Who Determines Your Self-Worth?

Who determines our self-worth?

The boss who passed us over for the promotion?

The romantic interest who didn’t want a second date?

Our parents who disagree with the choices we’ve made with our lives?

The spouse who shows very little interest in our achievements or challenges?

The prospective client who decides not to work with us?

What about the neighbour with the bigger house and flashier car?

The person in our industry whose career makes ours suddenly feel inadequate?

The friend who treats us disrespectfully?

The relative who thinks we should be married by now, should have children, should have a better job, should have bought a house or should have done something differently?

Or, the demanding client who was unhappy with us today?

Then, of course, there's us! The voice in our own head that looks at what we have achieved, earned, created, accomplished or become... and decides it still isn’t enough.

Whether the judgement is coming from someone else or from inside our own head, you and I both know intellectually that it has no right, nor the power, to determine our worth. Yet we hand over the measuring stick all the time, usually without even realising we’ve done it.

When did self-worth become something we had to earn?

Other people’s opinions are only one of the ways we learn to measure ourselves. We also measure ourselves by how busy we are, how productive we’ve been, how much money we earn, the job title after our name, the number of people who follow us online, our age, our appearance, our relationship status, the house we live in, the car we drive, the invitations we receive, the clients who choose us and the people who approve of us.

For many high-performing people, there are even more sophisticated versions. How useful am I? How much am I contributing? How much do people need me? Am I still succeeding? Am I living up to my potential? Am I achieving as much as I should be by now?

When the answer doesn’t feel good enough, somehow the judgement shifts from 'I’m disappointed with this result' to 'there must be something wrong with me.'

That distinction is enormous.

You can make a poor decision without being a poor human being. You can lose a client without becoming less valuable. You can fail at something without becoming a failure. You can be rejected without being unworthy. You can have a year in which you earn less money, accomplish less, change direction, fall apart, begin again or have absolutely no idea what you are doing next and remain exactly as worthy as you were before.

Our results can change. Our circumstances can change. People’s opinions of us can certainly change. Our worth does not need to rise and fall with them.

Who gave us the measuring stick?

There is no international committee sitting somewhere deciding how busy is busy enough, how successful is successful enough, what age you should reach particular milestones, what your body should look like, how much money makes you rich or how impressive your life needs to appear before you’re permitted to feel good about yourself.

Why, sometimes, do we behave as though there is?

Advertising has played its part. Social media has intensified it. Families, workplaces, communities and cultures have handed beliefs down through generations about what it means to be successful, attractive, agreeable, accomplished, chosen and impressive.

Be ambitious, but not too ambitious. Be visible, but not too loud. Make something of yourself, but don’t get above yourself. Don’t waste your potential, but don’t make other people uncomfortable either.

No wonder the measuring stick keeps moving.

We can spend a lifetime trying to arrive at a point where we finally feel like enough, only to discover the criteria have changed again.

One of my passions in my work has always been helping people change that record, because self-worth isn’t supposed to be the prize we receive after we have performed well enough.

Self-worth is our sense of our inherent value as a human being. It sits underneath the roles, achievements, mistakes, possessions, relationships and opinions. It is about who we are, rather than what we do or how other people perceive us to be.

That doesn’t mean we stop wanting to grow. It doesn’t mean we stop caring about the quality of our work, reflecting on our behaviour, striving for something extraordinary or acknowledging when we haven’t shown up as the person we want to be.

When our worth is no longer on trial, we become much more able to look at ourselves clearly.

We can say, I got that wrong, without turning it into I am wrong. We can hear feedback without allowing it to diminish our worth. We can stretch beyond what we already know without having to be instantly good at it. We can take more risks because failure no longer carries quite the same threat. We can change our minds, leave situations in which we are being diminished, ask for more and stop requiring the world to constantly reassure us that we deserve to be here.

So, how can we strengthen our self-worth from within?

1. Separate your worth from the result

Notice the places where you have quietly made your worth conditional. I’ll feel good about myself when I get the promotion. When the business reaches that number. When I lose the weight. When someone chooses me. When people respect me. When I have achieved enough to prove that I really am capable.

There's nothing wrong with wanting any of those things. The problem begins when we make them evidence of our value.

Your achievements can tell you something about your skills, choices, effort, opportunities, priorities and circumstances. They cannot tell you how worthy you are. Neither can your mistakes.

Check in instead with the things that sit closer to who you actually are. Your values. Your integrity. Your character. The way you treat people. The promises you make to yourself. The courage you show when nobody is applauding.

Are you living in a way that feels aligned with who you want to be? And even if you weren’t quite there today, that is information. It is not a verdict on your worth.

2. Release the demand to be perfect before you approve of yourself

I consciously quit perfectionism years ago and it remains one of the best decisions I have ever made.

Perfectionism is often dressed up as having high standards, but they are not the same thing. High standards can encourage us to grow, create beautiful work and become better at what we do. Perfectionism moves the finish line.

It says you can feel proud when there are no flaws. You can relax when everyone is happy. You can approve of yourself once you have stopped making mistakes. Which, of course, means never.

Life includes mess. People misunderstand us. We choose badly. We say the wrong thing. We miss opportunities. We get things spectacularly wrong. We occasionally discover that something we were absolutely certain about five years ago makes no sense to us now.

Good. We are human-becomings. We are supposed to learn, change, experiment, rethink and grow.

A mistake can require an apology. A decision can require correcting. A result can require another attempt. None of those things requires you to withdraw your own worth.

3. Become more discerning about the voice in your own head

We talk a lot about the Inner Critic, but I think there is something important to understand about it. Not every uncomfortable thought about ourselves is wrong.

Sometimes we did behave badly. Sometimes we could have prepared better. Sometimes we know we’re hiding, avoiding something or settling for less than we are capable of.

The answer isn’t to replace every difficult thought with something positive. It is to become discerning.

When a critical thought appears, pause long enough to examine it. Is this true? What is the evidence? Is there something useful here for me to learn? Is this thought helping me take responsibility, or simply attacking me? Would I speak to someone I respected this way?

And, most importantly, have I turned something I did into a judgement about who I am?

Take the lesson if there is one. Make the change if one is required. Then put down the weapon.

You do not need to punish yourself in order to grow.

Get to know the person underneath the performance

One of the ways I help clients strengthen their self-worth is through self-understanding, because when we don’t know ourselves particularly well, it is very easy to allow the world to tell us who we are.

If you'd like to play along, I invite you to take out your journal and explore:

Who am I?

Who am I not?

How am I when I am most myself?

How am I when I am trying to gain approval?

What do I value?

What do I stand for?

What brings me alive?

What drains me?

What are my strengths, skills and unique gifts?

What qualities do I most respect in myself?

Where do I abandon my own judgement in favour of someone else’s?

Whose approval still has too much influence over me?

Where am I still trying to prove that I am enough?

What would become possible if I no longer needed to prove it?

Dive in and see what comes up. Have fun with it.

You are allowed to want more for yourself. You are allowed to become more skilful, successful, courageous, wealthy, healthy, visible or accomplished. But, none of those things makes you more worthy at a human.

Your life becomes very different when you stop asking the outside world to determine something that was never theirs to decide.

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If this has brought up questions about how much of your life is being shaped by your own sense of self-worth, and how much is still being influenced by approval, achievement or other people’s expectations, there are a few ways you can explore this further.

Firstly, I’ve created two complimentary Blueprints you can work through in your own time.

The Unshakeable Woman Blueprint will help you strengthen your self-trust, confidence and internal authority. Success Was The Warm-Up is for you if you’ve already achieved a great deal and are beginning to question what success, fulfilment and the next part of your life now look like on your terms.

If you don’t want to work through these questions alone, The Soft Strength Salon is where you do this work with me as your coach. Over six months, we work together on the life, work, leadership, dreams and desires you want to create next, while strengthening the self-trust, clarity and inner authority that allow you to create them without handing your worth to the outside world.

Janelle Ryan is a globally recognised personal, career and leadership coach who works with high-performing professionals and established leaders navigating growth, change and the next phase of their life and leadership. She is the founder of Sky High Coaching, an international speaker, retreat leader and published author, known for her work on internal authority, soft strength and sustainable success. Janelle blends deep insight with practical application to help you lead with clarity, confidence and precision.