You Are Good Enough
If you judge yourself with harsh criticism, going over and over all the things you think you’ve done wrong, or that haven’t gone well, then you will benefit from having a mantra of ‘I am good enough’. Feeling that you’re simply not good enough can affect every area of your life, as it has mine.
Sometimes when I’m in a low mood, I begin to question what my husband Jonny is doing with me. I’m so hard to live with. He tells me, “Eva, you keep me alive. You give me passion, energy, colour. You’re my muse. Life is never dull with you, always full of variety’.
What a gem. If you have a partner and feel like this at times, remind yourself that you are worthy of being with this person.
Make your mantra today, ‘I’m good enough’. This will help you navigate through the dark patches, as long as you can find ways to communicate honestly about what’s happening.
As I have a default position of ‘I can’t do that’ I am often stopped in my tracks by my fear of ‘just not being good enough’. This has held me back from fulfilling my potential on many occasions.
Aiming to do my best has always been a double-edged sword for me. To overcome my low self-worth that I grew up with, as a result of childhood sexual abuse by my father, I created an outer shell of achievement that became my hiding place.
I always had to strive to ‘be the best’- which is subtly different from doing my best. It started at junior school, where I always had to be top of the class. This became a desperate attempt to show that there was nothing wrong with me - nothing wrong ‘in the state of Denmark’.
Any child who has grown up in a shame environment caused by experiencing childhood trauma as result of consistent abuse, especially if that abuse is from a main care giver will tend to feel inside that there is something fundamentally wrong with them – or these things just wouldn’t have happened.
As we depend upon our parents, we cannot blame them as they are meant to be taking care of us – so the fault must lie within the child – that’s the crazy logic that the child mind develops.
I felt my survival depended on my achievements because I felt so worthless inside. Always another goal to achieve. As an adult I achieved a First Class Honours undergraduate degree and a Distinction in my master’s degree. But this didn’t make me feel any better.
Running one London Marathon was not enough - I had to run three. Even though I found the last two somewhat grueling!
Keeping up this standard I’d set for myself became harder and harder. Until I chose to seek some therapeutic support and realised what an impossible task I had established for myself. Eventually I understood that this constant striving so hard to be successful was as a result of my fear that one day I would be found out. People would realise that I was an imposter and would be able to see that inside I felt worthless.
To improve my mental well-being, I chose to develop a ‘Good Enough’ strategy in all areas of my life. I no longer had to strive to be the best. Being good enough was an acceptable way forward. As a result, my life has become much easier and less stressful.
To achieve this shift in my consciousness, it has been necessary to set myself certain boundaries and deadlines, so that the unhelpful desire to be the best does not creep back into my life. In this way, I can let go of the incessant pushing to just do that extra bit more to achieve what I imagine would be a better result.
What I’ve discovered is that separating your achievements from your inner worth is essential, for your well-being. You are not your exam results. You are not your performance. You are not your successes or failures. Instead, aim simply to be a good enough person who can do your best. And that is good enough.
Accepting our limitations and vulnerabilities are what makes us human. This means accepting that we are good enough exactly as we are.
As Leonard Cohen said in his song, ‘The Anthem’ -
“Forget your perfect offering.
There is a crack, a crack in everything
That’s how the light gets in.”