What if you are already enough, and perfect was never the target? I had it engraved on something once, and the engraver emailed back to ask if I was sure.
What if you are already enough, and perfect was never the target? I had it engraved on something once, and the engraver emailed back to ask if I was sure.
She said it did not sound right to her. I said it was exactly right. Feeling not enough is how the body keeps you on the sofa, because nobody can hurt you there. The coward looks at the hero and asks why bother. The hero looks back and says we will worry about that when we get there. You have everything you need for the next step. Not the whole staircase. The next step.
One thing to try: Say it once, out loud, and notice what argues back. I am enough.
In this episode
(0:00) Everybody feels not enough at some point
(1:40) The voices telling you this will not be any good
(3:10) Telling my daughter how amazing she was, and what it did
(4:33) The engraver who emailed back to check I was serious
(6:09) Not enough is how the body keeps you in the comfort zone
(7:30) Stay where you are. You have not got the talent for it
(8:36) The coward and the hero, looking at each other
(10:29) I am enough. You are enough. Right now, as it is
Support the podcast and join the Weekly Calm: stevenwebb.uk
Thank you for listening.
Steven
The question this answers
What if you are already enough, and perfect was never the target?
There is a difference between those two, and it is the difference between being able to take the next step and being frozen on the sofa.
The heart of it
Nobody can hurt you sitting still, which is precisely why your mind tells you that you are not ready.
You do not need the whole staircase. You need the next step.
Perfect is not a comfortable place to sit, because it does not exist.
I bought my daughter a tree of life last Christmas and had it engraved. Her name, and then, round the outer ring, have and always enough.
The engraver emailed me back to ask whether that was right. It did not sound right to her.
It was exactly right. I wanted Kemba to know she has always been enough, is enough now, and will be.
Here is what happens when you aim at perfect instead. You cannot rest there, because there is nowhere to stand. And it does something else. Praise a child for being brilliant at drawing and they may stop drawing, because now there is a standard to fail.
I did that to my daughter for years, entirely meaning well. Every time she felt low I told her how amazing she was. Fifteen years on she still does not feel she has done enough.
And feeling not enough is very effective at keeping you put. It is why children watch the same film forty times. They are not watching the journey, they are waiting for the ending they already know is coming. When the hero gets cast out it is upsetting the first time, and fine the fifth, because by then they know it turns out.
We do not know how ours turns out. So we stay in.
There is a moment in every one of those films where the coward sees the next problem coming and asks what the point is. And the hero says, we will worry about that when we get there.
One small thing to try
Hand flat on your chest. Three words. I am enough.
Do it a few times a day and feel it rather than say it.
That is what loving yourself actually looks like. Not announcing that you are marvellous. Just declining to tell yourself you are not ready.
Standing on the starting line, we are all cowards.
Everybody has the doubts. I have them every time I turn this microphone on, with my notes in front of me.
Questions people ask
Is this not just positive thinking?
No, and the difference matters. I am amazing is a claim you will argue with. I am enough is a much smaller statement and it is true, which is why it survives contact with a bad day.
Why is perfect worse than enough?
Because you can rest in enough. Perfect has no floor. There is always another version of it, so you never arrive and you never stop.
What if I genuinely am not ready?
Then you are not ready for the whole thing, which nobody ever is. Nobody starts school knowing enough to pass the exams. You learn the next bit by doing this bit, and that has always been how it works.
Read along
The transcript
It follows the audio. Press any line to jump there.
self-worth · acceptance · self-compassion
Read the transcript
Every now and again, I think everybody in their life feels not enough. And this podcast is all about you
if you feel sometimes that you're not enough. Whether it's in a relationship or whether you're not achieving your goals
or what you want to do in life and you just don't think you're ready. This podcast is for you.
I'm Steven Webb, your host, and welcome to Living Deeper Lives, the podcast that used to be called Stillness in
the Storms of Life. But we've changed it because we're looking deeper into the full meaning of living a full
human life with all the feelings and all the trimmings. We've just had Christmas. It's Boxing Day today. So it's
like life with all the trimmings. It's like your normal roast, the Christmas Day roast. That's what Living Deeper Lives
mean. No point in living a life unless you're going to experience everything. So today we're talking about feeling enough.
And I think everybody at one time in their lives don't feel enough. One of my favourite quotes is by
Elberto Salazar, a long distance runner. And I know in recent years he's had a doping scandal, but this
quote still stands for everybody. And it says, I had as many doubts as anyone else. Standing on the starting
line, we're all cowards. And I think that comes down to not believing we are enough. You know, we practice.
Every time I go live, I study up for the live and I put out my points I'm going to
talk about. And even on this, I've got it all here in front of me. I've got my notes. I've
got in my head what I'm going to say.
And then you turn on the mic and the doubts kick in. Those little voices inside of you that you're
going to say something wrong or you're not going to it's not going to be a great podcast. It's not
going to be a great message. You're not going to do it justice. All those little voices so loud within
us. And
I think it comes down to we're all the same. I think we all feel like that. And I know
we have parents and we have people that love us, that mean well, and they tell us how perfect we
are and how amazing we are. I always remember a Bbc done a study on born talent
and they come to the conclusion that there's very little born talent. You might have circumstances and perhaps if you're
tall, you're not going to become a jockey and things like that. Most of you draw as children and then
you go and present your work of art, your Picasso to your parents. Oh, what is it? Because you've got
to ask, because it's just lines literally and you cannot even make out the colours sometimes. And they go like,
oh it's a firetruck. Or it's a teddy or it's a doll. And you go, oh wow, that's amazing, that's
a brilliant poster. Or a brilliant picture. But then they believe that they cannot produce the same masterpiece again, so
they fail to do it. And they get frightened to do it. So although we praise these children up and
we praise them up for being the most beautiful, the most amazing, the most talented, it actually has the opposite
effect and it makes them fearful of... Not being able to produce the same results again. And I did the
same with my daughter I I would always, whenever she didn't feel enough or whenever she felt down, I would
tell her how amazing she was. And I did it from what I believe was the depth of my heart
and I did it for the right reasons. But little did I know she just never believed me. And 15
years on, she still feels that she's done enough. I've been working on this this year. I've been running from
doing the Inner Peace Academy and every time I go to go live, I sit here almost terrified of getting
everything wrong I'm terrified of not being enough. Not being able to do enough for the people listening. Not been
able to help them. And I know the big picture of it is not about that. And I I know
I am enough. But knowing it and living it are two different things. So this year I bought my daughter
A Tree of Life. Because we were talking about how the tree symbolizes the roots and the trunk and the
branches of opinion, belief and the roots of who we really are. And the next podcast is about that.
But we were talking about that so I brought her a little tree of life and because her name's Kemba
spelt with a K you can never get anything with a name on it. So I got engraved Kemba Webb
and in the outer ring I got engraved have and always enough. And the person doing the engraving sent me
an email back and said, are you sure that's right? It doesn't sound right to me. And I said, yeah,
that's perfectly right. And I explained the story to her. And I said, I wanted my daughter to always feel
like she is enough. She always has been enough and always will be enough. And when we sit in that
we are enough. That's so much easier than sitting in I am perfect. When we sit in I am perfect
and everything is perfect and everything's just sweet and beautiful and wonderful, it feels uncomfortable. There's nothing
comfortable about perfection. It's not comfortable because it doesn't exist. How can you sit in something that does not exist?
But if we sit in I am enough, you are enough. It then gives us confidence to take the next
step because that's what it all boils down to is taking the next step. It's not about getting to where
you need to go. It's not about having all the knowledge and the wisdom and the skills to get to
your final destination. Nobody sets out in school with all the knowledge to pass the exams. Nobody sets
out to climb a mountain with every knowledge of every step they're going to take. You get the broad knowledge
and you learn along the way. And every single time you do it, and every single step you do, you
learn vital knowledge to take the next step. You may not have, like I say, all the skills or the
talent to go to exactly where you need to be in two or three years time, exactly where you want
to be. But you have everything to take the next step. But feeling like we're not enough is a good
way for the body to keep itself in the comfort zone. No one can hurt you sat on the sofa.
You know, it's why kids watch the same movie again and again and again. They like to know what's coming
up. They like to know, especially with Disney movies, you have the hero's journey, don't you? You have the hero
that's playing around at home and everything's fine. Everybody's happy. And then something goes wrong and he's cast out and
he goes off on a journey. And he loses who he is. And then he has to find who he
is. And then he has to come back. Children don't like watching a new movie because they don't know when
he gets cast out it upsets them. They don't know at that point he's going to return and everything's going
to be okay. But once they watch the movie a couple of times, they learn that it's going to turn
out okay in the end. And that's what they're waiting for there's not sitting down to watch the journey, watch
the movie. They're sitting down waiting for the hero at the end. And they know it's coming so they feel
comfortable. The problem is we don't know the journey ahead of us. We don't know the future. So we're frightened
to take that step. And one of the tricks the subconscious mind will work is by making you believe you
are not enough. Making you believe you're not capable. You're not strong enough. You haven't got the wisdom or you
haven't got the talent to be able to do it. So stay where you get stay where you are So
what does it look like when you're living a life that you do feel like you are enough? Well, you
have more confidence. You live in the moment more because you don't have to prepare so much for the future
because you don't have to fear it so much you've realised that you've got all the tools you need to
live and to survive and to get on with life and nothing can take you down. And going back to
the movies again, you know the kind of movie that you got the hero in the movie and you got
the coward in the movie. And they might be sailing somewhere or doing something. And they look down there. They're
just about to come across one big problem. And then the camera glimpses to another problem that's just around the
corner. Just to keep your suspense. So you know more than what they do, that the moment they're over
this little jam, they've got another one. But the coward sees it. And the coward looks at the hero as
if to say, do you know what? Why bother? There's nothing we can do here. And the hero looks back
at the coward and says, we'll worry about that when we get there. But what if we can't? And the
hero will say, we will deal with it. Do you trust me? And that's what living life is enough. It's
the belief in yourself.
So that's what I want you to remember. I want you to remember those three words. I am enough. And
just do it a few times a day. Just take a deep breath. Place your hand on your heart and
just say, I am enough. And when you do that, that's how you love yourself. Yeah.
Loving yourself is really that simple. It's it's a belief in yourself. You're not locking yourself. You're not saying you're
useless. You can't do this. You have to fear this because you're not enough. Just believing you are enough and
sitting in that is is loving yourself, self-confidence, self-esteem,
self-love most of all.
Just three magic words. I am enough. And you have to feel it throughout your body.
So you can do this right now. Just take a couple of deep breaths.
You may want to close your eyes.
And I want you to place one hand over your heart flat.
And just relax and I want you to say within your head, I am enough. I am enough.
It gives you a kind of feeling of confidence and a belief that you're in control of your destiny. I
am enough. You are enough. You have everything right now in your life, within you
and externally, to be enough
now If you support what I do and you enjoy these podcasts, please subscribe and hit the review and let
me know what you think. And if you want to live a more deeper and meaningful life, head over to
StevenWebb.com and that's where you can support me by either downloading free meditation or buy me a coffee. That would
be awesome um Take care. Thank you for listening and have a great day.
