Yes, it’s true: You are amazing.
You are wonderful, fantastic, downright spectacular. No? You don’t think so?
Every day I hear people put themselves down. They curse themselves for being stupid, a failure, or weak. My answer to them is always the same — sure. But let’s be clear what we’re talking about. You, the totality of you, is not stupid. The whole of you is not a failure. Your entire being is not weak.
Oh, it’s true that you may fail at certain tasks. You may act stupidly, and do dumb things. You may also show weakness in the face of difficulties. But these are things that you do, not who you are.
And by making this simple but important distinction — the things that you do versus who you are — you are taking a big step toward being a happier, healthier you.
The problem of rating the totality of yourself as good or bad, rather than rating your actions, or behaviors, is that you are setting yourself up to be an emotional mess.
When we make the mistake of rating ourselves as good or bad, we feel miserable for not thinking we’re good enough. Or, when we rate ourselves as good, we run the risk of setting ourselves up to feel bad when we fail at something. Either way, we’re in trouble.
Humans cannot be all good or all bad. So rating yourself this way is totally irrational. Learn to let go of this old rating system and you will feel better about yourself.
Today you may screw up that report for your boss. You may forget to wish your wife a happy anniversary, and you may act selfishly and somebody else might feel hurt. But that makes you human, as human as anyone else. For all those things that you do that may not be so great, there will be a million things that you do that are stunning. Yet most of those actions you won’t even recognize, or remember, as they’re automatic.
Yes, you are a flawed human being — but you are also amazing for it, not despite it.