Rank,” as in the military, is codified. There is a set of rules and expectations regarding rank that has been agreed upon within a structural hierarchy. When one person out-ranks another, they literally have more power than the subordinate. “Status,” on the other hand, is a social construct that not everyone agrees upon. A celebrity might be given preferential treatment at a particular restaurant, but at a different establishment, they have to wait in line, just like everyone else. Status has no external reality. You can’t pour it into a jar. It exists because enough people agree that it’s a thing, but it’s entirely subjective, and a product of the human ego. If you’ve ever been “star-struck” by the proximity of a celebrity, it’s because your ego tells you that the celebrity’s worth is greater than your own, and you can temporarily increase your worth by having some type of contact with them, such as asking for and receiving an autograph. However, if you passed a celebrity on the street and didn’t recognize them, then it would have no more effect than passing a random stranger. “Status” does not emanate from a person, it exists only as a concept.

Whether or not self-worth exists only as a concept, or if it has an actual external reality, it isn’t a problem. The real problem is the feeling that comes from the belief that one’s worth is less than others, or that one is unworthy of being loved. People believe these things, not because they are true, which they never are, but because they have learned to believe it from others. The earlier one learns it, the harder it is to un-learn. But that is one of the core tasks of therapy: to unlearn the beliefs that maintain feelings of shame, and to realize the truth that your worth as a human life is un-diminishable.