I recently received a very short email that asked a very important question. Here it is:
Can you give me some advice on how to deal with people who proclaim that I’m worth nothing?
By way of background, the email came from a young woman whom we’ll call “Alma.”
Alma is a college student who first wrote to me back in January. A man who supervised her during her summer internship showed interest in her. Although the young woman initially did not respond, he pursued and pursued, until, thinking that he really loved her, Alma finally accepted him. Then, when she left the internship, the man dumped her.
Alma was traumatized and could not concentrate on her studies. But people around her thought that her devalue and discard was “nothing much.”
In her recent email, Alma didn’t provide any more information. But actually, that doesn’t matter in answering her question.
External and internal
There are two aspects to dealing with someone who invalidates you: the external aspect and the internal aspect.
The external aspect is what Alma asked about — how do you deal with the people who say such a cruel and vicious thing to you?
The short answer is to remove them from your life. There is no point having any kind of involvement with people who tear you down.
Under their control
Now, this may be difficult if you are somehow under their control. Alma is young, and she may be referring to her parents, university professors, or work superiors. So let’s look at each of these possibilities
Parents. Good parents love their children and do their best to nurture and support them. If you are trying your best in life (meaning you’re not a criminal or a parasite), and a parent calls you worthless, then the parent is either a lousy parent or impaired — perhaps alcoholic or struggling with his or her own problems.
If your parent is impaired, you may want to back off of interactions with him or her until the problem is resolved. If you must have contact, build your emotional armor so that the hurtful statements bounce off of you.
If the parent has always said terrible things to you, and has also harmed you in other ways, you are justified in breaking off the relationship completely. Yes, we are supposed to honor our mother and father — but only if they’re honorable.
University professors. University professors are supposed to teach students and prepare them for the future. But some professors have a mean streak. Or, they get caught up in academic politics.
The good news is that your time at the university will sooner or later be over. The bad news is that you may need a passing grade from the professor to graduate. If you can’t transfer to another class, you may need to ignore the hurtful words and work really hard to get a good grade.
Know that the day will come when you will be out of there.
Work superiors. A supervisor or boss has no business making that kind of statement to an employee. But some people in the workplace are sociopathic bullies.
If you’ve been reading Lovefraud for a while, you know that once they are adults, sociopaths don’t change. A mean boss will always be a mean boss. Therefore, the only reason to stay in that job is that you haven’t yet found another job. Get out as soon as you can.
Friends and lovers
If someone who is supposed to be a friend says that you’re worthless, well, that person is not a friend. Eliminate him or her from your life.
If it’s your boyfriend, girlfriend or spouse who is saying these things, you need to evaluate the relationship.
Real love means supporting and caring about your partner. If you are trying your best in the relationship and in life, and your partner is tearing you down, then your partner is at best callous, and at worst sociopathic.
Sociopaths typically start relationships by lavishing you with love and attention, and then slowly morph their behavior into criticism and control. The criticism may first be over minor things — like something you cooked — but later escalate until it becomes really hurtful and damaging.
If your partner shows the key symptoms of a sociopath, know that tearing you down may be his or her objective. No matter what you do, you will never satisfy this person. To save yourself, you must get out of the relationship.
Internal aspect
The true solution to the problem of being called worthless is internal.
Know that you are worthy. Know that simply due to the fact that you are a living human being, you deserve to feel love, pursue happiness, and live your life in peace.
If you have any doubts about your worthiness, then you have internal healing to do.
It may help to determine where the doubts came from. Were you ever abused in any way? Did you receive negative messages from your parents, teachers, church or society while growing up? Did small failures turn into big failures?
Maybe you experienced none of these things, but ideas of “less than” or “not good enough” still managed to take root in your brain. If that’s the case, I suggest you sit quietly, with a pen and paper, and ask yourself what you feel.
An answer will percolate up from your subconscious. When you get your answer, ask why? When the next answer comes, again ask why? Keep going until you get to the root of the issue. You may be surprised at the beliefs that are hidden within you.
Real healing
Figuring out how the doubts began is a first step in the right direction. Real healing comes from releasing your negative experiences and beliefs.
How do you do that? In my experience, you allow yourself to feel the emotional wounds associated with them. In private, with the help of a therapist, or with my Deep Emotional Release service, you bring the wound to your awareness so you can process it. If you experience a strong reaction, go ahead and then let yourself cry, wail, yell in anger, stomp your feet — whatever you feel moved to do. Or, you may experience an energetic heaviness, which, as you let it exist, eventually dissolves. Whatever strategy you use, you want to get the negative energy out of your system.
Then, replace the negative energy with positive energy. How? By doing anything that brings you joy and pleasure. Take a bubble bath. Walk your dog. Watch the sunset. Treat yourself to a chocolate chip cookie.
You may need to go through many rounds of releasing the negative and taking in the positive. But if you keep at it, eventually you will know the truth and truly believe it:
You are worthy, and anyone who says otherwise does not deserve to be in your life.
Very good post by Donna. I want to add a couple of points.
First, if the supervisor also expressed a personal interest, that person clearly crossed the line of professional conduct. This is an extremely important to understand – the person was taking advantage of their role, and is wrong for pursuing a personal relationship. I can guarantee that someone like this will do the same with another person. And then another person. And then another person. I would very strongly recommend that Alma report this back to her university, so other students are not subject to the same behavior. She may have to wait until she has her degree if she fears retaliation (which is also not allowed, but a very real possibility), but I would still recommend in the strongest possible terms that the university know what happened and not place anyone else there. It might be difficult, but have nothing to do with the deeds of darkness, but rather expose them.
Second, a very simple truth. Not only is Alma not “worth nothing”, to the contrary she is extremely valuable. Even with the simple description Donna shared, we can see that Alma has dreams, goals, ambition, and the desires to make those dreams a reality. One of the characteristics of people who accomplish great things is that they don’t give up. Everyone faces obstacles, but some people believe in their dreams so strongly they overcome the obstacles to make the dreams come true. It’s very easy to see that Alma is on this path. In the words of Einstein (and yes, he really said this), “Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds.”
Last, in one word, the people who say Alma is worth nothing are wrong. Completely, totally wrong. Get those people out of your life forever, and get people into your life who believe in you, support you, and care about you. I would recommend you take Donna’s line and commit it to memory: “You are worthy, and anyone who says otherwise does not deserve to be in your life.” Amen!
Thank you russconte – very good points and encouragement for Alma – and anyone else in this situation.
I only have energy to say excellent excellent post Donna.
I will reread it tomorrow.
Thank you Donna and your website for saving my life.
Stronginthecity
With respect to honoring our parents, the way I frame the concept is that we are to honor them whether they are honorable or not. However, honoring one’s parents does not mean accepting abuse or being treated badly. We can honor our parents even when they act in harmful ways to us, by maintaining our boundaries. If it is necessary to break off all or almost all contact with our parents, we can continue to honor them by avoiding speaking contemptuously of them, and by being respectful even though we don’t cover up the truth about their wrong choices if we choose to share with others. Another way to honor parents even without contact is by being a success in our own life and by being true to our own values.
AnnettePK
Thank you for replying to this particular segment of the article. “Yes, we are supposed to honor our mother and father but only if they’re honorable.”
It bothered me because it’s the same logic my ex used to excuse his abuse of me. He’d say he would only be respectful of me if I was respectable, and then smear me to prove I was “not respectable” and therefore entitled to abuse me.
My mother was not what anyone would claim was a good person. Once I became of legal age, the way I dealt with her was to not allow her to harm me, but I did not seek vengeance either. I reasoned that she was so damaged and it was not my place to damage her further. I will say, I did love her but I was also sad that she chose to be the way she was.
Your solutions of how to honor our parents is also good goals to set to eventually get beyond a sociopath in general. I know being true to my own values helped me to re-establish my identity after the discard, to “find myself” again, to help me realize that I was distinct and separate from a monster.
Thank you for your words and so many replies to LF members that carry grace and common sense in the midst of our crazy nightmares.
Thank you for your truly helpful advice on healing. When I was in the throes of my negative delusion army state, feelings and intellect were severed. I could talk about but not feel the significance of what I was expressing. It took me time to first learn the language of feelings and their corresponding significance metaphysically. I would write words down on cards and then describe what that emotion meant. I would write down associations to words that expressed feelings. I would copy phrases from novels, newspaper clippings and T.V. shows I nwatched. Over the years I have stacks and stacks of index cards. I go over these cards periodically, discovering new meaning in old posts. I daily learn the language of “I am, I feel, yes please, no thank you.
Like many of my friends on this site, my parents pretending to be ethical beyond measure, while tormenting me relentlessly, from earliest childhood on.
Honoring those who deserve to be honored! Does this include a criminal son, a sexually addicted daughter who uses the Internet frequently to find sex partners on line? Also, my son has 2 children from a relationship with a psycho mother, sociopathic, that is.? One child is 12 the other 17. The youngest is a boy, oldest a girl. I can tell from the girl’s Facebook page that she is not the quality person I wish she was. Her dad has been in jail more than once and the mother is married to a bonafide “pedafile”.
None of them are on my radar except my son who I call periodically and always wish him a “happy birthday”.
I would like to share, that neither my son or my daughter are included in my will as far as my property . I am planning to leave my son and daughter a cash amount., in good faith.
I only ask, am I on the right side of the curve? Not communicating with these grandchildren was a decision I made when their mother married a pedafile. This last bit of info I have never shared with anyone at all ’till now.
Thank you for allowing me to share. This site has done wonders for my healing journey. Kalina
Kalina
I think we must honor ourselves first, just as we must respect ourselves first in order to be able to respect others in a healthy way. And that means not allowing the disordered to harm us. That is one way of honoring them as well. By not allowing their bad behavior towards ourselves.
What you do with your estate, with regards to who inherits what, is up to you. It’s my belief that NO one is ever entitled to an inheritance, so there is no “right” side, there is only Your choice.
I am so sorry your grandchildren have a pedo in their home. My father was a pedo. It changes EVERYTHING in a child’s life, their ability to trust, how they see themselves and the world. What a nightmare. Seems once people go to the dark side, they rarely return to the light. It is so very Sad.
I think it is possible to honor the “role” our parents played in bringing us into the world, while still setting boundaries to protect ourselves from them if they are bad people. In this sense, “honoring” does not mean we have to keep them in our lives or be nice to them. I honored my mother for the last 5 years of her life by sending her a card (or flowers) every year on Mothers’ Day. This is the only communication I ever had with her. For all practical purposes, I had cut her out of my life – of necessity. If she called, I would limit the call to a few minutes and then end it. When you release anger you have toward someone, you can still acknowledge the lessons they taught you in your life and appreciate those lessons. In the case of parents, I don’t think it’s wrong to honor that they brought you into the world. That alone is a gift.
My daughter has cut me out of her life, she said I did not respect her boundaries because I did not agree with her and refused when she tried to force me to spend holidays with her psychopath father. I loved her, raised her, gave my all for her while he went through years of targeting women to destroy, serial marriages and abuse of wives and stepchildren. After his third divorce he targeted our daughter and pulled her into his psychopath’s web. I guess she is a minion, not a target he used her to hurt me but I survived. I do no longer
want her cards or flowers or even to see her anymore but I do still send her flowers on her birthday. She was once my precious little girl. I am grateful that she honors me by letting me see my grandchildren who adore me. And I pray that someday she will escape his lies and pity game and want me back in her life.
Do I ever wish someone had given me permission to break off the relationship with parents a long time ago. That honour thy parents in the bible, that I could not get past, did a bit of a number on my heart. And life.
Have not had any problem ridding myself of the sociopaths I attracted and closing my heart to non relatives, once the games started, but the bible misleading has probably done more damage than one cares to admit. Excellent advice Donna!
In retrospect, I believe if the break from dishonorable parents could have been made in time ~ attracting sociopaths into one’s life could also in time have been corrected. Took a long time for me to recognize sociopathic situations & individuals because the dishonorable was not seen as such.
This is advice which needs to be passed on to all generations from here on in. Very loudly and very clearly.
About honouring evil.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IT1qj4pTo0I