A common thread in the tapestry of my work is hearing the whispers (or the shouts) of self-doubt in the words of my coaching clients. We’ve all been there. Who hasn’t wondered if all this work was going to pay off some day? The nagging nature of our active mind often delivers us mixed messages. First, it might tell us that we have to achieve the gold-standard of our society’s validation- in the form of books read, teachers studied with, education earned, credentials met, training completed- and then when we do any or all of these things, another voice chimes in; the one which tells us that because our work comes easy to us, because we enjoy it, it’s a shame to accept that it’s worth something.
When I’m seeking services, even if I know nothing of the technical aspects of the service, I instinctively know if they’re charging too little. At times it’s so ridiculous, their tendency to place too little value on their work, that it takes no intuition to feel it. Like the guy in northern New Mexico who came to fix our chimney in the middle of a blizzard, precariously climbing our two-story peaked roof in little canvas slip-on shoes, with no assistance. I was horrified. But when he was finished, the real horror was what he asked for his sixty minutes of service, which meant that we could actually have heat in our house. We gave him triple what he asked and that still wasn’t enough.
Transpersonal Psychologist Rosie Kuhn ( http://dr-rosie.com/ ), in her book Self-Empowerment 101, has a great paragraph in relation to this topic. She writes, “People’s relationship with money is one of the most fascinating phenomena and influences in their realm of power and achievement. Our beliefs and interpretations, our assumptions and expectations about money are amazingly significant. They generate so much of what shows up in our lives. We emphasize its importance and give it tremendous power to make us feel successful or make us feel like failures. We give it the power to make us happy or make us anxious, worried, depressed or diseased. In some cases, it’s been given the power to kill us.”
Think about that. What is your relationship with money trying to teach you about yourself and your life? Are you too attached to things at the risk of your health? Are you afraid to ask a fair wage for your work because you have a nagging sense that you’re not worth it? Are you so stressed out that your baseline has become the constant low-grade gut-churning sense of worry and anxiety? If so, it doesn’t have to be this way. There are other options, other ways of being.
You’re worth more. The simple understanding of that can be the doorway to new worlds.
Leave a Comment