From a young age, we are evaluated and socialized to meet society’s expectations. Being tested, receiving approval and reward, and being punished has conditioned most people to seek their value from others. We fear being a loser and being left out or left behind, so we use most of our resources to ensure we meet society’s standards and obligations.
This is important. However, in our desire to be evaluated well by others, we may lose sight of the fact that our own evaluation of ourselves is even more important. The fact that we have an intrinsic value that we can only discover for ourselves is not taught to us by our families or by society. They also don’t teach us how to do it or why we should be aware of it.
Society understands the value of things you can transact with—things you can give or take. These things have a price tag on them that is determined by the two entities on either side of the transaction. It can be negotiated and can change. Transactions get us the things we need for our physical body to thrive in the material world and for our emotions to feel good.
However, no matter how much stuff we have, even with a good job and a nice boyfriend, it still feels like something is missing. When we feel that sense of something being missing, when we feel lonely, it’s because we’ve lost our sense of self and our sense of purpose—our value.
In the end, if we don’t have conviction about our own value and what we’re worth, then we cannot manage ourselves or move forward and progress and develop because we are not at the center of our own value. This is at the heart of the matter.
Living in society until now, we’ve been constantly barraged by tests and evaluations, so we’ve allowed society to determine our value. Putting our value in the hands of our environment makes us a slave to our environment. We become constantly self-conscious and unsure of ourselves. We don’t have our own conviction.
Without having conviction in our own value, how can we really love ourselves? How can we value ourselves enough to
love ourselves? We can only love ourselves when we believe in and trust ourselves. If we don’t believe, trust, and accept in ourselves, what does it mean to say that we love ourselves? There is no sincerity behind that because we don’t really know ourselves or acknowledge our real value.
What do we mean to ourselves? That’s what we need to look at square in the face.
We are able to do that because we are human beings with a brain that has the capacity for consciousness. Unlike other animals, we can look at ourselves from afar and try to see ourselves objectively. We can ask ourselves the existential questions of philosophers and sages. Questions such as “Who am I?” and “What do I want?” are essential for discovering our absolute value.
Answering these questions is not an academic exercise, and it cannot be accomplished with only the knowledge and experience we’ve accumulated in our lives. What we have to do is feel. We have to use our inner sense to experience the pure energy at our center, especially in our
heart chakra. What we'll find is what I call the
true self,
divinity, or
soul. With a feeling of that energy, we need to think about how we’ve lived so and figure out what we’re going to live for in the future. In that moment, we will be engulfed by our potential
greatness and gain a sense of purpose.
That greatness is waiting to be expressed. The more we express it, the greater our consciousness will become, and we will raise our value. That is personal growth.
Growing ourselves starts with complimenting and praising ourselves. It requires a barrage of new and positive information. We need to tell ourselves that we are capable of creating our own health, happiness, and peace. The compliments and praise we give ourselves are more important than the compliments and praise we get from other people.
It doesn’t take money or a lot of time. All you have to do is just do it right away. It’s priceless.