When You Don’t Feel Like You’re Good Enough, Remember This

When You Don’t Feel Like You’re Good Enough, Remember This ©iStock/SanneBerg

Not everyone in the world is going to recognize your worth, and not every opportunity is going to work out. While it’s not usually your fault, every rejection brings with it a sense of inadequacy, and it feels crappy. You might think you aren’t good enough, but here’s some reminders to prove why you are:

  1. We’ve all felt incompetent at some point. Every one of us has compared ourselves to other people, and we’re always worse off for it. Just because someone else is better at something than you doesn’t mean you aren’t good at it too.
  2. You’re doing your best, and that’s all you can do. You can’t do better than your best, so don’t get discouraged if your best isn’t as good as you want it to be. All that matters is that you’re trying. It’s okay if you aren’t always succeeding, as long as you’re making an effort to improve.
  3. Every person who loves you thinks you’re good enough. Literally the only person who is down on you is yourself. Everyone else can see how hard you try, and they think it’s more than enough. Trust me.
  4. You’ve come such a long way from where you used to be. If you look back on where you were a month ago, it might not seem like you’ve come very far. But take a look at where you were a year ago, or even a few years ago — you’ve accomplished a lot more than you realize.
  5. You’re exactly where you’re meant to be. Yeah, it sounds cliche, but it’s the truth. There are certain stops you have to make along your journey in life, and this is just another one before you take off for the next adventure. You’ll get where you’re trying to go, so just enjoy the rest stops when they come along.
  6. Everything will fall into place on its own time. Things happen the way they’re supposed to happen when they’re supposed to happen. You may not be as far along as you thought you’d be by now. So what? Plenty of successful people didn’t find their success until much later in life. Life has a funny way of working itself out.
  7. Small steps forward will snowball into bigger progress. Maybe you feel like a failure because your boyfriend dumped you for a girl who already had an established career path. Big deal. You don’t need someone who isn’t willing to stick by you through the rough times, and moving on from that relationship will bring you closer to the right guy and probably motivate you to work harder. Progress — no matter how small it may seem — is still progress.
  8. You can do anything if you want it badly enough. That dream job you think is unattainable? Don’t let the difficulty of obtaining it keep you from trying anyway. With enough drive and determination, anything is possible.
  9. You’re stronger than you think. Nobody thinks they’re as strong as they truly are because they focus on their weaknesses. Focus on your strengths, including your ability to adapt and overcome your weaknesses.
  10. You’re still trying, and that counts for a lot. This is seriously the most important thing. If you don’t try, you’ll always fail. By trying you’re at least giving yourself the chance to prove that you are capable of succeeding.
  11. Nobody deserves your love more than you. It’s great to love others and care for them, but it doesn’t do a whole lot of good if you aren’t able to practice self-love too.
  12. Anyone who believes you aren’t good enough, isn’t good enough for you. Point blank and simple. If someone has to audacity to tell you that you suck, that person is a crappy human, and you don’t need crappy humans in your life because you deserve better than that.
  13. You succeed every single day just by living. Start paying attention to the small successes – the things you did do – rather than only seeing the things you didn’t finish. Got out of bed? Did the dishes? Cooked a meal? It takes effort just to survive, so if you’re still alive then you are at least succeeding at that.
  14. You’ve overcome so many obstacles in life already. Think about all of the things that could have stopped you, but didn’t. And you moved forward – progress!
  15. “It is never too late to be what you might have been.” George Eliot knew what she was talking about. You have the power to be whatever version of yourself you wish you were. You can be the version of you who believes she isn’t good enough for anyone or anything, or you can be the upgraded version of you who knows she is a badass capable of anything. So ask yourself, who do you want to be?
Kristan is a 24-year-old blogger from the cornfields of Terre Haute, Indiana. She spends her days working in accounting, and her nights trying to change the world with her words. You can find her on Instagram and Twitter @kristangible, or read her blog at kristangible.com.
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