How do we devalue ourselves?

 «I didn’t really want to»

Imagine that you have long dreamed of enrolling in a vocal school, learning how to sing and performing your favorite jazz compositions. However, there is never enough time for this. After all, every time there are more important things. The child should be taken to the sports section, visit the mother-in-law on the weekend, finish the quarterly report at work …

And it’s embarrassing to talk about this idea to family and friends. After all, they can laugh, and condemn, and cause a feeling of guilt. And it turns out that it is easier to remain silent and give up on a dream than to start realizing it and experience a range of different emotions at the same time.

When we tell others what we really care about, we become vulnerable. We don’t know how such a conversation will end for us, how the interlocutor will react to it, whether relations with people important to us will remain after it … Therefore, depreciation in this case is an opportunity to protect ourselves and avoid unpleasant emotions, states, conversations, situations, and their consequences.

 “Who needs my skills?!”

It happens that we doubt the usefulness of our abilities, skills and talents. Many of us have the opinion that only something outstanding and highly appreciated by society is good in us. And our “ordinary” qualities, knowledge and experience do not deserve special attention. So we deprive the significance of our achievements, time, strength, energy.

This attitude develops in childhood. If a child does not meet the high expectations of parents, then they compare him with other children, scold him for low results, and in general they are often dissatisfied with him. Instead of warm support, the child receives cold criticism. This is how an inner critic is gradually formed, who regularly informs a person that he is insufficient, moreover, with the words and intonations that his parents used. And the person begins to devalue himself. 

 And what did he see in her?

Sometimes we devalue not only ourselves, but also other people. And then envy or condemnation comes into play. It hurts so much to look at someone else’s goodness or someone else’s success that it is simply necessary to identify some shortcomings there: “I don’t see anything special in her”, “So everyone can”, “And why is she only paid money for?”.

Envy is an indicator of an acute lack of self-worth. Not self-esteem, like “I am the best”, but a sense of the value of my being. This is a fundamental experience that can be expressed in the phrase «It’s good that I am.» When we are envious or judgmental, we temporarily reduce the tension that comes from shame, fear, and self-disappointment. It is so difficult for us to get in touch with these feelings that we switch to another and devalue his qualities and achievements.

«Hold on, everything will be fine!»

The most unexpected kind of devaluation is words of comfort. When a loved one is in a difficult life situation, we want to calm him down and say something like: “Don’t cry”, “Be strong”, “You can handle it”, “Life goes on”.

It seems to us that in this way we help him cope with problems. In fact, we are afraid to come into contact with our confusion and powerlessness to help or change anything. We don’t know how to deal with our emotions, so we just talk about our states, say the “right” words and thereby devalue the feelings of a loved one.

As you can see, depreciation is to some extent our desire to save money. When we reduce the importance of feelings, events, people, desires, needs that are important to us, we «anesthetize» ourselves. And the tension is less.

However, such “prudence” ends up costing too much. It deprives us of the value of our being, closeness in relationships, joy and fullness of life. Therefore, in order not to miss your life, it is important to learn to value yourself. 

How to learn to appreciate yourself?

1. Learn to notice your emotions, manage them and understand what they are telling us

Our feelings signal what is happening to us now, what we need, what we want. This is a treasure trove of information about us. 

2. Track thoughts and stop any criticism in your address

No phrases like “should have tried harder” or “stop whining, pull yourself together, rag.” Being harsh on ourselves will never make us feel valued.  

3. Learn to support yourself

The ability to always be on our side is a necessary skill that helps us notice our fears, sadness, shame, pain, live them with warmth to ourselves, and then take risks and act, no matter what.

4. Notice, recognize and appropriate the results of all your achievements

… And even those that at first glance seem insignificant.

5. Be aware of and respect your desires, interests, dreams, aspirations

6. Form your value system

Decide which aspects of life are most valuable to you. Are they really yours or are they imposed on you by your parents, friends, society?

7. Learn to endure your emotions in contact with another person and recognize their value

This is a great way to create truly intimate relationships with other people. It may be difficult to do this on your own, then you can turn to a psychologist.

Self-worth is giving significance to everything that happens to us, to all our states, experiences and feelings. We appreciate ourselves when we recognize all our manifestations as natural, without feeling shame or guilt for them. When we choose ourselves, we make decisions ourselves and are responsible for their consequences. And so gradually comes a strong sense of their significance in this world and the unconditional right to be here.