I'm Not Worthless. I'm A Daughter Of A King.
Words sting.
When I was in high school, a classmate looked at me on day and told me I was ugly. At first I shrugged it off because I had never heard someone say such insulting things to me before. He made it his mission every day to drill it into my skull that I was ugly and nobody liked me on a daily basis.
I had the wrong friends during this time who never stood up for me and allowed that bully to tear apart the little self-confidence I had. Suddenly I became exactly what he wanted me to be.
I became ugly.
I stopped taking photos with my friends during our adventures out and started avoiding hanging out with people altogether. In the darkness of my brain I heard the bully's insults like a stuck record each morning as I got ready for school.
Ugly...Worthless...Nothing...Invisible.
After a while I gave up. I stopped talking and avoiding social situations completely existing only in the school library where I drowned myself in reading every book possible. If I was ugly in people's eyes, I needed to be smart. I needed to be impossible to beat at English so I could throw back insults when people tried to attack me.
It didn't help. Insults made it worse. I felt like my words truly caused a lot of damage and really did hurt a lot of people. I didn't like the person I had become and retreated further into my shell for the rest of high school.
Even after I left school, the words others had drilled into my brain seemed stuck with me. I was still that girl, afraid to be myself in fears of being stuck with an insulting label.
Through college I stuck to the label that had been placed upon me by the boy almost eight years before. Looking back I had become so comfortable being what he wanted me to be and failed to recognize my worth. My self-confidence was shot.
A few months after baptism, I suddenly had a breakthrough. I had lived in the shadows like a hermit and avoided doing things at church simply because I didn't know how people would accept my contribution. I still felt worthless. I still felt invisible and alone in my own feelings of inadequacy.
I remember reading a quote that always makes me laugh but has been one of the most powerful quotes that I have carried with me whenever I seem to get into a rut.
It says:
'If you ever have a bad thought about yourself, tell it to go to hell because that's exactly where it came from'- Brigham Young
So I did just that. I started eliminating bad thoughts from my brain little by little. I started being more present at church, contributing where ever I could. (I even taught Gospel Principles one day which was really weird and such a fail). I got out of my head and truly enjoyed being active at church.
I changed. I stopped thinking about the opinions of others and focused more on the spirit and praying for help to help me overcome my hangups and insecurities. I realized that if I busied myself during church hours that I wouldn't compare myself to members who had more years in the church than I did.
Then magic happened. I got a calling to be a librarian. As a book lover, it was my dream calling although I was slightly disappointed that I wasn't made Young Women President which went to my mom. I remember the former librarian telling me that this calling was hard but I never saw it as a challenge.
Immediately I set out on a mission to talk to people more and engage with my fellow "baby" converts in Gospel Principles class. I started making care packages for them of church books which I thought could help them progress and strengthen their testimony after baptism. The more I worked in the calling, the less unsettled I felt and the less unsettled I felt the more fulfilled I felt.
I wasn't worthless. I was here...serving my Heavenly Father the best way I knew how, trying to fill each person I met with the love of Christ as much as it seemed to overflow from within me. That's the furthest thing from worthless.
Hanging out with the missionaries as much as I have in the last two years I've come to realize that even these young adults who know so much about the gospel, who are light years ahead of me in their experiences in the church (I will never get over not being able to go to Girls Camp) and who have dedicated almost two years of their lives to serve full-time missions, still struggle with the same experiences I do.
Elder David S. Baxter Of The Seventy explains in the August 2007 edition of the Ensign in the article titled Overcoming Feelings of Inadequacy how unfortunate actions and unkind comments can diminish our feelings of self-worth.
It's normal to experience feelings of inadequacy. What really matters is that we choose whether to allow those feelings/ or things people have said to us to overwhelm us or shrug them off and change the narrative. We project the image people see of us in this world, we build our testimonies brick by brick and precept upon precept.
Nobody's perfect in this life. While we're striving towards perfection and bashing ourselves for our short comings, we're missing out on the greatest moments in our lives. We're missing out on crucial moments to endure through our hardships and strengthen our testimonies.
God doesn't make worthless people. He makes us all in his beloved and precious image.
If only we could get that through our head...
-The Sassy Mormon
When I was in high school, a classmate looked at me on day and told me I was ugly. At first I shrugged it off because I had never heard someone say such insulting things to me before. He made it his mission every day to drill it into my skull that I was ugly and nobody liked me on a daily basis.
I had the wrong friends during this time who never stood up for me and allowed that bully to tear apart the little self-confidence I had. Suddenly I became exactly what he wanted me to be.
I became ugly.
I stopped taking photos with my friends during our adventures out and started avoiding hanging out with people altogether. In the darkness of my brain I heard the bully's insults like a stuck record each morning as I got ready for school.
Ugly...Worthless...Nothing...Invisible.
After a while I gave up. I stopped talking and avoiding social situations completely existing only in the school library where I drowned myself in reading every book possible. If I was ugly in people's eyes, I needed to be smart. I needed to be impossible to beat at English so I could throw back insults when people tried to attack me.
It didn't help. Insults made it worse. I felt like my words truly caused a lot of damage and really did hurt a lot of people. I didn't like the person I had become and retreated further into my shell for the rest of high school.
Even after I left school, the words others had drilled into my brain seemed stuck with me. I was still that girl, afraid to be myself in fears of being stuck with an insulting label.
Through college I stuck to the label that had been placed upon me by the boy almost eight years before. Looking back I had become so comfortable being what he wanted me to be and failed to recognize my worth. My self-confidence was shot.
A few months after baptism, I suddenly had a breakthrough. I had lived in the shadows like a hermit and avoided doing things at church simply because I didn't know how people would accept my contribution. I still felt worthless. I still felt invisible and alone in my own feelings of inadequacy.
I remember reading a quote that always makes me laugh but has been one of the most powerful quotes that I have carried with me whenever I seem to get into a rut.
It says:
'If you ever have a bad thought about yourself, tell it to go to hell because that's exactly where it came from'- Brigham Young
So I did just that. I started eliminating bad thoughts from my brain little by little. I started being more present at church, contributing where ever I could. (I even taught Gospel Principles one day which was really weird and such a fail). I got out of my head and truly enjoyed being active at church.
I changed. I stopped thinking about the opinions of others and focused more on the spirit and praying for help to help me overcome my hangups and insecurities. I realized that if I busied myself during church hours that I wouldn't compare myself to members who had more years in the church than I did.
Then magic happened. I got a calling to be a librarian. As a book lover, it was my dream calling although I was slightly disappointed that I wasn't made Young Women President which went to my mom. I remember the former librarian telling me that this calling was hard but I never saw it as a challenge.
Immediately I set out on a mission to talk to people more and engage with my fellow "baby" converts in Gospel Principles class. I started making care packages for them of church books which I thought could help them progress and strengthen their testimony after baptism. The more I worked in the calling, the less unsettled I felt and the less unsettled I felt the more fulfilled I felt.
I wasn't worthless. I was here...serving my Heavenly Father the best way I knew how, trying to fill each person I met with the love of Christ as much as it seemed to overflow from within me. That's the furthest thing from worthless.
Hanging out with the missionaries as much as I have in the last two years I've come to realize that even these young adults who know so much about the gospel, who are light years ahead of me in their experiences in the church (I will never get over not being able to go to Girls Camp) and who have dedicated almost two years of their lives to serve full-time missions, still struggle with the same experiences I do.
Elder David S. Baxter Of The Seventy explains in the August 2007 edition of the Ensign in the article titled Overcoming Feelings of Inadequacy how unfortunate actions and unkind comments can diminish our feelings of self-worth.
It's normal to experience feelings of inadequacy. What really matters is that we choose whether to allow those feelings/ or things people have said to us to overwhelm us or shrug them off and change the narrative. We project the image people see of us in this world, we build our testimonies brick by brick and precept upon precept.
Nobody's perfect in this life. While we're striving towards perfection and bashing ourselves for our short comings, we're missing out on the greatest moments in our lives. We're missing out on crucial moments to endure through our hardships and strengthen our testimonies.
God doesn't make worthless people. He makes us all in his beloved and precious image.
If only we could get that through our head...
-The Sassy Mormon
This is such an important topic to discuss! It effects ALL of us!! I loved how you said it got better as you busied yourself helping others ❤️ the only oppinion that matters is God's. The only place we need to seek validation...is from our Heavenly Father!! Our thoughts can change everything...and lucky for us we can change our thoughts!🙏🏼🙏🏼❤️
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