Self-Confidence vs Self-Worth: The Life-Changing Difference Between Them & How to Build Both Today!
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I am so excited for today's episode. It's you and me together. If you have ever felt like you're not enough and no matter how many people you please or no matter what you achieve or what goals you accomplish, you still feel like something's missing, like you're not enough, we are going to turn that around today. So get ready for this episode of The Jamie Kern-Lima Show.

Before we jump into this episode, I'd love to invite you to join this community to hear more interviews and one-on-one conversations with me and you to help you truly believe in yourself and trust yourself and know you are enough so that you can become unstoppable in living your best life. All I want you to do is click on the follow or subscribe button in the app that you're listening or watching this episode on.

I love your support. And oh my gosh, it is incredible to see your comments and how many people are just sharing these episodes. And I'm so grateful to be here with you. And I'm excited to go on this journey with you. So thank you for following and subscribing to The Jamie Kern Lima Show. It means so much to me. Jamie Kern Lima is her name. Everybody needs Jamie Kern Lima in their life. Jamie Kern Lima.

Jamie, you're so inspiring. Jamie Kern Lima. Hi, it's Jamie Kern Lima. And on today's episode of the Jamie Kern Lima Show, if you have ever felt like you are not enough, today I am so excited to share with you what's been a true revelation in my life and what I've found to be one of the greatest keys to finally feeling fulfilled and enough.

And if right now you sometimes or always struggle with feeling enough, you're far from alone. See, right now, 80% of women don't believe they're enough. 75% of female executives deal with imposter syndrome. 91% of girls and women don't love their bodies. And 73% of men feel inadequate and not enough.

And when we believe we're not enough as who we innately are, it's a lie.

a lie that can impact how we show up in every area of our lives, from our jobs to our most important relationships to our goals and hopes and dreams. Today, I am so excited to share with you an exclusive chapter from my book, Worthy, just for you. It's called The One Thing That Changes Everything. It's about the difference between self-confidence and self-worth.

and how they both work in your life to finally help you overcome self-doubt and truly believe that you are fully enough and fully worthy, even if it's for the first time ever or for the first time in a long time. So get cozy and lean in because I just feel in my heart that these words might be exactly for you today.

Worthy, chapter one, the one thing that transforms everything. She said, I'm just not giving up. The woman I'll be a few years from now is counting on me. And the world shifted. Nakia Homer. Have you ever been longing for that thing to happen? The thing you're sure would finally make you happy and fulfilled?

Whether it was landing a certain job or reaching some level of achievement, getting married, having kids, hitting that goal weight. Have you thought, when I finally get that promotion, when I finally make a certain salary, when I finally get the dream house, when I finally get the external recognition I'm craving so deeply, when I finally feel celebrated by others—

When I finally hit that milestone, then I'll be enough. Then I'll finally feel fulfilled and happy and worthy. Have you ever had an experience where you actually got that thing you'd been longing for? It probably felt amazing, right? Did you experience joy and elation? Did that thing finally happen, happen?

Did that thing finally happening solve all of your feelings of emptiness and leave you with lasting fulfillment forever? Or did you experience a temporary high followed by a slow descent back to unfulfillment? Be honest and really think about it. Did it feel incredible for one year, a month or two, a few weeks, or maybe even a few days or hours? Then what?

Or maybe you're still waiting on that thing to finally happen so you can then surely, finally feel happy and fulfilled. Most of my life, I believed that if I could just accomplish that thing, then I would finally feel enough. I thought that if I became successful enough, based on the world's definition of what success looks like, then I would eventually have these feelings of worthiness and love.

that I wasn't capable of just feeling them on my own, that I needed to earn them and achieve them. This belief drove me to spending most of my life hiding in plain sight, feeling unworthy. I imagined that one day I would achieve enough, get physically fit enough, eat healthy enough, pray enough, do the right thing enough.

be attractive enough, become funny enough, please everyone else enough, be celebrated enough, be selfless enough, and resolve all of my perceived flaws, and then I would be worthy. Then my feelings of self-doubt would be resolved. I also used to think I was all alone in feeling this way.

After decades of life experience and the blessing of growing a company that served millions of people across the U.S. and eventually the world, I finally understand that I'm not alone in these feelings. The sense that you're not enough and therefore you're undeserving of love is as close to universal as a feeling and a fear can be.

Through meeting so many of my greatest heroes in real life, many of whom have accomplished more than I could imagine, I learned they still have these exact same fears and they work daily to overcome them. It was then that I had a huge epiphany waiting on X, Y, or Z to happen and then expecting to feel happy, fulfilled, and worthy is never going to happen.

Nothing actually changes, even when things change all around you, unless things also change within you. That is why embarking on the journey of truly learning to believe you're worthy will impact every other part of your life in a way that accomplishments, relationship status, job titles, gold medals, cosmetic surgery, material possessions, or the number on the bathroom scale never can.

So what does make us feel truly fulfilled? Well, that is what this chapter is all about.

And just FYI, we're going to get tactical here, and I'm going to share some foundational tools that will help set up many of the lessons in the book to come. So get ready. Class is about to be in session. But, you know, here's the thing. We didn't come here to just look cute, right? Your time is precious, so let's roll up our sleeves together and dive in as these concepts are core to the wild journey of unlocking worthiness that we are going to take together.

self-worth and self-confidence. Your self-worth is the foundation for your fulfillment. And without it, you'll never feel truly fulfilled. But before we go any further, I want to clarify the difference between self-worth and self-confidence. They're two very different things, but we so easily confuse them.

And many of us spend our entire lives focused on only things that build our self-confidence, not realizing they do nothing to build our self-worth, which is a huge reason that when we finally do get that thing and then the next thing, we're still left feeling unfulfilled.

Self-worth is the internal, deep-rooted belief that you are worthy of love and belonging just as you are. On the other hand, self-confidence, while also an internal trait, is generally linked to your assessment of how you compare to the outside world. It's the feeling of assuredness, certainty, and competence in one or more specific areas of your life.

Self-confidence is how you evaluate yourself based on your qualities, skills, and traits. It's also how strongly you believe in your ability to meet life's challenges, your willingness to try and go for it, and to succeed. Self-confidence is linked to external things that can fluctuate often. So your self-confidence can also fluctuate often.

It can rise and fall based on mood, comparisons, circumstances, performance, and approval from others. Self-worth is believing you are enough and lovable and valuable innately and exactly as you are, regardless of how you evaluate your traits and independent of what's happening around you.

There are also several other commonly used terms that are easily confused with self-worth and self-confidence, including self-esteem and self-love. But to avoid confusion and for maximum clarity, in this book, we're going to focus solely on the terms self-worth and self-confidence.

While both self-confidence and self-worth are important to your overall well-being, to maintaining healthy and fulfilling relationships, to building physical and mental health, and to enjoying greater success in the areas that matter to you most, it is so common to confuse the two, which is why so many of us struggle with feeling unworthy or as if we're not enough as we are, and we hope to fix our lack of self-worth, which

which is deep, internal, not dependent on the external, with things that actually only help our self-confidence, which fluctuates depending on the external. And no matter how much we achieve, how many personal or career goals we accomplish, how large our following on social media is,

how great our outfit looks, or how svelte a figure our most recent fitness or weight loss goal leaves us, we're still left with the same feelings of not enoughness deep down inside. When we achieve everything we set out to accomplish, we help boost self-confidence, which is super important and wonderful, but we haven't done the work to help bolster self-worth, which is different.

Self-confidence is what you show on the outside. Self-worth is what you feel on the inside. Self-confidence is based on mastery. Self-worth is based on identity. Self-confidence is what you can do. Self-worth is who you are. Self-confidence is believing that you're skilled enough. Self-worth is believing you are enough.

Self-confidence fluctuates based on your environment. Self-worth is stable through every environment. Self-confidence is fragile. Self-worth is foundational. Self-confidence is the belief in your abilities as a person. Self-worth is the belief in your value as a person. Self-confidence is, I'm striving to earn love.

Self-worth is knowing I am love. Self-confidence gives you drive. Self-worth gives you peace. Self-confidence is optional. Self-worth is essential. Self-confidence eventually surrenders. Self-worth ultimately prevails. Self-worth is your foundation. Self-confidence is the house you build on top of it.

Your house will only ever be as secure as the foundation it's built upon. The common misconception is that building self-confidence will give you feelings of innate love, enoughness, and value, and it simply doesn't. Only self-worth does that. Both self-confidence and self-worth play a very important role in your journey to ultimate fulfillment in life.

And while it's important to continuously build and strengthen both, it's also so important to understand and differentiate between the two. So often people focus on self-confidence alone and don't understand or aren't aware of how critical a role that self-worth plays.

With strong self-worth, when you go after your pursuits and build self-confidence and achieve and grow and contribute to the world and to others, you can do it all on the foundation that you're worthy, whole, lovable, and enough. When it comes to the meaningful pursuits in your life,

Only a foundation of strong self-worth can ensure that these three important things. First, that you don't stay stuck because you feel unworthy or not enough to go after them. Second, that you don't sabotage your success along the way. And third, that when you do achieve the things you want in life, you're able to actually enjoy them and feel fulfilled in the journey.

Your self-worth is independent of what's happening on the outside. It's independent of your strengths and weaknesses. It's independent of your successes and failures. Your self-confidence fluctuates easily based on circumstances that are often external. Self-confidence can shatter when we face a painful failure, a setback or rejection, or

When we have self-confidence without strong underlying self-worth, we're less likely to take risks. We don't want the pain associated with losing our self-confidence and feeling like we have nothing left. Strong self-confidence without strong self-worth often keeps us stuck, afraid to take chances, afraid of rejection, and afraid of potential failure.

Almost everything around us in life, every product, every consumer message, every goal we're told to strive for, all simply build self-confidence alone, which can be fragile and volatile. But when we have strong self-worth, it gives us a resilient core that is much more difficult to diminish.

What might seem counterintuitive at first is that when you have strong self-worth and believe you are enough exactly as you are, you don't become complacent and lose ambition. It's actually the opposite. The stronger your self-worth is, the less complacent you are because you're no longer affected by most of the reasons causing you to stay stuck.

There's a famous saying in boxing that a boxer gets 30% better after they win the title because their self-confidence boosts and identity boosts simply from winning that title. I would venture to bet the opposite is true, that after a loss, the toll on the boxer's confidence would diminish performance. But either way, their performance fluctuates along with their confidence in response to external circumstances.

The beauty about strong self-worth is that it doesn't fluctuate easily in response to external wins or losses. With strong self-worth as your foundation, you become unwaveringly resilient. And that is how you become unstoppable in your journey of becoming all that you are born to be. Self-confidence without self-worth.

Whether you're in a highly celebrated or public role or you're a behind-the-scenes kind of person, even if you have all of the self-confidence in the world, you're equally likely to hide in plain sight or not show up to others as your true authentic self when you're lacking deep self-worth, even when it's undetectable to anyone else. When you walk into a room and even talk to everyone in that room,

But know that no one truly sees the real you. That's you showing up in a way disassociated from the real you. I like to call this showing up as your representative rather than your full self. That representative might even change based on what room you walk into, whether it's the boardroom, the classroom, or your own living room and bedroom.

Every time you show up inauthentically or as your representative or as the person you think will make other people happy, you are telling yourself you are unworthy as your true self. This leaves us feeling unseen and disconnected, even if we're the ones deciding not to be seen for who we truly are.

And this is much more likely to happen when at our core, we don't believe we're enough and worthy of love innately. Self-confidence without self-worth looks like abundant approval on the outside and lack of fulfillment on the inside. Self-confidence without self-worth looks like success on the outside, but feels like failure on the inside.

It's why you can win the Ironman or walk on the moon or win the Olympic gold medal only to return home and shortly after feel incredibly unfulfilled. It's why you can finally achieve that fitness or health goal or get the huge promotion at work and still wonder why you don't feel the love or lasting fulfillment you hoped you would.

When you improve self-confidence, you're bolstering your opinion of your own traits and abilities. When you improve self-worth, you bolster the deep belief within you of your own value as a person. Learning this distinction makes it easy to understand how all of the solutions most people advise us to do and that we've gone for haven't ever worked the way we hoped.

They're usually solutions derived from external sources, which are important to help us grow in our confidence, but don't actually help us grow in our own core belief about our worthiness. There's so much more coming up in this episode. You are not going to want to miss it. But first, I wanted to share this with you.

In life, you don't soar to the level of your hopes and dreams. You stay stuck at the level of your self-worth. When you build your self-worth, you change your entire life. And that's exactly why I wrote my new book, Worthy, How to Believe You Are Enough and Transform Your Life for You. If you have some self-doubt to destroy and a destiny to fulfill, Worthy is for you.

In Worthy, you'll learn proven tools and simple steps that bring life-changing results, like how to get unstuck from the things holding you back, build unshakable self-love, unlearn the lies that lead to self-doubt, and embrace the truths that wake up worthiness.

Overcome limiting beliefs and imposter syndrome. Achieve your hopes and dreams by believing you are worthy of them and so much more. Are you ready to unleash your greatness and step into the person you were born to be? Imagine a life with zero self-doubt and unshakable self-worth.

Get your copy of Worthy, plus some amazing thank you bonus gifts for you at worthybook.com or the link in the show notes below. Imagine what you'd do if you fully believed in you. It's time to find out with Worthy.

Imagine, what would you do if you fully believed in you? My weekly free inspirational newsletter is packed with tips and tools to help you find out. It's called One-on-One with Jamie, and it's delivered right to your inbox each Tuesday morning. It's a love letter from me to you.

From my soul to yours. And I hope it brings you the words and messages you need at just the right moment.

Plus, when you're a part of my free inspirational newsletter community, you'll be the first to get behind-the-scenes content, inspirational messages, and be the first to learn about upcoming events and more. It's the place to be, and I sure hope you'll join me there. So if you're not on the list yet, you can sign up for free at jamiekernlima.com or click the link in the show notes below. And here's to becoming unstoppable together.

And now more of this conversation together. Achievement doesn't lead to fulfillment. All the things we strive for in any area of our life all come down to one simple thing. We hope they'll make us feel enough and loved. Don't believe me? Sound too simple? Let's break it down. After their most basic needs are met and they're financially secure—

Why is it most people still want even more money? To buy things? Well, why do they want those things? To feel important? To gain external admiration? Or for the positive emotions they expect to experience when they have them? Why do they want that? Because underneath all of it, they want to feel enough and loved. And they believe that acquiring these things will give them these feelings.

Often people get married when they don't want to, make decisions to avoid feeling like they'll be abandoned, have kids when they're not ready, and take jobs they dislike all to get their families or society's approval to fulfill the same hope and need to feel enough and loved.

So many of us spend the majority of our lives on the unhealthy diet trend of the moment and spend countless hours and money to try and look a certain way. Others take harmful drugs to enhance their muscles or trade the maximum amount of their time on this earth for the maximum amount of money, prestigious cars, and job titles they can acquire.

all with the underlying belief that the closer we get to an aesthetic ideal, the more we'll be loved and enough. And these beliefs are often reinforced as truths by well-intentioned people around us and just about every advertisement we see.

None of these things we spend so much time striving for actually leads us to the true feeling of being enough, truly loved, or truly fulfilled. But these beliefs don't foster fulfillment because they aren't truths at all. They are all based on the same lie that you need to achieve to do more and be more in order to feel love.

It's so common to believe this lie, but it's a never-ending dead end when it comes to worthiness. Don't get me wrong. The journey of going after your hopes, ambitions, and dreams is beautiful. It's a beautiful path to building self-confidence. And it's a key part of living the highest, fullest expression of yourself.

It can make you feel confident, strong, and many other positive emotions and feelings, but never worthy. You need to achieve in order to be worthy of love is a lie that is often reinforced by well-intentioned friends and colleagues who only ask us what we're doing and what we're up to instead of how we're being or how we really are.

well-intentioned family members who only want to know how our career or job is going, if we're dating or married yet, and what we're doing next. When we deliver answers that demonstrate achievement in any of these areas, they're often met with an approving smile, congratulatory words, and recognition that can be confused with love. We receive similar messages in other areas of life—

You're a good parent if your kids get into a good school, get a good job, get married, and start a family. And if your kids do none of those things, even if they're wonderfully happy, the concern and pity that others show reinforces the message that you must have done something wrong as a parent and you should be worried about your children.

Similarly, social media projects the notion that everyone else is happy because in their posts, they seem to be doing so much, achieving so much, traveling so much, and having so much fun. And the more exciting their lives look, the more they're rewarded with likes and comments.

This cultural obsession with achievement can certainly stimulate the economy, but when generations are taught that hard work, career progression, recognition, and monetary achievement are the ultimate goal, it doesn't foster learning innate worthiness or true fulfillment.

For most of my life, I believed the lie that if I could achieve what our culture calls success, if I could look a certain way, if I could please everyone else and check all the boxes, then I'd be fulfilled. Then after spending decades of my life striving for it all, I got a whole lot of it all and nothing changed.

Because as I arrived at each new destination and crossed each celebratory finish line, I still took me with me. I learned firsthand that no amount of money or fame actually helps you feel enough or more loved. Nothing actually changed because the core of my own self-worth was always the same and almost always low.

My self-confidence increased. My bank account increased. The approval and praise I got from others increased. But none of those things impact self-worth, and none leads to true fulfillment. Let me repeat that. No matter what you accomplish or what finally happens in your life, you still take you with you. Meaning, if you are still standing there with the same circumstances inside—

There is nothing outside that can fill up the inside, at least not for long. We so often spend our whole lives delaying our happiness and worthiness under the false pretense that when we finally get this or that, then we will feel fulfilled.

It's fun to win and often so fun to celebrate a victory, but it doesn't change how enough you feel. So the real work is learning how to believe and feel enough and fulfilled right now, exactly as your circumstances are and exactly as you are, as the you that you take with you, the you that's innate.

The you that doesn't need any icing on the cake because it knows it's already sweet and filling enough. The journey of unlearning all the lies our conditioned belief system believes and learning how to hear our own knowing, trust ourselves, and believe that we are truly worthy exactly as we are is one of the greatest and most important journeys we'll ever take if we choose to in this lifetime.

If you're someone who perhaps is a lifelong student like I am, and you love personal growth and development, well, here's something that might be a huge aha moment for you. Perhaps you've read countless books, and perhaps you've even attended events where you've identified the limiting beliefs that have been holding you back in your life. For example, I'm not attractive enough. I'm not funny or interesting enough to attract a potential partner. I don't have enough money.

I don't have the right education. I'm too young or too old. I'll never become wealthy. I'm an imposter or my business won't ever succeed, etc. Then perhaps you practice the tools and methods to replace those limiting beliefs with empowering ones. Well, here is the thing.

Almost all the most common limiting beliefs are tied to self-confidence or external circumstances.

Building self-confidence and learning to believe the things you hope and dream are actually possible for you in your life is an important endeavor. But there is a big problem and a missed opportunity in how most people, life coaches, thought leaders, and even many of the most sought-after experts approach overcoming limiting beliefs and creating the life you desire.

They almost always focus solely on how overcoming limiting beliefs will only lead to better self-confidence. People are left with the impression that if they build their skill sets and grow in their confidence that that's enough, but they completely miss a critical step. If you only begin to confidently believe that those things are possible for you, you don't innately believe you are worthy of them,

You likely won't keep them even if you get them. Even more important, you'll never feel fulfilled in life if you don't also overcome limiting beliefs around self-worth.

Perhaps you have limiting beliefs or stories you believe to be true about yourself, such as, I don't come from the right family, or I'm not good-looking enough, or I'll never make a ton of money, or I'm a bad mom, or I've made too many bad decisions, or I'm scared to try and take a risk, or I break promises to myself and never stick to a workout routine, or I'm an imposter and not deserving of the CEO title.

If you do the work to overcome those limiting beliefs and replace them with new empowering beliefs, it'll boost your self-confidence and improve your life greatly, but it won't lead to fulfillment in this life. It's just one piece of the equation.

See, you can do all the work of overcoming limiting beliefs and building a confident identity around how smart you are, talented you are, hardworking you are, how you keep promises to yourself and others, how devout your spiritual practice is, how you live your values and treat others well, and how you put goodness out into the world.

And when you do all these things, they're so important for an improved, beautiful, strong self-confidence and external identity. But if your internal identity around self-worth doesn't feel valuable, enough and worthy of love exactly as you are with or without all those things, then you can achieve them all, but you'll still never feel fulfilled.

If you or someone you know or love or care about continues to achieve it all, accomplish it all, work on all the things that we know lead to a greater sense of self-confidence, but still feels unfulfilled and can't figure out why, this is why. Because you're growing in all the areas and beliefs about yourself and your own identity that boost self-confidence, but not in the ones that boost self-worth.

You can accomplish all your self-confidence-building pursuits successfully, build great assuredness and skill, and achieve goals that align with a high external identity. But you will still only reach a level of fulfillment and sustainability that reflects your own internal identity around worthiness. You can achieve all the things that make it look like you're a success, but you're

But if your internal identity and self-worth still tell you you're not enough or not worthy of love and belonging, then you will feel imposter syndrome when you reach a goal. You'll feel like it's never enough no matter how much you accomplish. You'll feel unworthy of love and not understand why you feel empty in a relationship.

You can live out and experience every great thing in the world and feel unfulfilled the entire time because your deep sense of self-worth has debilitating cracks in the foundation. The path to fulfillment. I love a great visual. And where you fall on the one I'm about to describe impacts all areas of your life,

This chart explores the relationship between self-worth and self-confidence on the path toward true fulfillment. So later in this book, I'm going to share a powerful tool around getting ultimate fulfillment in life. But first, it's important to note where you fall on this worthy self-worth and self-confidence chart right now in your life.

So I'm going to describe what this looks like if you're listening to this on the podcast. I just want you to imagine almost like a capital L, right? Just a chart with two axes, one going straight up and one going straight out, one going vertical, one going horizontal. And then there's a diagonal line straight up into the right, just like a very, very standard chart. This is the Worthy Self-Worth and Self-Confidence chart.

I want you to imagine on the bottom axis, the one running all the way across horizontally, you have self-confidence. And on that long horizontal axis, you can rate yourself low, starting in the bottom left corner, all the way to high on the far right side of that lower self-confidence axis, and

Then we have the vertical, straight up line, that straight up axis that goes from the bottom left corner straight up. That is self-worth from low to high.

If you'd love to see this chart, you can see it for free at worthybook.com slash resources. You can print it out and keep it with you as well. So in this chart on self-worth and self-confidence, I want you to consider how almost every effort, action, focus, and goal falls under the self-confidence category.

But on this chart, no matter how far to the right you succeed on self-confidence, which is that horizontal line, that horizontal scale, no matter how far right you get, no matter how high your self-confidence, you actually only progress up that diagonal path to fulfillment to the level you rise or soar on the self-worth vertical scale. Self-worth, self-confidence, and your identity.

Your identity is the story you tell yourself about yourself and the story that you believe. No matter our intentions, we always find ourselves returning to behaviors, actions, and decisions that reinforce our beliefs about who we are. This is why so many people do such deep work on overcoming limiting beliefs in their life because if they don't, those limiting beliefs will hold them back from believing their hopes and dreams are possible.

The more self-worth and self-confidence you have, the more fulfilled emotionally and physically well and happy you feel. Research shows that self-worth is one of the best predictors of personal happiness. One study from Berkeley Wellbeing Institute shows that worthiness is a better predictor of happiness than 19 other emotional processes, including strong personal relationships and gratitude.

So I want to explain four examples now of where people fall on this chart. This is really, really important for you in your life right now. Because again, I just kind of want you to get a visual of this L-shaped chart. And I want you to get a visual of the bottom horizontal line, which is your self-confidence.

If you're low, you start on the left side, right, in the bottom left corner. If you rate yourself really high, imagine you're going all the way far right on that horizontal line of self-confidence. But then straight up is self-worth. Imagine yourself low to high all the way.

From the bottom left corner and straight up diagonal, that is your path toward true fulfillment. All right? So I want you to imagine you might be really high on the self-confidence and put yourself all the way to the right because you've achieved stuff. You're working hard. You've hit your goals, et cetera. But if deep down inside you don't believe you're worthy of love and belonging and enough as who you innately are, then you're really low on that vertical self-worth line.

That means you're nowhere close to the diagonal path to true fulfillment. You cannot out-succeed your level of self-worth. Your self-worth becomes your ceiling to true fulfillment. That is why both are so important. So I want to talk about four examples and where they fall on this chart. And in particular, what happens if you either have self-confidence or self-worth without the other?

And perhaps as I explain each description, I want you to imagine where they visually fall on this chart. All right, let's take person A, okay? When you imagine this chart, they are very low on self-worth, but they're really high on self-confidence. So they're like the bottom far right side of the chart, right? Now, they're incredibly successful on the outside, likely a high achiever with career financial success.

But whatever they achieve, it never feels like it's enough. And they are perpetually unfulfilled. Perfectionists are often A's, very high on self-confidence. They're far right on the chart, but they don't rise very high. They stay really, really low because they don't have self-worth inside.

Now I want you to imagine the total opposite, person B. They have really high self-worth. So they're really, really high up there on the chart, but they're at the very beginning. They're very low on self-confidence. They likely feel a deep sense of peace and love, yet don't feel competent or confident in their own skills and abilities that indicate external measures of success.

they may or may not have any drive to achieve more, but are at peace either way, regardless of the outcome of their external pursuits, or even if they choose not to have external pursuits.

So they feel a lot of peace. They have a lot of self-worth. But because they're not also building self-confidence, they're not getting close to true fulfillment. Now I want you to imagine person C. They are in the bottom left corner with low self-worth and low self-confidence. They may be at the infancy of their journey of awareness around and commitment to building one or both.

Finally, there's person D. Imagine that person in the top right-hand corner of the chart. They're way at the tippy top of that diagonal path to true fulfillment. Person D has a strong inherent sense of self-worth and assesses themselves to be high in levels of skill and attributes.

This person has high ambition and drive, but because they also have strong self-worth, they're not trying to fill a void of not being enough or lovable or worthy through external accomplishments. They remain unshakable internally, even through highs, lows, risks, rewards, successes, and failures of their external ambitions. They feel a deep sense of self-worth as well as self-confidence.

So when you think about you and your life right now, where would you place yourself on this chart? Take a moment and think about where you truly feel you are right now and maybe mark it visually in your mind. Next, consider where some of your close friends and family members and colleagues might fall in this chart. Are they aware of the ways their current levels of self-confidence and self-worth impact all areas of their life?

If this is a huge aha for you, and if you know someone else right now who has been hustling and hustling, thinking if they could only accomplish those things in their self-confidence column, then they'd finally love themselves, then they'd finally be enough, please pause and share this with them. You can share this episode right now with them.

No girl, no woman, no person left behind in learning how to foster true self-worth. Because we're in a society that tells us if we could only be person A, that person that just keeps hustling and hustling and hustling and achieves everything, then we'd be happy. And that's just simply a lie.

See, I've been person A most of my adult life, thinking if I could just achieve enough, commit to my fitness routine enough, read enough books, contribute enough, fit into that one pair of jeans, please enough people, become the world's definition of success enough, then I would finally feel enough. And then that's when I would finally feel happy.

And it's all a lie because no amount of success on the self-confidence scale leads to true fulfillment without self-worth. When I received Oprah's cell number, a dream come true after 40 years of, you know, just visualizing and praying and hoping I'd meet her one day.

I got that cell number, and then I did not call her for over four years. Why? I was living as an A on this self-confidence, self-worth chart. I had a whole lot of self-confidence in my skills and abilities and talents. I had just been named on the Forbes list and was one of only a small number of women who had started an idea in her living room and built it into a company as large as IT Cosmetics had become. I was passionate about my personal and our company's philanthropic efforts and

I felt confident in my life's purpose of helping women truly believe they're enough. But still, deep down inside, I didn't yet feel like I was enough. And as I was sitting there with this 40-plus year dream happening, having lunch with Oprah, talking about all these vibrant topics, right, for four hours, this was a dream come true in my life, I had high self-confidence. But deep down inside, I didn't have strong self-worth.

I didn't believe I was worthy of being her friend. And I didn't believe I was worthy as who I was innately. And I didn't yet understand there's a massive difference between self-confidence and self-worth. So when she shared her phone number with me, I failed to seize the blessing. And I didn't call her for four years.

That is what low self-worth will do to us. It makes you feel undeserving and not valuable enough or lovable enough as we are. It convinces us to sabotage opportunities and possibilities because we actually deep down inside don't believe we're worthy of them.

As I've applied this revelation and concept to my own life, along with the lives of many others I've begun so passionately sharing it with, it has been eye-opening how widespread the misconception of confusing self-confidence with self-worth is, and just how detrimental it is in guiding so many people to an unfulfilling life.

Even people who have the privilege of access to therapy, coaching, and education. And even people who coach others on or teach personal fulfillment for a living. I was recently having lunch with a friend who has incredibly high self-confidence and by all external measures is successful financially, socially, and in his decades-long career.

In our conversation, he was reflecting on his past career success in the corporate world and sharing how painful a recent setback had been in his business. He had made a decision that had cost him both money and notoriety. Mid-conversation, he blurted out something that made my jaw hit the floor. "'I used to be somebody,' my friend declared."

"'WTF!' I exclaimed. "'Sorry, Grandma. "'What do you mean you used to be somebody? "'Everybody is somebody. "'You have got some major work to do around worthiness right now.' "'I was very direct with him. "'He instantly stopped short and just stared at me. "'And after a few moments of silence, "'his eyes began to tear up ever so slightly.'"

Even though he was someone who so many others turned to for advice, it was apparent that he still believed that external validation would lead to worthiness, a mistake that is so easy to make. Plus, he was now in a spot in his life where he had low self-worth and, for one of the first times in his adult life, low self-confidence at the same time.

He had been living his life as an A on the worthy chart, very self-confident with lots of external success, but because he never felt fulfilled, he had spent his entire life striving for even more success, hoping worthiness and fulfillment would eventually come. Now, given his recent external setbacks, he was living as a C on the charts and was low in both areas.

When he said the words, I used to be somebody, it broke my heart. And because of his beliefs around unworthiness, he was breaking his own. So many of the things we worry about, so many of the things we let hold us back, so many of the lies about our worth that we waste time believing to be true don't actually matter. Life is way too short to believe the lie that they do.

The more and more conversations I have where I listen to someone explaining how unworthy they feel and how they hide it from the world, the more I'm resolved to spend this one beautiful life believing I'm worthy and valuable exactly as I am. And I don't want to leave anyone else behind on their own journey of worthiness.

I want you to know that you are valuable and worthy of love right now, in this very moment, exactly as you are. You are somebody. Nothing on the outside, nothing you fearfully fail at or victoriously achieve, no past mistake you've made, nothing anyone else says or doesn't say about you can change that.

They can't give it to you and they can't take it away. It already is and is already true. And the somebody that is you is fully worthy. Self-worth and its impact on your most important relationships.

When you confuse self-confidence and self-worth, it can also affect the level of depth and connection you experience in your relationship with yourself, your friends, and your peers, and often in your intimate relationships as well. Self-worth related issues are often the kind of issues that couples keep from each other. Most people only share when they're facing issues that fall into the self-confidence category.

But when it comes to issues of self-worth, most of us either aren't aware of them or don't want to acknowledge, share, or discuss them with our partners or anyone else. We not only keep them to ourselves, but we also bury them deep inside. Though buried, they're still there and they impact all areas of our life. The first and most important person you have to be honest with about self-worth is yourself.

And let's talk about perception around the idea of self-worth and self-love for a moment. Sometimes we don't focus on learning to love ourselves because we worry it seems selfish or self-centered or even narcissistic. This couldn't be further from the truth. In fact, narcissism is not about self-love at all. It's actually the opposite and is one of the most shame-based of all personality disorders.

Narcissism actually comes from deep feelings of unworthiness and shame. It's driven by self-hatred. All the grandiosity, superiority, and entitlement that's often displayed with it that could be mistaken for self-love are actually attempts to compensate for low self-regard.

Cultivating true self-worth is one of the most generous pursuits, not only for your own fulfillment in life, but for your capacity to show love to others. Research shows that without self-love, we're more prone to addictions, self-sabotage, unhealthy relationship patterns with our body and with others, codependency, people-pleasing, and other self-destructive behaviors.

Our kids, too, often neglect their self-worth. With parents and others they trust, they'll usually share their struggles that fall into the self-confidence category around external circumstances or their own perceived abilities, external experiences, or competencies. But they often don't share their deep beliefs around whether they feel innately worthy of love and belonging.

If something or someone hurts their self-confidence, they'll tell us. But if something or someone hurts their deep sense of self-worth, they often won't. If you are a parent, this is one more reason to do the work of truly understanding and building self-worth in your own life so you can better equip your little ones to know how to nurture and continue to build theirs too.

Similarly, in marriage, if your partner's having some problems that are tied to external achievement-based, skill-based, or even confidence-based issues, they'll be more likely to share it with you than if they're struggling with a deep internal self-worth issue. In our society, it's much more acceptable, if not expected, that men will hide their self-worth issues.

then the pain of those issues transmits in endless, often hurtful ways to themselves and those around them, whether through disconnection, disassociation, or sabotage. What's most often the case is neither partner is aware of true underlying issues tied to self-worth.

and that two partners live inside a relationship with no idea why it feels so disconnected, lonely, or like the other person is hiding something, when in fact, they're both hiding from themselves and their own awareness. You can only experience the depth of love, intimacy, and connection with another person as the depth you love and intimately connect with yourself.

I've embraced my own self-worth in stages through the awareness and tools that I'm sharing with you in this book. That's how I eventually finally got up the courage to call Oprah. From there, I gradually believed I was worthy of teaching alongside her. And now we have a beautiful friendship. I recently invited her over for lunch at my house. We called it a worthy weekend.

I know that she loves these special English muffins, so I had them overnighted from a small bakery in Napa for her. And she knows I love cozy blankets, so she brought me her favorite blanket as a gift. Now, don't get me wrong. I'm still tempted to freak out right before she arrives.

I still feel butterflies in my stomach. I still immediately have to practice many of the tools in this book to remember and know that just like you and every one of us, I am fully worthy and enough exactly as I am, even at a worthy weekend lunch with Oprah. Soaring self-worth.

When you improve self-worth and your inherent belief that you are worthy as a human, exactly as you are, it gives you the knowing that you are innately valuable and enough, regardless of any achievement, compliment, award, or circumstance. Research shows building our worthiness can impact everything from our mood to the quality of our relationships to job satisfaction.

Remember, you can build your self-confidence like a house on top of the foundation. Strong self-worth, knowing you are enough exactly as you are, is that foundation holding your house up and allowing you to actually enjoy the pursuit of building it.

True self-worth can give you a stable, dependable, unwavering, unshakable sense of mental and emotional armor that, unlike self-confidence, isn't easily swayed by feelings, thoughts, behaviors, experiences, and the external forces life inevitably throws your way. Self-worth gives you a foundation of unwavering strength and resilience.

Even if the house comes crashing down in a storm of blows to your self-confidence in the form of setbacks, failures, rejections, and changes to external circumstances, self-worth helps you endure all of these. So let's get busy building it.

If you love chapter one of Worthy, I cannot wait for you to get your hands on the entire book. There are over 20 tools in it on how to build unshakable self-worth in your life right now. If you do pick up a copy of the book or audio book, make sure you go to worthybook.com to get some amazing free gifts as a thank you from me to you.

And I have one more thing to share with you, but before I do, if you got value out of this episode, my only ask is that you please click the follow button or the subscribe button right on the app that you're listening to this in or watching it, and then share this episode with everyone you believe in. Share it with another person in your life who could benefit from it.

Post it and share it with others online or in your community who just might need the words and tools and lessons in this episode today. You never know whose life you're meant to change today by sharing this episode. And thank you so much for joining me today. And before you go, I want to share some words with you that couldn't be more true.

You, right now, exactly as you are, are enough and fully worthy. You're worthy of your greatest hopes, your wildest dreams, and of all the unconditional love in the world. And it is an honor to welcome you to each and every episode of The Jamie Kern Lima Show. Here, I hope you'll come as you are, heal where you need, blossom what you choose, and

journey toward your calling and stay as long as you'd like because you belong here. You are worthy. You are loved. You are love. And I love you. And I cannot wait to join you on the next episode of the Jamie Kern Lima show. Do you struggle with negative self-talk?

Living with a constant mental narrative that you're not good enough is exhausting. I know because I spent most of my life in that habit.

The words you say to yourself about yourself are so powerful. And when you learn to take control over your self-talk, it's life-changing. And I wanted to give you a free resource that I created for you if this is something that could benefit your life. It's called Five Ways to Overcome Negative Self-Talk and Build Self-Love.

And it's a free how-to guide to overcome that negative self-talk to build confidence and develop unshakable self-love so that you can dream big and keep going in the pursuit of your goals. Don't let self-sabotaging thoughts hinder your progress any longer. It's time to rewrite the script of your life when filled with self-love, resilience, and unwavering belief.

If you're ready to take charge of your narrative, build unwavering confidence, and empower yourself to persevere on the path to your dreams, you can grab your free guide to stop overthinking and learn to trust yourself at jamiekernlima.com slash resources, or click the link in the show notes below. Who you spend time around is so important as energy is contagious, and so is self-belief.

And I'd love to hang out with you even more, especially if you could use an extra dose of inspiration, which is exactly why I've created my free weekly newsletter that's also a love letter to you delivered straight to your inbox from me.

If you haven't signed up to make sure that you get it each week, just go to jamiekernlima.com to make sure you're on the list and you'll get your one-on-one with Jamie weekly newsletter and get ready to believe in you.

If you're tired of hearing the bad news every single day and need some inspiration, some tips, tools, joy, and love hitting your inbox, I'm your girl. Subscribe at jamiekernlima.com or in the link in the show notes. I am so excited for this book. You know why? Because it's going to save so many people.

It's powerful. It's happening.

It's worth it. Imagine what would you do if you fully believed in you? I went from struggling waitress facing nonstop rejection to founder of IT Cosmetics, a billion dollar company, by learning how to overcome self-doubt and believe I'm worthy of my hopes and dreams.

And I'm sharing how you can too in my new book, Worthy, how to believe you are enough and transform your life. If you're ready to truly trust yourself and break through that barrier of self-doubt and know that where you come from or even where you are right now doesn't determine where you're going,

then worthy is for you. It's time to go from doubting you're enough to knowing you're enough. It's time to step into all of who you are and into the person you were born to be. And it's time to believe that you are worthy of it. Because in life, we don't become what we want. We become what we believe we're worthy of.

Join the Worthy movement today by grabbing your copy of Worthy anywhere books are sold and head to worthybook.com now for free gifts, including my five-part course on becoming unstoppable and my 95-page Worthy Workbook Action Plan that teaches you how to implement the tools from the book into your real life right now. Worthy is groundbreaking. Yo, Worthy, you are Worthy.

- This book is gonna change lives. - This book literally will teach you how to actually feel worthy so that you can have the strength, you can have the confidence. - The lessons in this book and the strategies will change your life. You will never be the same again after you read this book.

Jamie's Book Worthy is a must read. It is going to inspire you, empower you, give you the hope that you need and the kick in the rear end that you deserve. Jamie's Book Worthy is incredible. The gifts are going away, but they're all free right now on worthybook.com.

It's such an honor to share this podcast together with you. And please note, I'm not a licensed therapist and this podcast is not intended as a substitute for the advice of a physician, professional coach, psychotherapist, or other qualified professional.

If you love this episode about self-confidence and self-worth, I promise you are going to love this one right here. This life-changing episode is packed with tools that you can apply to your life right now to build happiness and fulfillment. Check it out.