About that “worthiness” thing.

Often we feel we need to cram who we are and what we experience into the mold of someone else’s expectations or needs in order to be worthy. 

I don’t mean ESPECIALLY worthy. I mean just worthy to exist. To breathe. To take up space. 

We don’t have to “earn” the air we breathe or the physical space we occupy. 

But we instinctively feel we do. 

We’ve don’t want to be a “waste of space” or a “waste of oxygen.” 

We’ve been told, all our lives, that some people just aren’t worthy. 

Often we’ve been told that people who don’t “contribute to the world” aren’t worthy. 

Sometimes we’ve been told that being alive is a “gift” we have to “earn” with our behavior or accomplishments. 

(Seems to me if something is truly a gift, we don’t have to “earn” it, but whatever.) 

We DON’T have to “earn” or “deserve” the privilege of our existence via our behavior or accomplishments. 

We are “worthy” of being alive by virtue of the fact that we are alive. 

So why do we get so obsessed with “earning” our very lives? 

Most of it is programming. 

Some of us truly feel that if we don’t have SOME sort of incentive to achieve things or behave well, we just…won’t achieve things or behave well. 

If we are worthy just because we exist, where is the incentive to be better? 

Every single time I write about the subject of self-worth, I get asked: if we don’t “earn” our worth though our behavior, then what is the basis of our worth? What gives human life value? 

I don’t know. 

Different people are going to have different ideas about what gives human life value. Your mileage may vary on whether your, or anyone’s, life has “value,” I suppose. 

But the real truth is, I don’t care. 

I don’t care if you think your, or my, life has value. I don’t care if you think your, or I, “deserve” to exist. 

The fact is, we DO exist. 

That’s what I DO know. 

And as long as we exist, we have the responsibility to manage our quality of life. 

There are things about our quality of life that we don’t control. We don’t control many of the things that happen TO us. We don’t control the genes or many of the other biological factors that are handed to us. We don’t control many things about our environment. 

Our job is to get real and proactive about what we DO control. What we CAN impact and manage to create the kind of quality of life we’d prefer. 

I think getting wrapped around the axle about “worthiness” is often a distraction. 

There’s NOT going to be a world in which I just decide that it’s pointless to try to manage our quality of life because we are “unworthy.” 

Worthy or not, I prefer humans to live quality lives. 

I can’t speak to what would make someone “deserve” a high quality of life or not. 

I can only speak to the fact that I want people to live high quality lives. 

I don’t care whether they are “worthy.” I don’t care whether you, reading this right now, think you, or I, are “worthy.” 

I don’t care if you achieve amazing things or no things in your life. I care that you are as happy and comfortable and fulfilled as you can be. 

Why? Not because you do or don’t “deserve” it. 

But because it improves MY quality of life to help you improve YOUR quality of life. 

Don’t sink in the quicksand of ruminating on “worth.” 

Focus in on improving your quality of life today in realistic ways.