Is sacrifice really needed?

I used to believe things were worthy only if there was sacrifice behind them, if they were "hard to get".

I created a story around effort, relating sacrifice and value: if no sacrifice, no value.. That would include my own value as a person and as a professional. So, for me, waking up at 5.30am, taking 2 buses to get to work, another 2 buses later to go to university and another one to finally make it back home at 11pm, was normal.

Truth is, this belief was serving me. It was confirming my reality and was hiding what was really going on: I was not able to set boundaries into any aspect of my life: not at work, not at home, not with friends… I needed to feel exhausted, overloaded and overwhelmed with things in order to label myself as worthy. Behind my "effort" story was my need of pleasing others.

I got great results for myslef though: fast and steady growth in my career, a marriage, great group of friends and social life. Always pushing myself into better results at work, making myself available for whoever needed me and volunteering to do whatever needed.

But I reached the point in which I could not handle it anymore. I over did it and broke myself into pieces.

It was only after that I managed to understand none of the things I was doing were really necessary. I pushed myself into a crisis by creating that story about what worthiness required. But it was not a true story. There were no facts. They were only believes I was holding to as if they were true.

Our belief system is composed by the ideas and generalizations we make about the world. Are the judgements and evaluations we have accepted based on our reference experience and our family, parents, significant other, colleagues, culture, education system… every single thing we get influenced by!

We give meaning to everything that happens based on our belief system and we build our lives around them. It becomes our reality. We get results according to those believes.

And they remain true until we can shed light to them, challenge and re define them.

Which belief do you need to change to get the results you want?

Write a comment or DM me if you would like to have a conversation around this.