August 26th, 2023
“Hot like wasabi when I bust rhymes
Big like LaAnn Rimes
Because I’m all about value”
– Ancient 1990’s proverb
In recovery, I live by the mantra “Progress, not perfection”; as I study karate, I’ve learned that its true goal is “the perfection of character.”
These are not mutually exclusive principles.
I’m dealing with a mild-to-spicy self-esteem crisis (in this economy, aren’t we all?) and I know that its root is my idea of my own value.
We tell ourselves (and those we love) that it doesn’t matter what other people think; that true self-esteem comes from within.
I don’t think it’s that simple.
Look, I’ve spent a lot of time not liking me. Neither of us are really interested in the reasons why. But over the past five years, I’ve actually learned to accept, enjoy, and sometimes love the actual monster that I am.
But it has done little for my self-esteem.
And it’s because I live in this thing called the world.
I can adore myself and still need outside affirmation, because I am always in my own head, and my own head is biased. We need each other to tell us who we are; not to ourselves, but who we are to them.
For a person living in the world, it’s our only real sense of value.
I can feel like I’m valuable, but if nobody tells me I am, if I don’t get paid or compensated like I am, if my relationships don’t validate those feelings, if I’m not treated like an essential piece of the community puzzle I prize, then how can I know that I am?
Value is dictated by the market. The market is everybody else.
Nobody is perfect, and our values vary.
I live by making progress, and knowing that it will never lead to perfection, because I was born with a fatal flaw: I have the disease of being human.
But progress needs a target, and if that target is perfection, then progress never really ends. And if that’s true, then it means we are invaluable, priceless even; there is no limit to how we can increase our worth.
Worth that is ultimately determined by everybody but ourselves.
It’s why I often reach out and tell people who I barely speak to that I think what they’re doing is incredibly dope. I regularly tell people they’re doing an amazing job, and even though I sound like I’m being a smart ass, I mean it. I give high fives and throw elbow bumps and activate awkward hugs where needed.
I try to remember that my words matter, and when I am in the moment, I can use them to remind people that they matter.
People should know their value. People close to you, those arm’s-length away, and complete strangers.
We determine value. We let people know what they are.
And more often than not, it doesn’t cost us anything.
The Den 