I have a confession: When it comes to love, I have been selling myself short. For years. I have sold the best of me at rock bottom prices. Auctioned off my heart to the lowest bidder. But I’m here to say that I can no longer do this. I have taken myself off the discount rack and marked my heart back up to full price.
In the past, my method for screening potential mates has involved a complex algorithm that even I don’t fully comprehend. What I do know is that I took all my years of experience, added in a measure of pain, and multiplied it by my capacity for deep love to come up with a formula for heartbreak.
Often in matters of the heart, I aimed low. I always intended otherwise, but the results revealed the opposite. I dated some real winners. And, although some of these winners have been truly nice people, let’s just agree (as my friends all do) that they were not for me.
My tendency in the past to select unsuitable partners was not because I believed that I didn’t deserve someone amazing, nor because I had remarkably low self-esteem. No, it’s not something that I intellectualized, as if I thought that I wasn’t worthy or that I thought that I had nothing to offer, it was a feeling deep in my core and the way I saw relationships modeled. Perhaps this rings true for you, too.
Maybe as a young child when you were growing up (like me), your single mom didn’t value herself and her worth in the world, and even though she told you that you deserved all the good the world could hold, what she did in her own life belied those words. This situation, where the talk doesn’t match the walk, leads to a schism between the heart and head. Yes you know, you are indeed and wholeheartedly cognizant of that fact that you rock, but the person you looked to during your formative years for guidance about the way the world works showed a very different way to be in intimate relationship to another. Yes, this verily sucks.
So allow me, dear reader, to counsel you for a moment—please, do not do this. Do not do as I have done. If you have or do sell yourself short, stop it. Now. It’s that easy. Really.
There is no limit to what you are capable of, and no cap on the love your heart can feel. So why do we, many of us, settle for less than we deserve? Why do we compromise on what we want? Why do we sell ourselves short when it comes to affairs of the heart?
First, let’s consider the most important relationship you will ever have; no not the one with your parents, partner, siblings, or your children. No, the most important relationship you will ever have, and the one that determines how all your other relationships fare, is the relationship that you have with yourself. How you feel about yourself informs everything you do when relating to others, whether lovers, friends, or colleagues—Hell, it probably even determines the way you talk to the cashier at the grocery store. Therefore it is of utmost importance that this primary relationship, the one between you and your hot and glorious self, is bomb-proof. Air-tight. Solid.
The amazing thing about getting good with yourself is that you don’t need more self-help books, twenty additional years of therapy, or more experience to start. You just need to step away from the past and into the now. You need to stop selling yourself short.
Consider this: You are unique; you have something to offer—many things that no one else on the planet has in the same combination. Isn’t that cool? You are made of lots of good characteristics and some not-so-savory bits, too. That’s just as it should be. You are worth it. You do deserve it. The universe vibrates in a delicious way when you step into the space of self-love. So I ask you, challenge you, beg you, to do one thing different today—stop selling yourself short and step into your light. Love is already there waiting for you.
Shanna…. oh my heart is cracked open on this one through your story! Not only because my own story holds the shadows of which you write… a mother who saw herself as a servant to others and lacked her own self worth. I spent years working through that one. And yes, it did require me to fall wildly in love with myself to break that curse. And now that I am older and a mother of sons 20, 22 and 25, I have been surrounded by young motherless women for years. Young women whose mothers either worked overtime or were horribly wounded and attacked their daughters in their esteem. And thus so many find themselves in tragic relationships and lives. One thing I do see in them is a wild instinctual awareness. An awareness that once exposed to the truth of womanhood and their value as individuals, they work hard to seize their lives and achieve.
Thank you so much for revealing your own intimate journey for me and others and for claiming your full worth so that we can be emboldened to do the same!
Oh how I can relate to this beautifully written, heartfelt and poignant post. I have a string of star-crossed lovers in my wake—none of them able to love me in a mutually supportive way but my story is a little different. I grew up with an abusive, narcissistic mother at the helm so I had some serious imprinting to overcome. I was just drawn to emotionally unavailable men because that’s what I knew best. Even though I had a warm and loving father. Go figure. Years of therapy, enormous work on psyche and spirit—but it wasn’t until a very good friend looked at me one day and said, “We miss the joyful, happy, outgoing person you were before you married ______” I had forgotten how happy I was when I wasn’t in relationship with yet another poor choice. For me, it was like stopping cold turkey. I made a decision that I wasn’t going to do that anymore. And then I walked gracefully but decidedly into the woman I am today.
Because I’m worth it. And, life is too short. . .
Thank you, Shanna. You ALWAYS stimulate my mind and tug at my heartstrings.
What a timely post. When it comes to dating I have always settled for the bottom of the dating pool. I knew within a month that these men were not marriage material. After every relationship, I lost 10 lbs. I was happier alone than I was with the person. My life moved forward like a speeding train instead of like a steam locomotive when I was in the relationship.
I’ve always known this (yet kept repeating the cycle) but the “red flag” didn’t hit me in the head until I joined B-School. I was in another worthless relationship with someone that didn’t complement my life and its future. Finally walked away from it (in October) and I’m moving forward. I’ve decided to no longer settle. I am going to focus on my business, my faith, creating and maintaining relationships with like-minded people, and let the universe bring the right man to me.
You are amazing in so many ways. You are beautiful, talented, funny and can surely turn a phrase. I will personally intervene on you if you settle again. You deserve someone just as amazing as you.
I know so many women with early wounding who can relate to this article. I think I will post it on my website. I wholeheartedly agree that the way to find a loving partner is to start with a loving relationship with the self. Like attracts like. Heal the heart and you will be more available for intimacy with an equal partner.
I remember being in marriage counseling and saying that all I wanted was to be in a healthy relationship and the therapist said that he used to think that way too until he realized they all hung out with each other…
Shanna, your advice is affirming and amazing, and I’m ecstatic that you marked your heart back up to “full price!” I spent time (too much time) in the discount relationship department, too, and “discount thinking” affected every area of my life, every decision. No more clearance racks for this girl. Thank you!
Oh my… this one resonates with me so deeply. Definitely don’t engage in long-term relationships that are merely ‘good enough’, but have found myself saying, “Well, he’s really good *on paper*” and finding out weeks or months later that my intuition was totally right and the guy was totally wrong for me! No judgment about anyone I’ve dated- just pure and total confidence that none of them has been my soul mate. Why do I know this for sure? ‘Cause I haven’t ended up with any of them. ;-) This post encourages me to keep my standards high!
Shanna, you continue to inspire! Sending you an ear-to-ear grin!
ouch! i am right there with you sister. i am learning everyday how to love myself, not an easy process, but one i enjoy. i am have accepted that i am indeed a work in progress. both my father and mother vomited their heartache on me and saturated me with a vilil stench. at times it makes my own stomach ache. of course, i know they were doing their best, and i am learning more and more about the art of forgiving. as i unwrap the present, of living in the now, i find most days are magical, and i do think i am falling in love with myself over and over again, sure i have my days, but it’s wonderful to find that self worth, grab it and treasure it. thank you for this profound post, your words always drench me with robust clarity. thank you. xo
This is beautiful Shanna. Really moving and tender and courageous. Loving ourselves is such a journey and it often involves saying no thank you, I want brighter, bigger, more beautiful because I am. Lovely to connect!
Hello beautiful people!
Thank you for taking the time to read my essay–this post has touched a lot of people (I’m still getting comments online and off). Such a critical thing it is to learn to love and value ourselves and not settle for less than the same in a partner.
Of course it’s not easy work to do, staying in that place of grounded love of self, but it’s the best work we can do. After all, the alternative, a life of dysfunctional unhealthy relationships, is not really living, now is it?
♥ Shanna
This is so painfully true. This is what happened when I stepped out on my own. I never thought I was capable or worthy of more. That was always the problem. Only when I valued myself and the relationship with my own heart could I return to working on the marriage I had already given up on.