00:00 

Hi there, this is Intentional Living with Tanya Hale and this is episode number 127, "Our Worth and Our Works." Welcome to your place for finding greater happiness through intentional growth, because we don't just fall into the life of our dreams...we choose to create it. This is Tanya Hale and I'm your host for Intentional Living. 

00:22 

Well, hello there and welcome to the podcast today. So glad to have you with me. This is Tanya, surprise, and I just want to talk to you. This is coming out, I think, the week after Thanksgiving. I've had some people ask me lately if this is a good time to get into coaching and let me tell you what, if you get stressed out over the holidays, if you have a lot of family drama, if you just struggle during the holidays with depression or whatever, this is a great time to get into coaching. Is the new year a great time? Yes, the new year is a great time, but this is also a great time. The investment at this stage in your life, at this time of the year, to help you manage your thoughts around some pretty tough circumstances can be so important in your life. Just wanted to offer that up that if you are thinking about life coaching, this is a great time to get into it, especially I think a lot of people have really struggled with this year. It's amazing how many things I see on social media where people are like, "oh if 2020 were a charcuterie plate" or whatever, right? So I've just seen some funny things, but also some things that just show how much people are struggling with this year and thinking that once it turns to 2021, everything's going to be better. 

01:53 

Well, let me tell you, just changing the circumstance, turning that page of the calendar, is not going to make things better. It's like we talked about last week: love it before you leave it, right? Love 2020 before we go. Get to a place where you can love 2020, where you can appreciate the things that you have learned and the blessings that you have experienced this year. And the more you can do that, the better 2021 is going to be. Otherwise, 2021 is just going to be an extension of 2020. Things don't change overnight, and it's us that has to change. We have to be able to see this for what it is and appreciate the growth and increase our ability to be resilient. That's really what it comes down to, and that is what I am trained to help you do. So yeah, give me a call. Get on my website tanyahale.com. You can schedule a free consult. You can also find a link to my calendar on my Facebook page, which is Tanya Hale LDS Life Coaching. You can find me there. 

02:59 

Okay, let's jump in. Today we are talking about our worth and our works. This is such a great topic, and I'm super excited to chat with you about it. I've noticed that in my journals, I always seem to keep circling back to self-worth, and here's why I think that is. Every client that I work with, and myself, the things that we are working through always come back to self worth at some level. And I'm starting to believe that our self-worth growth never ends, because it seems to me that even when I'm in a good place where I embrace my worth, and I really understand and accept my worth, the next time it comes up for me, I understand something at a deeper level that I didn't understand before. I feel like I'm in a good place with my self-worth. I feel like I totally get it. I embrace it, I'm grateful for it, and yet I seem to keep coming back around and learning something more and something more, and I love that. 

03:55 

When we think about where God is with his perfect understanding and acceptance of his self -worth, then we can start to get an inkling of how far we have to go before we really get a good handle on our own self -worth, and I'm believing more and more that so much joy and freedom and contentment is to be found when we step deeper and deeper into our own self - worth. 

04:20 

This understanding of who God created us to be, our value in his eyes, and what it is possible for us to create in this life, I believe, is the key to truly embracing the gospel as a whole, the atonement of Jesus Christ and our own divine potential. 

04:39 

So this time around, coming back to self -worth, one morning while I was doing scriptures, my mind again just kind of went to self -worth, and sometimes it just does that, right? Like we'll be reading scriptures and an idea pops into our head. 

04:54 

So I asked again in my personal revelation journal the question. about what else do I need to understand about self -worth I asked for more insight and the next morning I woke up earlier than my alarm and I remembered this question and I began to ponder it and I love these times in the morning when this happens because my brain isn't yet filled up with the things I have to get done and that I don't want to forget for the day it's also rested and clear and I feel much more open to listening and hearing the buzz of the day hasn't started yet and I was reminded again of how easy it is for me to connect my self -worth with my works and I know I'm not alone in doing this I think most of us have a tendency to think that the more we do the more educated we become the more callings we hold the more service we render and the more compassion we feel then the more our worth increases and we tend to think that the opposite is true as well The less I accomplish in a day, if I choose not to get an education, if I don't hold a calling, if I don't do as much service, or if I get annoyed and frustrated easily, then the more my worth decreases. We have a tendency to think that our worth is on a sliding scale, that it's always up for negotiation, that at any minute we could lose everything we've worked for. So we need to dig a little bit deeper into this. 

06:20 

The first thing I want to discuss today is the difference between "worth" and "worthy." "Worth" refers to our inherent value, value that exists regardless of what anyone, including us, thinks about it. A three-carat diamond is worth the same amount, whether it is placed in a ring or in a necklace setting, whether it's shoved in the back of a drawer or displayed at the jewelers, right? Whether it's cleaned and polished weekly or whether it hasn't been cleaned in several years. The worth of that diamond does not change. 

06:56 

"Worthy," as we often use it in a more religious context, is a word very different in that context that we use it. In this religious context, we often use "worthy" to mean that we are clean enough or free from sin enough or trying hard enough, right? But where our worthiness in this context can change depending on what actions we have been engaging in, our worth never does change regardless of the actions that we engage in. Our worth is always great. It is never on a sliding scale. It is never up for negotiation. And some of us really struggle with this concept. As much as we learn as children that we are children of God, that we are daughters of a Heavenly Father who loves us. This concept of worth never diminishing of things we do or don't do, not having an impact on our worth at all, can be hard for us to accept. 

08:01 

So let's start at the beginning, like with a newborn baby. This little person comes into the world and is cherished from the first moment she or he is placed in their mother's arms. In fact, this child is cherished even before they're born. We have this amazing love for a little baby that has done absolutely nothing to deserve our love. If our worth really was negotiable, when would you say that this baby earned her worth? When she starts to coo or smile? Maybe when she says "mama" for the first time or she says her first sentence. What about when she starts to feed herself or when she gets potty trained? Just when would she earn her worth? When do you think we would start to diminish this child's worth? The first time they keep us up most of the night? How about their first really big blowout, right? Does their worth diminish when they write with permanent marker over the walls? What about when they throw up all over your brand new car? What about the first time they knowingly talk back to you? Does their worth diminish when they lie to you about something important? Or what about the first time they try drugs? Or when they tell you their girlfriend is pregnant? Or when they decide to marry someone you don't approve of? Surely one of these things diminishes a person's worth. Right? Not even. When does a person's worth really change? When does it go from being great, even when they do nothing as a baby, to being negotiable? Does it ever? That, my friends, is the question that so many of us are constantly going back to. 

09:48 

But here's the thing. Our worth never changes, but somewhere along the way, we begin to decide that our works impact our worth. We decide that what we do or what we don't do creates more worth or takes away our worth. So here's a distinction I want us all to start stepping into: our worth as a person is completely separate from our works as a person. If we take any two people in the world, any two, I don't care who they are, and put them up against each other, their worth would be exactly the same. No life is more valuable than another life. The prince is not worth more than the pauper. Now the choices we make in life do make a difference for sure, but they don't make a difference in our worth. What they do is make a difference in the experiences we choose to have. If I choose to get a master's degree, that doesn't make me a person of more worth than someone who gets a GED. What it does is make me a person with a different experience. If I choose to put myself on a path to make a million dollars a year that does not make me more valuable than someone who makes $35,000 a year. What it does is give me a different experience. 

11:12 

I was chatting with my missionary about this just yesterday. Her decision to go on a mission does not make her any better or of more worth than another person who decides not to go. What it does is give her a different experience than someone who doesn't go. Our worth is always the same. Our experiences are different. So if our worth never changes, why in the world would I want to go through all of the pain and effort of setting and accomplishing goals? Why would I want to do anything tough like losing weight or working out or getting a master's degree? Good question. It's because we want to have a different experience than the one we are currently having. When I choose to start working out and eating more healthy, I don't do it because it will make me a person with greater worth. It won't make me better than anyone else. I do it because I want to have the experience of living my life in a healthier body. So right now, I'm working on increasing the number of push-ups that I can do in one go, okay? So I want to be able to do 50 full-on toe push-ups by Christmas. So that's requiring that I'm doing push-ups every morning when I work out. And I've also started doing them a few times during the day between my middle school classes. We're online right now, so I can. I don't have anybody in my room, so I can pop out some push-ups. But why am I doing this? Not because I'm in competition with anyone. The other women I work out with have very different goals than I do right now. I'm doing it because I want the experience of pushing myself to do something hard and feeling as though my body is strong. By the way, today I did 30 push-ups up from 25 yesterday. So exciting, right? I was super excited when I did my 30. 

13:11 

Alright, so here's another one. For me right now, I'm single. I'm very happy with what's going on in my life. And I'm very content where I am. I don't look at the possibility of getting married someday as something that will make me happier, or make me more content, or more whole, or more complete. It will not make my worth any greater. Just as getting divorced didn't make my worth any less. What getting married would do is give me an opportunity to have a different experience. I want to learn how to have an emotionally connected relationship, to learn to truly truly love another person without an agenda. I want to learn how to communicate openly and have tough discussions that increase love and intimacy, rather than create contention. I want to experience all this, not because it will impact my worth, because it won't. But just because I want to have this experience, I want to experience life in a healthy relationship. My worth is not tied up in a marriage relationship, it never has been. Even when things were really tough in my previous marriage, and it never will be, even when I find a partner to share my life with. 

14:26 

I really believe that Satan would have us think that we have to prove our worth through our works. He wants us to think that we have to prove we are better than someone else, that this comparison to others we tend to do validates our worth. When we tie our worth to anything, we are holding ourselves down. Only by completely separating out our worth from everything else going on in our lives will we truly be able to start stepping into our worths, really stepping into our God-given greatness. We didn't come to earth to prove our worth, but to have experiences that will help us discover our worth. Experiences don't prove our worth, they just give us opportunities to learn and grow and discover our worth. 

15:19 

Okay, I'm going to say that one more time because this is probably the most important thing that I'll say this whole podcast. Experiences don't prove our worth, they just give us opportunities to learn and grow and discover our worth. Our worth that already exists. Our worth that is never negotiable. Our worth, that is constant regardless of the experiences we choose to have. And whatever experiences we have, they are always an opportunity to dig deeper into discovering our worth. It's not something to create or build or destroy. Our worth is something to be discovered, unearthed, to become aware of. 

16:04 

Alright, so how do we start to discover our worth? If it is there, buried under layers upon layers of beliefs that we say we don't have worth, how do we dig it out? I know this will surprise you, but the answer lies in our thoughts. I was reading in The Book of Mormon yesterday morning and came across this scripture. This is when Christ is visiting the people in the Americas after his resurrection and he is teaching, in essence, the Sermon on the Mount to these people. It is the scripture that says, "but I say unto you that whosoever looketh upon a woman to lust after her hath committed adultery already in his heart. Behold, I give unto you a commandment that ye suffer none of these things to enter into your heart." I started thinking about how our heart is often spoken of in scriptures as the center of our feelings, or even our desires, and how all of our desires are created by our thoughts. I've heard it said so often that when we entertain thoughts long enough, eventually they become our desires and then our actions. 

17:14 

Sounds just like the thought model, right? We have often been instructed by our church leaders that when an impure thought, an inappropriate thought, enters into our minds, that we don't entertain it. But we set it aside, we replace it with something virtuous, lovely, or of good report, as Paul teaches, right? We have been taught to manage our thoughts so that we keep our desires and our actions where we want them to be. Okay? And then I thought that it's fascinating that this concept is so often taught in relation to keeping away from sin, but we're not often taught the other side of this coin. If certain thoughts will pollute our minds and our desires and impact our behaviors negatively, then the opposite of that is true as well, right? I can have thoughts that will create greater desires, that will impact my behaviors positively, and our self-worth is one of those places. When I choose to start contemplating my worth, choosing over and over to think that my worth is great... so on one side we're taught, "get rid of the thoughts that don't serve you," and now bring in the thoughts that do serve you, right? So if I start to do that, if I start to think that my worth was given to me by God consistently, eventually those thoughts repeated over and over will become beliefs. And these thoughts and beliefs will create feelings of sacredness, of great worth, of reverence for this amazing person, me, that God created. My heart will be changed to be more in alignment with God when I think thoughts that are more in alignment with God, right? And God knows my worth to be great because He created me. Why would He create anything less than amazing? 

19:09 

And so then, when my feelings are one of all reverence and gratitude for my great worth, then my behaviors will naturally follow suit. I will strive to act in ways that are befitting someone of such great worth, and it all starts with my thoughts. If you struggle to believe in your great worth, it starts with thoughts. Thoughts repeated over and over and over until they become beliefs, okay? So that's how we get to a place where we think that we are not of worth. Same thing, we think that thought over and over until it becomes a deeply held belief. We reverse that by doing the same thing. Thinking thoughts over and over and over of how great our worth is until it becomes a deeply held belief. 

20:02 

So if you're really struggling with the thought of thinking that you are of great worth then you will want to start doing what we call ladder thoughts. So sometimes if your current thought is "I am worthless" then going straight to "my worth is amazingly great" can feel like a stretch and your brain is going to go, "yeah, girl, I don't believe that." And your brain is going to kind of resist that thought because it is so opposite of what you already believe. So a ladder thought is one that is a step closer to your desired thought, but one that you can still reach and hold onto. So, for example, if you think "I am worthless," a next ladder thought could be "God created me and He knew what He was doing.: Can you believe that thought? If so, then learn to repeat that thought consistently, especially when you find yourself thinking "I'm worthless." When you think "I'm worthless", automatically go, "well, actually God created me and He knew what He was doing, He didn't create worthless things." Maybe that's the best you can do right now, and that's great. It's a step up from "I am worthless." 

21:18 

So you're going to think that thought until it becomes comfortable, and the thought "I am worthless" starts to fade into the background. Then you're going to find the next ladder thought, something like "God created me, so I must have great worth." And then the same process of repeating and remembering until this new thought becomes a belief and feels strong in your mind. This process of using ladder thoughts slowly moves your brain into a new belief, a belief that you can believe to be true, but that you don't really believe is true. You may not believe it's true right now, but we're working one step at a time to get there. So let your brain work with what it already knows to be true, stretch it into something it can believe, but isn't totally comfortable or natural yet, and then a ladder rung at a time you move toward your desired belief of "my worth is amazingly great," or "I am of great worth," or whatever feels good to you. If you struggle with this a lot, right now none of that's going to feel good to you. It's all going to feel awkward and uncomfortable. So that's why we use the ladder thoughts. 

22:31 

But please remember, please remember, your worth is already a reality. You are already of great worth. It doesn't need to be created, it just needs to be discovered. Your works and your worth are two very different things that don't even play in the same playground. I know that you can discover your worth. I know that God can help you see what you've never seen before, to understand what you've never understood before, to become what you've never become before. Discovering our worth, I believe, is the work of our lives. This is what we were born to do. I believe we were born to recognize our worth as God created us. 

23:20 

If you want some help with creating thought ladders, with seeing your mind around this issue, with learning to embrace the truth that you are of great worth, I can help you with this, and I would love to help you with this. I would love to help you move into a space where you can learn to discover and accept and embrace your worth. Can you just imagine what you could do with your life if you fully embraced your worth? You could do exactly what God created you to do and that would be as amazing as your worth already is. I love growing up. I love, love middle age so much. If you want some personal help from me you can go to my web page, tanyahale.com. You can schedule a free consult with me. You can go to my Facebook page Tanya Hale LDS Life Coaching and do the same thing. Either place you can do that. 

24:20 

And last of all, if you feel this podcast is adding value to your life, please subscribe so you never miss an episode. Please leave me a review. That makes it more accessible to other people who are looking for podcasts. And please share this with people that you feel would benefit from this same content. I feel like I have so much to share and I'm so grateful that I get to share this with you. I may never talk to you. I may never know that you listen to this, and guess what? I still am so grateful you're here. So grateful to be able to be of service in this way and to make an impact in the world, a positive impact in the way that I am. So I guess that's it for me today. Hope you all have a really fabulous day and I will talk to you next week. Bye. 

25:16 

Thank you so much for joining me today. If you would love to receive some weekend motivation be sure to sign up for my free "weekend win" Friday email: a short and quick message to help you have a better weekend and position yourself for a more productive week. Go to tanyahale.com to sign up and learn more about life coaching and how it can help you get to your best self ever. See ya!