What You’re Worth
by Alan Cohen • Haiku, HI

I am a disaster relief fund raiser for the Red Cross," a woman explained at a seminar. "When a hurricane or flood hits, I swing into action and have no problem raising millions of dollars in a short time for people in need. When it comes to my own life, however, I have trouble paying my bills each month. What’s wrong with this picture?"

An insight came to me. I told her, "When you find the same worth in yourself that you do in the victims of the disaster, the universe will provide for you as well as you provide for them."

Everything that comes to you (or doesn’t) is a reflection of what you believe you are worth. Every dollar that comes in or goes out. Every healthy, good-feeling moment, and every pain. And every relationship, however ecstatic, demeaning, or boring. Those who mistreat you but remind you how you mistreat yourself. Those who love and support you affirm your self-honoring. So rather than seeking to get rid of people who are unkind to you or import those who will adore you, recognize your deep deservingness to have the things you want and be with people you love. Then you will be amazed at how the universe rearranges itself to reflect your upgraded sense of deservingness.

I was counseling a fellow who had been in a long painful relationship with a woman who consistently found fault with him and laid the fault for her unhappiness at his doorstep. "She is not doing it to you," I suggested to him. "She is doing it for you."

"How’s that?"

"You hired your girlfriend to magnify every self-loathing thought you have had about yourself and feed it back to you in such an intense and obvious way that you will have to come to terms with it."

Healer Dr. Carla Gordan once told a similar client, "If anyone talked to you the way you talk to yourself, they would have kicked them out of your life a long time ago." Many of us put up with an inner critic that we would never tolerate in the outside world. When I once accidentally dropped and broke a glass in my kitchen, I heard myself say aloud, "You clumsy jerk." Hearing those words come out of my mouth, I was stunned. I would never say them to another person. So why would I say them to myself? Do I deserve less kindness and respect than I would offer to someone I loved?

Just as I could tell what I believed by what I was saying, you can tell what you believe by what you are getting. If you experience a recurring pattern in your finances or relationships, for example, you can get to the root of your issue by asking yourself, "What would someone have to believe for this to keep happening?" If you can be honest about your answer, you will get a wealth of insight that might otherwise take many years to unveil.

For example, if you keep meeting unavailable men, you must believe that "all the good ones are taken or gay." Mean-while sitting in the next booth at a restaurant is a woman on a happy date with an available man. How did she find one, but not you? Belief and self-worth.

You can also use successes and blessings as a barometer of your sense of deservingness. If you have good friends and family who love you and bring you great joy, you can be sure that you feel loveable and recognize that you live in a universe that supports you. In that case you can compliment yourself on creating a situation that reflects a powerful healthy thought.

Each of us is stretching to the next level of manifesting our self-worth. Only you can know what that is, and only you can take steps to live it. At another seminar a woman reported that she was a government worker who awarded stipends to low-wage earners. Like the Red Cross fundraiser, she, too, felt restricted financially and did not have the funds to do all the things she wanted.

"What would you love to do if you had the money?" I asked her.

A smile grew as she answered, "I would treat myself to a self-pampering weekend at the Canyon Ranch Spa."

I went to whiteboard and wrote an equation: Home improvement/low-wage earners = Canyon Ranch weekend/you. Just as the low-wage earners had to stretch their sense of deservingness to receive outside support, this woman needed to stretch her deservingness to give herself a self-nurturing weekend. We are all working from the level we find ourselves at the moment. While the external issues are manifested differently, the internal dynamics are the same: Do you know who you are and what you deserve, and are you willing to claim and accept it?

Alan Cohen is the author of many books, including the best-selling The Dragon Doesn’t Live Here Anymore and Mr. Everit’s Secret: What I Learned from the World’s Richest Man. Alan will soon be offering a six-month personal mentorship program. For information or to receive Alan’s daily inspirational quote and monthly newsletter, email info@alancohen.com, phone 1-800-568-3079, visit www.alancohen.com, or write PO Box 835, Haiku, HI 96708.