I recently came across the term ‘hustling for worthiness’ for the first time in a book I was reading. This refers to the idea that people who crave validation, who crave being made to feel worthy, will constantly and unrelentingly seek out worthiness from other people and through external things. When I did some further research, I noticed that the term ‘Hustling for Worthiness’ was coined by Brene Brown.
I think that part of the idea of hustling for worthiness is the incessant need to seek out validation from other people, regardless of whether they are the right people, which ends up being to your detriment. Self-doubt and a lack of self esteem are at the core of this feeling. If you do not trust yourself or have a strong foundation of self-worth, then you will be constantly seeking out approval and worth from others. As such, hustling for worthiness is not just a symptom of a problem, it is both a symptom and a cause. If your self-worth is derived entirely from what other people tell you, you will always be looking for other people to tell you how to feel about yourself.
When hustling for worthiness you are inherently placing limits on your self-worth, because you are focused on seeking it out in other places. And even people with the best intentions cannot replace the quality of worth that you should give to yourself.
It is of course more nuanced than that. But not entirely. I notice now, that when I talk to my friends, or to anyone, I can see the parts of myself that needed the constant reassurance from others in order to be ok in myself. That is exhausting. Having now grown enough and fortified my own self-worth and beliefs, I can recognize how much time and energy hustling for worthiness took up. And how much better off I am when I stopped needing validation from others to love myself. Don’t get me wrong, we all need people. Human beings are fundamentally social creatures. This means that we do look to one another for things like validation. There is however, a key difference between knowing your worth and feeling validated at times, and your entire worth being dependent on the validation of others.
I also believe that rooted in a person’s self-worth is their resilience. I have always loved the metaphor that people are like houses. That without a strong foundation we will crumble. But what constitutes a strong foundation? I think it is lots of things. There are many different things that make up a strong foundation. Life is full of things that don’t go to plan. Some of those things are just happy accidents, and some of those things are tragic. And there is a whole spectrum in between.
But when those things happen, when there are bumps in the road or big disasters or when something doesn’t go your way, your reaction to these things is what indicates growth and a strong foundation. And what I mean by that is when hard things happen, it is healthy to give ourselves space to feel the pain. Not acknowledging the hard thing and the pain under the guise of strength is not strength. Because eventually all that pain will surface even when you don’t want it to. There is a difference between creating space for and feeling the pain, however, and being destroyed by it. When you don’t have a strong foundation any kind of pain, superficial or otherwise, is enough to create complete destruction.
And when that happens, it is significantly harder to get back up again. I am a firm believer that you can always get back up. But a broken foundation that is already cracked is inevitably going to be harder to build from. The reason why I believe that hustling for worthiness is part of this issue, is because a lot of the time, the two are linked. With a weak foundation, you are constantly looking for things to fill it. Self worth is a crucial part of a strong foundation. When you are constantly hustling for worthiness, you are not always picky about who you are getting your worth from. And when that validation goes away, you are left once more with a cracked foundation.
So what is the answer? The answer is growth, patience and internal work. I wish there was a quick fix. It would be much easier that way, less arduous and painstaking. Unfortunately though, it is rare that the best things come easy. And part of the growth is learning to be ok with that. Notice your patterns. If you find yourself constantly reaching for the validations of others, rather than focusing on what you think of yourself. This is something I have thought about recently. When no one else is looking, do you like who you are? (May provoke an existential crisis FYI). But it is an important question to ask yourself. Who are you when no one else is around? And is that a person who you like?
The answer will vary. Self-worth is not stagnant. But the more you grow with it, the bigger it grows and the stronger your foundation is. Confronting our own patterns and need of others is uncomfortable. But it is necessary to confront so that you can move through. Work through. I encourage you to think about if you find yourself hustling for worthiness. If you are over-thinking and exhausting yourself and others with constant neediness. And also not to chastise yourself for it. But to notice it and start to find ways to challenge yourself.
It is often difficult to believe how much capacity we have for change. A habit, a behavior, a thought pattern may seem permanent, a life-sentence, a part of your inner self. But very few people do not possess the capacity to change. That is the complete beauty in being alive. And being able to choose. All the time you have dedicated to hustling for worthiness, all that energy spent can be turned inwards.
— Liora
Liora Resnick 