Does this sound familiar to you? You reluctantly get up to face the day only to look in the mirror and wonder, “Why am I not good enough?” You feel like you can’t do anything right, which drastically affects your daily life. The truth is that you are good enough, but changing this state of mind, no matter what has happened in the past, involves diving into the underlying psychological reasons behind this all-too-common feeling.
The burden of who surrounds you
If you visit a psychologist and ask yourself, “Why am I not good enough?” the first question they will ask you is what kind of people have you spent your life with? In many cases, it begins with childhood . Children just want to be accepted and loved, but in a dysfunctional family, the child spends all their time trying to fix things for them to be loved, which may never happen.
This leads to deep-seated issues that cause you to never feel good enough, no matter how hard you try or how successful you are. But it is important to know that this does not only come from childhood.
Toxic relationships, negative friends, and overly critical bosses and co-workers can all damage your self-esteem and self-worth. You may not even know it’s happening until it’s too late.
Depending on the severity of the problem, professional therapy may be the best solution. However, surrounding yourself with more positive and understanding people can help. Additionally, support groups can also help change this negative cycle of unhelpful feelings.
The culture of comparison
“I wish I could be like them.” “Her life seems so perfect.” “How are they doing so much better than me?”
Do any of those questions sound familiar to you? Sometimes not feeling good enough comes from the comparison culture. While comparing yourself to others is nothing new, social media and the Internet in general have made this a negative habit for many people. In fact, excessive use of social networks has been linked to depression, although there are many factors involved.
The problem is that you usually don’t see the whole picture. You may idealize what others have instead of seeing your own struggles. This leads to an inferiority complex or disorder. If your doubts stem from comparisons, take a break from social media and start focusing specifically on yourself versus what other people are doing. After all, it doesn’t matter what others are doing. It only matters what you are doing in your own life.
A quest for perfection
How could striving for perfection make you not feel good enough? The answer is that no one is perfect, so you will never really achieve perfection . This leads to a vicious cycle of self-defeating thoughts. Something as simple as falling asleep one morning could lead to days of blaming yourself for not being good enough and demanding that you do better.
Although perfectionists often appear confident, they are also diagnosed with high rates of physical and mental ailments, including fatigue and depression. Fear of failure or being seen as a fraud kills your self-esteem and confidence.
Breaking the cycle of perfection is not easy. Therapy, forgiving yourself, seeing the good in mistakes, and reducing your number of responsibilities can help.
The overwhelming inner critic
While your inner critic can be helpful in motivating you, it can also bring you down. When you ask “Why am I not good enough?” it is a thought and not necessarily a feeling, although the thought leads to negative feelings.
This means that if you can take control of your inner critic and make it a little more positive, you can change the way you think about yourself. Your inner critic is a real thing . It can start from childhood or come from much more recent negative experiences that make you doubt yourself a lot.
Humans naturally listen to negative thoughts. about positive thoughts as a kind of survival instinct. That is why these thoughts are so difficult to combat. Your mind tells you “no” to help you save yourself whenever you feel a little anxious or insecure instead of pressuring you to try.
Countering this problem requires actively paying attention to what your inner critic is saying and replacing it with more positive words and phrases. You can even have a list of mindfulness quotes to help you focus on the positive. Practicing mindfulness helps you move away from living in the past and helps you let go of negative thoughts. It can even increase productivity .
A failure that ruined your course
Failure hits everyone differently. When you have worked very hard, a major failure can ruin the course you were following. For a while, you may not feel well enough. However, it is important to accept that failure is inevitable. That doesn’t mean you’re not good enough or that it’s all over.
Take a step back and be proud of everything you have achieved. Then learn from failure. Change your strategy or goals and move on. Failure happens, even to the most seemingly perfect people.
No matter what happens, remind yourself every day that you are good enough. Write a list of good things about yourself and big and small accomplishments to show that you are good enough to do anything you want to do.
