In a recent interview with the Guardian newspaper, actor Jodie Comer (“Villanelle” on “Killing Eve“) said this about what she had learned:
“As a woman, I’ve had to find my voice. Have a sense of my own worth. Know what I have to offer. ’Cos there’ll always be someone to question that.”
Jodie said these words at a moment in which her star is rising and rising. She’s made it from the streets of Liverpool all the way to Hollywood. Pretty much every director wants to work with her, and audiences can’t wait to see her.
And yet… she thinks there’ll always be someone questioning her worth.
YOUR DEFINITION
My first question would be: “How would you define your own worth?”
Is it something determined by the outside world, the agents, the tabloids, and the box office? Or does one’s sense of worth come from inside, from self-love, self-esteem, and a deep inner feeling that you’re basically okay?
People who question their self worth often ask themselves: “Do I really deserve this?”
This question doesn’t come out of nowhere. It often has its roots in painful childhood experiences, and comes from critical people who were close to us when we were young and impressionable. These experiences and voices became internalized, and are now part of our mental makeup.
THE COMPARISON
People who question their own worth do something else: they compare themselves to the person they they think they ought to be (or believe society wants them to be), and they compare themselves to those they see as more successful. If you do that, you’ll always find someone you don’t measure up to, to make you feel inferior.
The truth is: There is no one like you. You are incomparable and valuable beyond measure!
If you make your worth dependent on what you cannot control, you make yourself small and vulnerable. What you CAN control is how you view yourself and speak to yourself.
SHOW SOME RESPECT
For starters, you can treat yourself with kindness and respect. Be okay with your imperfections. They make you human.
If you wish to feel your worth, start by doing things that are important and worthwhile to you.
Doing meaningful things for causes greater than yourself, is one of the keys to building a healthy sense of self-worth.
Did you get that, Jodie?
This one hit close to home – thank you, Paul.
I sympathize with Jodie. When you don’t get where you think you belong for a while, there is a tendency to question whether you are as right as you think you are.
Internal validation is strong, but that external validation, the one that comes from superiors, peers, critics, and the public can be very powerful.
Actors who win an Oscar, for example, live (I read somewhere and it stuck) an average of SEVEN years longer than matched cohorts of peers. I would credit a good deal of that to the lowering of stress that comes from having your work validated by the Academy of Motion Pictures, which can be renewed every time you look at the statuette. Especially the first one, I would assume. Hard to believe in yourself seven years of life worth with no support!
I know my stress on finishing the second volume in my mainstream trilogy took a dive today when a major indie reviewing site posted a review of the first volume with the pullquote: “A FLAWLESS LITERARY GEM.”
Indies who write in categories the traditional publishers believe they still own have a hard time getting that feedback because the reviewers rarely accept self-published literary and mainstream novels (claiming general lack of quality) for review. Site after site indicate ‘no self-published work may be submitted.’ They claim they don’t have the bandwidth to separate the wheat from the chaff.
SPAs get reviews from indie sites – or from the paid sites like Kirkus which have deigned to accept indie money for reviews at steep prices (last time I checked, Kirkus charged indies $499 for a 300 word review).
Vicious circle.
The other side of the loop is that most SPAs write in specific genres (SFF, Romance, Westerns…) where they compete against others writing the same kinds of books for specific indie awards (the Hugo, the RITA, the spur…).
There is no mainstream award for indies that carries the same weight as, say, a Pulitzer, a Mann Booker, or a Nobel prize for Literature. The more prestigious awards may let indies in for a fee, but are not won by them.
All this makes the indie awards which DO consider a literary, mainstream, or general fiction category (usually small – often combined with something like non-fiction or poetry!) the more valuable for those who insist on writing what they want – and NOT submitting to big publishers. Us stubborn ones, I guess.
Anyway, this lovely review from this indie reviewer site had me walking on air all day. It helps. It is something I can read during the slog to the finish, the light at the far end of the tunnel.
Validation is a powerful force indeed, whether coming from the inside or the outside. It makes us vulnerable, and it can also give us wings.