Dr. Shadé Zahrai

Your self-esteem is suffering.

And then the fourth pattern that we see here is, of course, that endless need for approval.

We need other people to like us, to validate us.

We might become codependent in our relationships.

We say yes when we really want to say no.

We wear masks and contort ourselves to better suit the people around us.

But in doing so, we lose ourselves.

So that is the first and, in my view, the most foundational acceptance.

That's me.

So I love how you mentioned that we develop this early in life.

Let's start there and then we'll go to how we can start to break the attachment that we have to this.

So generally, this sense of acceptance that we have develops in the first three to four years.

Initially, it's based on the response we get from our parents, our primary caregivers.

And then it also develops based on whether we feel that we get the emotional support and the nurturing that we need.

If you feel like you constantly have to earn your parents' attention or do something exciting to get them to pay attention to you, then we develop this belief that I must perform to be worthy.

It can also happen later in life when a parent says to you or compares your report card, your grades to a sibling, or makes you feel like you're only of value when you're winning an award or coming first in the swimming competition that you're in.

So we developed these really early on.

And, you know, we do need to acknowledge so much of who we are as a result of those early experiences.

That doesn't mean we are a prisoner to that.

And it doesn't mean that we should be blaming that environment and our parents and our, you know, the caregivers that we had.