Being Enough

In all the interviews I watched with Michell Obama, after her book Becoming came out, every interviewer asked, with a bit of disbelief, “You have felt you were not enough?”  And each time Michelle answered yes.

Why is it so hard to believe that she has experienced the feeling she wasn’t enough?  Because we feel people who look like her and have it all together don’t feel that way.  But appearances are deceiving, and Michelle had the courage to speak the truth and even though she looks like she never would have felt she was not enough, she has.

Having worked with thousands of people over the last 30 years, I can say that there is not one person I have spent time with who didn’t have the feeling of not being enough.  In fact, it is one of the core beliefs that we all took on when we were young, and we spend our lives trying to make ourselves enough…when all the while we are! Just look inside of the lives of super models and you will see that even though the public adores them, they still carry the belief that they are not enough. Their nose is a little bit too long or they gained one pound or other models walk better than they do! So, it is not just you who gets caught and is run by this belief of not enoughness!

What would it be like to hold the intention this year to remember you are enough exactly as you are?  Your mind may come up with a whole list of why you are not enough.  But I am here to tell you that is not the truth.  Those are just beliefs you took on about yourself when you were very young.  The truth is you are enough. In fact, you are more than enough.  You are one of a kind!

Can you feel the difference between the old belief that says you are not okay as you are?  It tightens you into struggle.  Now, just for this moment, soften your belly, allowing a long slow out-breath and feel the truth that you are enough.  Maybe you can only experience this for just a moment before your struggling mind takes over again.  But be willing to come back over and over again to a long slow out-breath and simply say, “I am enough exactly as I am!”