If you don’t feel worthy of achieving the goal you set, it won’t matter how hard you work or how much time you put into getting there. You’ll always find ways to delay achieving the goal and the worst part is, if you don’t see what’s happening, you’ll think you are failing. You’ll think that you aren’t capable of achieving your goal because you’re flawed, you aren’t smart enough, you aren’t disciplined enough, but the realty is that subconsciously a part of you is working to undo all of the work you do.

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Transcript

Pam: [00:06] You’re listening to Not Bad Advice where our goal is to offer perspective that helps you improve one aspect of your life at a time.

[00:13] I’m Pamela Lund.

CK: [00:20] And I’m CK Chung.

Pam: [00:22] And we hope that after listening you’ll think, ” Hey, that’s not bad advice!”

[00:27] I recently saw an Instagram post by John Wineland – he’s @John_Wineland on Instagram – and it said, “We come to understand most of what we know about love by the time we’re six or seven, including what behaviors would be rewarded with love and what behaviors would have love taken away.” Think about what that means for us as adults. That our worthiness, our beliefs about how lovable we are, and what we need to do to get love are informed by the experiences we had by the second grade.

[01:12] You probably still believed in Santa Claus when you formed all of these deep seated beliefs about your worthiness. So I think it’s time to pick up some new beliefs.

CK: [01:22] So, on the last episode we discussed how feelings of unworthiness show up in our lives and how feeling unworthy can be the root cause of many issues that don’t seem related on the surface. I mentioned my experience growing up where I simultaneously felt like I wasn’t smart enough to please my family, but I was appearing to be too smart to fit in with my peers. And that made me feel conflicted about success all the way into adulthood.

[01:49] You talked about how you’re an overachieving people-pleaser, who feels like you can’t receive anything without reciprocating. So all of these different issues are rooted in unworthiness. Why is unworthiness the cause of so many seemingly unrelated issues?

Pam: [02:06] Well, because it’s all about what you’re able to receive, no matter the circumstances. And what you’re able to receive relates back to what you learned about love. Because really everything you receive is essentially a form of love.

[02:19] Money is love. Acceptance is love. Friendship is love. Attention is love. Everything we receive represents love in some form. It’s all the same thing in different packages and you’re comfortable receiving what you learned you were worth when you were a kid, when you discovered what would cause your caregivers to give love and what would cause them to withhold.

CK: [02:43] Can you provide any more examples of how unworthiness shows up or holds people back?

Pam: [02:48] Yeah, well, it’s sneaky because you’re not going to think, like I’m not asking for the salary I deserve because I learned that asking for more money made my parents mad. Instead, it will manifest in more covert ways.

[03:02] Maybe you won’t ask for the raise you want, because you think if you really deserved it, they would offer it to you and you wouldn’t have to ask.

[03:11] Or Okay. maybe you grew up poor and you don’t want to make your parents feel bad about their economic status. So you aren’t as aggressive in reaching financial goals as you’d like to be.

[03:24] Or maybe you want to do something, but you won’t act on it because acting on it would be visible to others, and you’re embarrassed to be seen working on that goal. For instance, if you suddenly have less time to spend with friends or family because you’ve enrolled in online classes, they may ask questions that you don’t want to answer. So you don’t enroll.

[03:45] Or maybe feeling unworthy prevents you from telling people what you’re trying to achieve, so they can’t offer support or encouragement, which makes success harder.

[03:55] Maybe you want to get in better physical shape or better mental shape and your partner doesn’t. You may fear negatively impacting the relationship in some way, if you grow and they don’t. So you don’t do the personal work that you want to do.

[04:10] Or maybe in a relationship, you try to be someone you’re not to make the other person like you more because you don’t feel lovable as you are.

CK: [04:18] Hmm… Interesting. And those are all rooted in unworthiness.

Pam: [04:23] Yep. Anytime you’re holding yourself back or not being true to yourself because you’re afraid of what other people will think, or because you think that you don’t deserve what you want, that’s unworthiness. And that’s how unworthiness keeps you from achieving your goals. If the goal you want to reach is something you worry about being judged for or something that you think may alienate people around you, you may unintentionally block yourself from achieving it.

[04:48] If you don’t feel worthy of achieving the goal you set, it won’t matter how hard you work or how much time you put into getting there. You’ll always find ways to delay achieving the goal.

[04:57] And the worst part is if you don’t see what’s happening, you’ll think you’re failing. You’ll think that you aren’t capable of achieving your goal because you’re flawed you aren’t smart enough, you aren’t disciplined… whatever the reason is. But the reality is that subconsciously, a part of you is working to undo all of the work you do.

CK: [05:17] It’s like you’re scooping water out of a bucket with one hand while pouring water in the bucket with the other.

Pam: [05:22] Right. And you might not even notice the sabotage because it doesn’t have to be directly related. Maybe you procrastinate every time you think about sitting down to write your book. Maybe every time you make a move toward building your side hustle, you celebrate by spending a bunch of money on things you don’t need. And then you have to pick up more hours at your day job to pay off the debt, which takes time away from your side hustle goal.

[05:47] On her podcast, Reclaim, Thais Sky talks about how when she wanted to move to New York, every time she thought seriously about it, it would lead her to binge eat because disordered eating was how she sabotaged.

[06:00] So this conflict can manifest in ways that you won’t even realize if you’re not able to step back and look at things objectively, or if you don’t have a coach that can help you see your patterns. If any of the examples in today’s show felt true for you, keep an eye out for ways you’re blocking yourself from achieving goals or where you aren’t able to receive some form of love.

[06:20] Next week, we’ll dive into how to start deprogramming unworthiness.

[06:53] So the tarot card I chose for today is the nine of cups. This card is an invitation to fully envision what you want and to see yourself achieving it in a realistic way. Think about what you’re scared to admit you want and picture what would change if you had it. Picture the welcome changes and the unwelcome ones, the happy shifts and the painful ones.

[07:24] What does getting, what you want feel like? What are you afraid of? What do you feel like you don’t deserve? Who could you be if you believed that you were worthy of getting everything you want? And what are you ready to start taking deliberate action to receive?

[07:44] If you find yourself thinking, “Hey, that’s not bad advice” while listening today, we’d love it if you share the episode with your friends and rated it in iTunes.

[07:54] You can get in touch with us on Twitter, where I’m @Pamela_Lund and CK is @cKdisco.

[08:01] To find us on other platforms, visit ForcesOfEqual.com/Advice. There, you can also contact us if there’s something you need advice about. We’d love to hear from you.