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BOOST YOUR SELF-WORTH WITH THESE 2 SIMPLE STEPS
We’ve said it before, and we’ll say it again (and again, and again, and again): YOU ARE ENOUGH.
But here’s the thing: It’s easy for us to say that to each other, and maybe even easy for us to say it to ourselves. But to actually believe that we are enough? That’s the hard part.
For advice, we reached out to Christine Dionese, a specialist in integrative, epigenetic health and food therapy. As someone who has dedicated her career to helping others understand the science of happiness, Christine has dug into the research behind beliefs and how they affect our behavior patterns—and the role all of this plays in our health and overall wellbeing. Read on for Christine’s insights on how our beliefs are constructed, how we project reality through them, and the two key steps we can take to reframe our thinking.
Our brains are hardwired to believe and assimilate behavior through language—language we’ve been exposed to by our parents and grandparents or those we spent the most time with growing up. This is a part of the study of neurolinguistics. When it comes to behavior changes we want to commit to, it turns out it’s all about our beliefs. Beliefs that became cemented as children through language and action.
Our beliefs are constructed of our inner child and shadow selves at the subconscious level. These inner-influencers play out at the conscious level in our daily lives. They influence how a potential environmental trigger will throw one person into a tizzy while watching another remain cool as a cucumber on a hot day.
The thing about beliefs is that they can be tricky to change. When our long-held beliefs are challenged, we can get a little nervous—after all, that security blanket of thoughts we’ve maintained our entire lives is now being questioned. And, when we find out that we’re operating on outdated software aka an outdated belief that no longer serves, we’re often left with feelings of anger and fear over the need to make a perceived change. Those feelings of anger and fear are completely common and natural. At first, you may be in denial about the underlying source of those fears and anger, but, as you begin to look at your beliefs, it can help speed you light years ahead to where you want to go. Acknowledging the presence of these feelings and, committing to doing something about this is a huge act of self-love.
It’s easy enough to love ourselves during the good times, but, when the going gets tough, it can take us down to negative town instead of reminding ourselves that life is naturally full of peaks and valleys, or, of the yin and yang that is life.
How we project reality through our individual beliefs
As a consultant who works with her clients at the belief level, I listen to people’s language very closely. Instead of a self-security reference point, I hear many people speak from a state of lack, fear and worry. The literal language they use “I don’t have, I can’t, or I’m not” is what the brain believes. For many clients, it may feel overwhelming to even consider believing they are enough.
Sometimes you’ll have done the exercises and you’ll be doing great and then someone else who is still living from a state of lack or constant self-pressure and worry will get under your skin. They may say things that suggest you don’t measure up and you begin to question, “wait, am I enough?” Remember, the golden rule to believing YOU are enough is to realize that they are operating from a different set of instructions, a different set of beliefs and when they project those beliefs toward you, they can become upset when perceived misalignment occurs. Remind yourself that there’s more than one route. I like to remind myself of something Ram Dass’ says, “we’re all just walking one another home.”
Think about it simply for a minute, two people standing on the edge of a ledge—one of you may believe they’re about to fall to their death while the other may feel like they’re standing on the top of the earth exalted. Neither is wrong, but both are operating based on their cemented beliefs that have been projected as their individual reality.
There are practical steps you can take to reassure yourself that YOU ARE ENOUGH
1 | Find your people
This may sound obvious, but as To Be Magnetic’s Lacy Phillips and manifestation specialist says, “find your expanders”. This may be a mentor or teacher you can learn from and with or, someone who you perceive to be on the path to realizing the goals you are currently working on. Conversely, it’s also ok to take a break from certain relationships—sometimes this means being brave enough to trust your intuition and know when a relationship isn’t energetically serving you any longer.
Try this mantra: when taking a break from a relationship, say this mantra out loud or to yourself, “thank you for being in my life to help be a mirror I needed to see into. I wish you well on your path ahead.” Setting an intention sends a positive message to your brain reinforcing that you and this person are enough, just reaching toward goals in different ways.
2 | Reframe your self-talk language and watch what happens
This takes a page out of neurolinguistics 101—how we assign value to and give power to language and allow ourselves to feel as a result. The language that we hear over and over is what we begin to believe about ourselves and the external world. If you heard as a child, “you’re not good at”, “what’s wrong with you?” or “you’re bad” and that was never unlearned, “not good”, “what’s wrong with you” and “you’re bad” are going to stick with you and shape your ability to create self-confidence.
Try this: Get a new journal. On the front write: Reframing journal: creating solutions out of perceived problems. In it, on the first page, write down a list of any goals you have. Beneath that, write a list of what you perceive to be holding you back from reaching those goals. Now go back and look at the language used. For all of those “I’m not”, “I dont’ have” and “I’m not good enough” phrases or anything that is phrased from a negative position, go back and reframe.
Examples:
I’m not…. I AM working toward
I don’t have… I have enough or I AM creating abundance
I’m bad at… I AM learning how to
We can only know we are enough when we acknowledge that this path to goal success is not linear and that it is a work in progress where we are continually picking up new sets of instructions and refining those instructions along the way.
When we reframe using “I am” connected to a positive outcome, we change our own story, we allow ourselves to become mindful troubleshooters instead of mind-full perfectionists.
Before you get started, let’s go back to beliefs. Each of us “does life” according to our own beliefs. And remember, beliefs are largely cemented since childhood and continually reinforced along the way. Many of us are in a stage of unlearning and chiseling out those beliefs that no longer serve.
A difficult task in chiseling is that as you chisel away, you may feel unsteady, or, that you don’t have solid ground to stand on because you’re uprooting everything you’ve ever known. When we think of it this way, it’s our subconscious clinging to the set of instructions for doing life that we’ve long held to be true. If you’re holding onto a belief that your parents taught you, it can be tough to admit that it may be doing more harm than helping. For many of us, it’s not easy thinking that our parents may not have handed us the greatest set of instructions in certain matters. Try reassuring yourself that your parents were doing the best they could and allow yourself the grace and bravery to create your own new guidebook.
Here’s a list of questions to answer to troubleshoot those beliefs developed by neurolinguists:
1 | What belief is holding me back or blocking my self-worth?
2 | Why do I believe that?
3 | Have I considered what would happen if I didn’t believe that?
4 | Whose belief is it anyway?
5 | What can I choose to believe instead that will positively serve me to replace the belief that is holding me back?
Our beliefs are what we project into everyday life as reality. When we answer these questions coupled with reframing our self-confidence through language, the inner child feels comfortable coming to the surface to meet us where we are at today to remind us, “see, you are enough!”
Christine Dionese, co-founder of flavor ID, is an integrative, epigenetic-health and food-therapy specialist, as well as a wellness, lifestyle, and food journalist. She has dedicated her career to helping others understand the science of happiness and its powerful effects on everyday human health by harnessing the power of the epigenetic landscape. Christine lives, works, and plays with her family in Southern California.
We’ve said it before, and we’ll say it again (and again, and again, and again): YOU ARE ENOUGH.
But here’s the thing: It’s easy for us to say that to each other, and maybe even easy for us to say it to ourselves. But to actually believe that we are enough? That’s the hard part.
For advice, we reached out to Christine Dionese, a specialist in integrative, epigenetic health and food therapy. As someone who has dedicated her career to helping others understand the science of happiness, Christine has dug into the research behind beliefs and how they affect our behavior patterns—and the role all of this plays in our health and overall wellbeing. Read on for Christine’s insights on how our beliefs are constructed, how we project reality through them, and the two key steps we can take to reframe our thinking.
Our brains are hardwired to believe and assimilate behavior through language—language we’ve been exposed to by our parents and grandparents or those we spent the most time with growing up. This is a part of the study of neurolinguistics. When it comes to behavior changes we want to commit to, it turns out it’s all about our beliefs. Beliefs that became cemented as children through language and action.
Our beliefs are constructed of our inner child and shadow selves at the subconscious level. These inner-influencers play out at the conscious level in our daily lives. They influence how a potential environmental trigger will throw one person into a tizzy while watching another remain cool as a cucumber on a hot day.
The thing about beliefs is that they can be tricky to change. When our long-held beliefs are challenged, we can get a little nervous—after all, that security blanket of thoughts we’ve maintained our entire lives is now being questioned. And, when we find out that we’re operating on outdated software aka an outdated belief that no longer serves, we’re often left with feelings of anger and fear over the need to make a perceived change. Those feelings of anger and fear are completely common and natural. At first, you may be in denial about the underlying source of those fears and anger, but, as you begin to look at your beliefs, it can help speed you light years ahead to where you want to go. Acknowledging the presence of these feelings and, committing to doing something about this is a huge act of self-love.
It’s easy enough to love ourselves during the good times, but, when the going gets tough, it can take us down to negative town instead of reminding ourselves that life is naturally full of peaks and valleys, or, of the yin and yang that is life.
How we project reality through our individual beliefs
As a consultant who works with her clients at the belief level, I listen to people’s language very closely. Instead of a self-security reference point, I hear many people speak from a state of lack, fear and worry. The literal language they use “I don’t have, I can’t, or I’m not” is what the brain believes. For many clients, it may feel overwhelming to even consider believing they are enough.
Sometimes you’ll have done the exercises and you’ll be doing great and then someone else who is still living from a state of lack or constant self-pressure and worry will get under your skin. They may say things that suggest you don’t measure up and you begin to question, “wait, am I enough?” Remember, the golden rule to believing YOU are enough is to realize that they are operating from a different set of instructions, a different set of beliefs and when they project those beliefs toward you, they can become upset when perceived misalignment occurs. Remind yourself that there’s more than one route. I like to remind myself of something Ram Dass’ says, “we’re all just walking one another home.”
Think about it simply for a minute, two people standing on the edge of a ledge—one of you may believe they’re about to fall to their death while the other may feel like they’re standing on the top of the earth exalted. Neither is wrong, but both are operating based on their cemented beliefs that have been projected as their individual reality.
There are practical steps you can take to reassure yourself that YOU ARE ENOUGH
1 | Find your people
This may sound obvious, but as To Be Magnetic’s Lacy Phillips and manifestation specialist says, “find your expanders”. This may be a mentor or teacher you can learn from and with or, someone who you perceive to be on the path to realizing the goals you are currently working on. Conversely, it’s also ok to take a break from certain relationships—sometimes this means being brave enough to trust your intuition and know when a relationship isn’t energetically serving you any longer.
Try this mantra: when taking a break from a relationship, say this mantra out loud or to yourself, “thank you for being in my life to help be a mirror I needed to see into. I wish you well on your path ahead.” Setting an intention sends a positive message to your brain reinforcing that you and this person are enough, just reaching toward goals in different ways.
2 | Reframe your self-talk language and watch what happens
This takes a page out of neurolinguistics 101—how we assign value to and give power to language and allow ourselves to feel as a result. The language that we hear over and over is what we begin to believe about ourselves and the external world. If you heard as a child, “you’re not good at”, “what’s wrong with you?” or “you’re bad” and that was never unlearned, “not good”, “what’s wrong with you” and “you’re bad” are going to stick with you and shape your ability to create self-confidence.
Try this: Get a new journal. On the front write: Reframing journal: creating solutions out of perceived problems. In it, on the first page, write down a list of any goals you have. Beneath that, write a list of what you perceive to be holding you back from reaching those goals. Now go back and look at the language used. For all of those “I’m not”, “I dont’ have” and “I’m not good enough” phrases or anything that is phrased from a negative position, go back and reframe.
Examples:
I’m not…. I AM working toward
I don’t have… I have enough or I AM creating abundance
I’m bad at… I AM learning how to
We can only know we are enough when we acknowledge that this path to goal success is not linear and that it is a work in progress where we are continually picking up new sets of instructions and refining those instructions along the way.
When we reframe using “I am” connected to a positive outcome, we change our own story, we allow ourselves to become mindful troubleshooters instead of mind-full perfectionists.
Before you get started, let’s go back to beliefs. Each of us “does life” according to our own beliefs. And remember, beliefs are largely cemented since childhood and continually reinforced along the way. Many of us are in a stage of unlearning and chiseling out those beliefs that no longer serve.
A difficult task in chiseling is that as you chisel away, you may feel unsteady, or, that you don’t have solid ground to stand on because you’re uprooting everything you’ve ever known. When we think of it this way, it’s our subconscious clinging to the set of instructions for doing life that we’ve long held to be true. If you’re holding onto a belief that your parents taught you, it can be tough to admit that it may be doing more harm than helping. For many of us, it’s not easy thinking that our parents may not have handed us the greatest set of instructions in certain matters. Try reassuring yourself that your parents were doing the best they could and allow yourself the grace and bravery to create your own new guidebook.
Here’s a list of questions to answer to troubleshoot those beliefs developed by neurolinguists:
1 | What belief is holding me back or blocking my self-worth?
2 | Why do I believe that?
3 | Have I considered what would happen if I didn’t believe that?
4 | Whose belief is it anyway?
5 | What can I choose to believe instead that will positively serve me to replace the belief that is holding me back?
Our beliefs are what we project into everyday life as reality. When we answer these questions coupled with reframing our self-confidence through language, the inner child feels comfortable coming to the surface to meet us where we are at today to remind us, “see, you are enough!”
Christine Dionese, co-founder of flavor ID, is an integrative, epigenetic-health and food-therapy specialist, as well as a wellness, lifestyle, and food journalist. She has dedicated her career to helping others understand the science of happiness and its powerful effects on everyday human health by harnessing the power of the epigenetic landscape. Christine lives, works, and plays with her family in Southern California.
