Here in the UK, we tend to be a bit self-effacing. There’s a tendency to amplify our inadequacies and downplay our brilliance.
Maybe it’s the same the world over?
Top Shelf
It’s easy to place other people’s abilities on the top shelf. They are the luxury brands that have something magically unattainable by mere mortals such as ourselves.
Aspirational window shopping is rife. We’re the Oliver Twist kid longingly gazing through the bakery window, salivating at the glamorous lives of others, the smell of success wafting from the doorway filling our nostrils with the conflicting scent of inadequacy.
A harsh analogy, but not uncommon.
The Reduced Aisle
And when you consider your own personality and gifts?
Too often consigned to the “Reduced” aisle. The plain-packaged budget brand with little to bring to the table. Some may even consider themselves past their sell-by or best-before date.
We overestimate the value of others and underestimate the contributions we might bring.
The curse of comparison.
Most of us are like the rest of us
Here’s the thing.
Most of us feel this way.
Most people struggle with their self-worth.
Most people consider others who they follow to be discriminatorily endowed with brilliance, like these remarkable mortals were front of line when God was distributing awesomeness.
Truth?
Truth is, they just stepped into the bakery and learned by experimentation to make half-decent bread.
Instead of standing gazing through the pane, they put on their overalls and started to knead their ideas into something others could consume.
It took time, but with perseverance they found their voice.
Everything feels small and insignificant when you’re just starting out.
The silent droves of people NOT queuing up to read our book, watch your video, or listen to your podcast is deafeningly loud.
So we retreat and take these social signals (or lack of them), as confirmation that our contribution is worthless, or at least close to it.
We budget our brilliance and stop turning up.
Don’t do that!
We get one shot to live loud. One shot at this game. Be in it to win it.
You’re not competing, you’re contributing something that no one else can bring.
This is a long Scripture for a short thought, but worth a moment’s meditation:
“For the body is not one member, but many. If the foot shall say, Because I am not the hand, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body?
And if the ear shall say, Because I am not the eye, I am not of the body; is it therefore not of the body? If the whole body were an eye, where were the hearing? If the whole were hearing, where were the smelling?
But now hath God set the members every one of them in the body, as it hath pleased him. And if they were all one member, where were the body? But now are they many members, yet but one body.
And the eye cannot say unto the hand, I have no need of thee: nor again the head to the feet, I have no need of you. Nay, much more those members of the body, which seem to be more feeble, are necessary…” (1 Corinthians 12:14–24 KJV)
Sure, I feel feeble sometimes. But according to God, I’m necessary.
Your voice and contribution is needed.
Don’t budget your brilliance.
Don’t consign your contribution to the bargain bin.
You have value. Your worth is inestimable.
And you’ll find your voice by using it, in whatever way fits with that magnificent personality of yours.
