How to feel good about yourself (without even trying) - The Self-Worth Experiment

How to feel good about yourself (without even trying)

By Dr Berni Sewell | Heal your self-worth

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Aug 06
How to feel good about yourself (without even trying)

How long have you been trying to feel good about yourself? 

How long have you struggled to be more, become “a better version of you”? So, you can feel worthy of other people’s love and acceptance.

And your own.

And for how long have you felt ashamed of yourself, disappointed in yourself because you still feel worthless? Because no matter what you try, which path you walk, how much effort you put into it, you always fail.

And even if you know, theoretically, that you ARE worth personified, it seems impossible to find your true worth in your heart. You repeat the affirmation, but it’s empty words without meaning. It’s not your reality, it doesn’t ring true. 

Deep down, you just cannot believe it.

Your mind keeps insisting that your only chance to ever have any worth is to work hard and sacrifice yourself to the relentless pursuit of ever more accomplishments and possessions. To be a success.

But you are never good enough.

And you try to fight it. You battle against the whispers that emanate from deep within your mind. You cling on to hope.

But the voices inside your head are getting louder, more overwhelming, undefeatable: You are worthless. 

And everything else you try to tell yourself is just a pipe dream. There is nothing out there for you. Because you deserve nothing. You are nothing. And, sometimes, you hate yourself for it.

But you know what? 

This will sound weird but being NOTHING is exactly what you need to feel good about yourself. Let me explain…

 

The manipulative reason why you cannot feel good about yourself

You see, it’s not your fault that you feel worthless, that you can’t love yourself or feel good about yourself.

It’s just that society always encourages us to be SOMETHING. We ought to be better, richer, prettier, slimmer, smarter, more perfect and so on. So, we can gain the worth we need to deserve a happier life.

And our mind buys into this manipulation. 

It wholeheartedly believes that, once we amassed enough possessions and achievements, we will have earned sufficient worth to pay for the fulfilment of our desires. Because that’s what it has been told since we were born.

So we sacrifice our life, health and happiness to the accumulation of money, qualifications, beauty and social media likes. Because our mind is convinced that being SOMETHING or SOMEONE (especially if this something or someone is better than the other people around us) is a prerequisite for happiness, abundance.

And self-love.

The massive problem here is though that you simply have no chance to ever fulfil all the criteria that society dictates. You will never be successful or wealthy enough, you will never be beautiful, attractive or sexy enough. You have no chance to ever have enough possessions or money. 

But not because you aren’t good enough!

But because the criteria society tells you to strive for are unobtainable. They are arbitrary nonsense. And the obsessive pursuit of meeting imaginary standards that promise to make you feel good about yourself is what actually ruins your life.

For one simple but mind-blowing reason.

 

The eye-opening truth about your futile pursuit of worth

We believe that we can only feel good about ourselves if we have worth. And that we must fulfil society’s criteria to earn worth. So, all our life, we struggle along the rocky path towards more worth.

And never get there.

Because, even if you could fulfil all required criteria, you would still feel worthless afterwards. You would still not be able to love and accept yourself.

Sure, you may have everything society dictates we need to be ok as a person, all the externalities we are made to believe are prerequisites to our happiness and deservedness. 

But, deep inside you will still feel unfulfilled and worthless.

And you will be forced to achieve, earn and be even more. And then more and more again. Because you believe the emptiness you feel means that you haven’t walked far enough on the path to worth. You aren’t enough yet to be able to feel good about yourself.

Because the truth is that, no matter which criteria you fulfil and what you sacrifice in the process, the path you are currently taking will never lead you to your true worth. You will never find your true worth.

It’s impossible.

But not because you are hopeless! But because worth is not something you can find, earn or gather. It’s nothing you can just pick up at the end of your journey like groceries from the supermarket. 

You cannot even increase or accumulate worth by doing something or being someone. In fact, the opposite is true.

Don’t believe me? Well, read on and you may be surprised what you discover…

 

The only way to feel good about yourself

As a society, we believe that the more we do, the more we possess and the more we are, the more worth we will have. But that’s just not true. In fact, doing, being and striving for more is exactly what stops you from feeling good about yourself.

You see, you don’t need to fulfil any prerequisites to find your true worth. You don’t have to be able to pay for it. Don’t have to be good enough. 

Heck, you don’t even have to find the right path.

Because your true worth is not a destination. It’s the infinite truth of your being, your unbounded and eternal essence. And because it is unbounded and eternal, it is already where you are now. Because it’s everywhere, always.

As such, you will never find your true worth, no matter how hard you search. Because it’s not something you can discover outside of yourself. Instead, it is part of you. It’s right there within you, was right there with you all along. 

You don’t need a path to find what you already have. Or to arrive where you already are.

So, stop struggling, running and straining in an effort to find your true worth. And start to discover it everywhere around and within you right now.

It’s much easier than you may think. Because you can realise your true worth, and finally start to feel good about yourself, by being and doing absolutely nothing.

And if you have a few more minutes, I will show you how.

 

How to finally feel good about yourself (by doing nothing)

The thing is that your true worth and your ability to feel good about yourself are always there. You don’t need to find it, gain it or develop it.

So, I guess you now wonder where it is then. If your true worth is always there, right within you, why can you not see it? Why can you not feel it?

And the answer is simple. Because you aren’t looking in the right direction.

You see, as a species and society, we have become so identified with our mind that our entire attention is on the incessant stream of thoughts in our head that plans, worries, replays, sings, babbles all day long.

We are so focussed on the mind and its stories, fears and doubts that we are blinded to everything else that’s already there. Such as our worth or our innate ability to feel good about ourselves, to destress and heal.

And the only way you will ever be able to feel your worth is to stop shining the light of your awareness solely onto your thoughts and move it to your worth.

Which you can do by stunning your mind into silence, by thinking NOTHING, if only for a second. And you will feel your worth float up from that nothing. It will feel good, relaxing, joyful.

You don’t need to battle to find your worth. You don’t have to work hard. You just need to think, do and be NOTHING.

Are you ready? Then here we go.

 

The NOTHING technique to feel good about yourself

To practice the NOTHING technique, memorise the instructions below or listen to the guided meditation I recorded for you.

NOTHING technique

Sit down comfortably and make sure you won’t be disturbed for the next 10 minutes.

Take a couple of deep breaths, in and out.

Now, start to watch your thoughts. Don’t get involved with them. Don’t judge them. Don’t let the worries that are streaming by rattle you or the memories upset you.

Just observe.

Whenever you notice that you got absorbed by your thoughts, take a mental step back and watch again.

Once you’ve watched your thoughts for a minute or so, ask yourself: “Where is my next thought going to come from?”

And watch out attentively for that next thought. Wait for it to come.

And, as you do, you will notice that it doesn’t come straight away. The question you asked stuns the mind into silence for a few seconds. 

I am not sure why this happens (maybe the mind suffers from performance anxiety when it knows you are watching it that closely?). But it does happen.

And while your mind is silent, you will feel a comforting sense of stillness. A good feeling that comes from nowhere, out of the nothing that the mind’s speechlessness left behind.

Focus on this good feeling as long as it lasts.

When the mind starts to chatter again, don’t worry about it. That’s normal. And it’s fine.

Just ask yourself: “What is my next thought going to be?”

And watch intently again, waiting for that next thought.

As silence ensues, focus again on the beautiful feeling that floats up from the nothing, the gap between the thoughts.

Repeat these 4 steps as often as you want and feel comfortable:
  1. 1
    Watch your thoughts without getting involved with them
  2. 2
    Ask the question: “Where is my next thought going to come from?” or “What is my next thought going to be?” and with all your focus and awareness watch out for that next thought
  3. 3
    While the mind is still, focus on the beautiful, calm feeling that lives in the nothing between or behind the mind’s thoughts
  4. 4
    When you realise you are thinking again, just gently direct your attention back to watching your thoughts and restart the process

This technique is adapted from Dr Frank Kinslow's book "The Secret of Instant Healing" which I highly recommend if you are interested in this topic. It's a life-changing book (well, at least it was for me). And if you should buy the book through the link above, I will get a little bit of the purchase price to keep my blog running...thank you!

How to feel good about yourself the easy way

Do the exercise I described above right now. It’s only 10 minutes. And I have recorded it as a quick guided meditation for you which you can listen to for your convenience below.

I’ll wait…

So, how did it feel?

It’s amazing, isn’t it?

As a species, we spend so much time and effort trying to find peace, relaxation and joy in our environment. We relentlessly, and unsuccessfully, seek our worth outside of us.

And the more we try and struggle, the more active our mind will be. Cutting us off even more from what we are looking for.

And what has always been there, behind the thoughts.

Because your happy place, your feel-good vibe, your true worth has always been within you. It will always be there for you.

Feeling good about yourself is not something you will do eventually when you have met all the required criteria (NOTE: which is never, because the criteria are unobtainable. Not just for you but for all of us).

It’s something that comes naturally, all by itself when you stun your mind into silence and finally discover your true worth behind the thick curtain of your ruminating thoughts.

So, stop trying to be something or someone to finally be able to feel good about yourself. And spend a few minutes a day being no-one and doing no-thing. Do the NOTHING technique several times a day or whenever you feel like it to boost your mood and relax. To reconnect to the truth whenever you feel cut off from your worth.

So you can feel good about yourself. Without prerequisites, conditions or hard work.

Just because you ARE worth. And you are now able to see it.

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