Unshakeable Self-Worth
Do you Deepak? I was recently gifted the Chopra App from my brother and sister, and now I Deepak nearly daily. The other day, Deepak told me about what an amazing world it would be if we all had unshakeable self-worth.
I totally agree.
My self-worth is certainly a lot more stable than it was a few years ago, though I don’t think I’ve quite reached the unshakeable stage yet.
Towards the end of 2019, I was experiencing my lowest self-worth in years – steadily over time, I’d come to accept the stereo type of an accompanist to be heard (NOT TOO LOUDLY, mind you) and not seen. And I’d embraced it not only as part of my job description, but also who I defined myself as a careerist, musician and freelancer in general. Being a citizen of the world, I thrive in freelance settings, but as a result of so much moving around, I didn’t have the prestige attached to my name that many of my peers did, and I understood this to mean that I was lesser – had less value. Had less worth.
Cue the pandemic. While the rest of the world was scrambling to make sense of this new topsy-turvy landscape we found ourselves in, I pivoted. Again. Like I always do, every time we move. Don’t get me wrong: the loss of my performances was devastating. But I already had my strategies for what to do when I found myself in a new culture, a new environment:
1. learn the language
2. expect to experience frustration and know it will pass
3. find a new direction in order to make money
4. build my community of support.
In fact, I was pretty fortunate that the hard work I put in at the beginning of this particular pivot left me reaping the benefits of more income and more music than ever before.
I have this annoying habit: I start a lot of books, but I don’t hold myself to finishing them. I’m not talking about reading the last page to decide if I’m invested in the book or not. I like to leap about through the chapters like a squirrel digging up fresh sod until a few words catch my attention. And then I’m off to the next book. When we go on holiday, my favourite thing to do is go to the beach and hold a book open on my lap, and stare out wistfully into the sea, imagining all the things the book might be about. Quite a few years ago now, there was this book title that had me really intrigued. It was:
Fire your Boss and Give Yourself a Promotion!
Though I never read the book, I thought about it a lot, and actually made a monumental, life-impacting decision based on its title. Thing is, just a few minutes ago, I found out it wasn’t an actual book, it was just an idea my husband had arbitrarily tossed about saying: if I ever write a self-help book, I’ll call it this! Somehow I’d forgotten this important part of the title!
This is the story of how the best book I never read allowed me to reclaim my self-worth.
I had just won a new job and had a meeting with the Dean of Piano. I was very happy with the terms of the position, and was looking forward to what the year would bring. On my way out, I asked the receptionist if I could please have a copy of a certain publication that the dean had suggested would be a good resource for me. The receptionist, simply stating a fact said,
oh, that publication is not for replacement teachers.
My instant reaction was to bow my head and apologize, before I even remembered that I was no longer a replacement teacher. She meant no harm by what she said, and was off getting me a copy before I could even explain about my new position starting in the fall.
On my way out of the building, less than a minute later, I fired my boss – and being a freelancer, my boss was actually, well… me!
It seemed to be the only recourse – I was so stunned that my reaction had been to apologize, and say, you’re right I shouldn’t have asked, rather than to claim my worth, and to feel proud of my new accomplishment. I was frankly appalled to realize that I was trying to make myself invisible yet again, just as I’d done for ages, whenever I’d worked in ANY institution. I was the stereotypical apologetic Canadian: sorry I don’t know the rules, sorry that you have to pay me money, sorry that me being here means someone else isn’t. Sorry for using this piano, this room, this space.
I decided I didn’t like the title of freelancer anymore because I didn’t like the job description that I had created for that role. So, I fired myself and hired someone with a new title: the Guest Artist. I created a new job description for my new employee: guest artists come with a wealth of knowledge that they’ve accumulated through their life experiences, and people are genuinely excited to hear from them and learn from them when they arrive. The guest artist is not expected to stay long. People feel lucky to have the guest artist for as long as they’ll stick around. And the guest artist also feels fortunate to share what they’ve learned with whichever institution or organization into which they’re welcomed.
I had finally realized I had a crippling limiting belief: that if I told my employer that I moved around a lot, they wouldn’t hire me. Even though this had NEVER been proven to be the case. If they hired me, it meant they had seen my CV and if they saw my CV, well, they would know I’d moved around a lot.
I realized that what I’d been trying to hide all those years was one of my great skills – my experience working in renowned institutions all around the globe and this experience was an asset to whatever organization I was working at.
This mentality shift has changed my life: by firing who I thought people wanted me to be, I was able claim my worth and offer what I - and only I – was uniquely qualified to share. This was liberation!
For the past few years, I’ve been working one-on-one with clients, coaching them in what I’ve dubbed “relocation coaching”: sometimes they are looking for a change in careers, sometimes a new trajectory in their current line of work, sometimes they’re actually physically moving to a new city. In all cases, they are looking for a little guidance to find their inner compass. One of my clients recently had a break through that mirrored my own: in her case, she’d been hiding that she is a professional opera singer (and she can SING!!) from her corporate colleagues because she was worried that if they found out, they’d think she wasn’t committed to that job. And just as rigorously, she kept her corporate job secret from the singing world, because she was worried that people would think she didn’t take music seriously, or have a love for music - that she was not an artist in her soul. But an amazing thing happened when she claimed her self-worth – she was able to create a new job for herself in a large family-run business (where she was not a family member), and name her price, once she allowed herself and her employer to see how her music-making skills had made her uniquely qualified - the only person - for the job. She found her self-worth. It was an honour to hold space for her in this journey.
If your self-worth is feeling a little shaky these days, know that you’re certainly not alone. And you are enough.
Imagine if we all lived with unshakeable self-worth. Imagine what we could accomplish. What potential we could reach. What possibilities would become available to us and to those around us. What an amazing space that would be!
If you want to know more about how I support my clients through my program The Musician’s Compass, you can
