I'm not good enough

"I'm not good enough" is probably something that everyone has said to themselves at some point in their lives.

Usually these comments to ourselves are very subtle and can feel like the truth.

"Well, I didn't get that promotion/client/job, I wasn't good enough".

" Well, I'm just too fat" - after trying on clothes that do not fit.

"Well, I guess I wasn't available enough" - when kids bring have bad grades in school.

The list can be very long. Saying such things to yourself is actually quite mean. Not only because they are not nice things to say, but also because they are not tangible. What does "not good enough" or "too fat" etc. even mean?

So, here's how I see this. If we think that we are "not good enough" at something, I recommend defining what "good enough" would look like.

I'll share a personal example with you, so you can picture what this can look like. When creating my LinkedIn newsletters, I usually create a graphic with it. Now, creating graphics is not a strength of mine, and more than once I have thought that I should do this through a professional. Which I do not want to do at this point. So I decided - rather than thinking that every single time - that I will define for me, what I expect from myself when it comes to this graphic. So here's my objective metrics: My graphic should be related to the topic I talk about and be on brand colours. THAT IS IT. Done. My graphic is good enough.

And this is what I'd like you to do every time when you feel that you are not good enough or something is not good enough. You owe it to yourself to put metrics behind what you want to achieve, which means that you can not only measure your progress and work towards your goal, but you can also determine whether something is good enough for now in the first place!

The same applies when you are trying to feel better, which a lot of people want to. So I'd like you to do the same thing. Define for yourself what feeling better means. Define for yourself what you want to feel or think or do to feel better. And then work towards that. Having a clearly defined goal and steps along the way will help you to not only see your achievement towards that goal, it will also help you to achieve milestones along the way and know exactly if you are are on track. And... if you fall off track, you can put a plan in place to hop back on track!

All of this means that you feel a lot more in control of what you are trying to do. And when you feel more in control, your anxiety will become more quiet and no longer take over your life.

Have a great evening, everyone!