How to Believe In Yourself Again

By Karolina Rzadkowolska

I don’t know what it was exactly. Maybe it was growing up shy and quiet. Maybe it was sitting there slumped over the toilet throwing up for the umpteenth time. Maybe it was so many broken promises to myself and so little progress made to actually develop myself.

By the time I was 30 and had used alcohol to lower the expectations of my life for well over a decade, my self-worth was low, low, low.

I absolutely didn’t believe in myself anymore. I mean, how could I? I couldn’t even trust myself to keep the smallest promises.

Like the promise that I would only have two drinks that night.

Or the promise that I would work out the next morning. It’s not like I broke those promises every once in a while. It happened over and over and over again that my word to myself stopped meaning anything.

My self-esteem crumbled every single Monday morning. And it hurt. I had a vision of who I wished I could be, and felt like I was completely missing the mark. So unaligned with my deeper values and bigger dreams.

To be honest, I barely even let myself dream. What was the point? Adulthood hit me with a reality check. It gave me a role and a box to fill, end of story.

Living a badass life on your own terms was for other people . . . other people smarter, more capable, and braver than I was.

I settled big time.

For years.

Long excruciating years.

And then the BEST THING EVER happened to me.

I realized I had a very complicated relationship with alcohol.

This is the best thing? Most people might use the words unfair, embarrassing, defective, etc.

But no, it was the best thing that has ever happened to me. Because you don’t just wake up from snoozing on your life with a gentle nudge. You need a big fat wake up call.

And my complicated relationship with alcohol + tug on my heart that life could be better without it was my big fat wake up call.

After years of letting myself down, making progress on other people’s dreams but not mine (like getting advanced degrees and promotions at work), and living in a zone of comfort, I took a break.

And it was my very first step in rebuilding my self-esteem. I got to 21 days, 50 days, 100 days alcohol-free and literally couldn’t believe the person standing in front of me. I did what??

And as the days added up, I started to believe in myself again. Here I was, literally working on my Achilles heel and making huge shifts in my beliefs and mental paradigm.

With the work I did on my relationship with alcohol, I was left with absolutely no desire for it anymore. No mental tug-a-war. No endless chatter. The very thing that brought me so much turmoil and shame had become completely insignificant in my life.

In that vacuum and space that finally appeared, I felt my dreams racing back to me. And the pride and confidence I felt going so many days without alcohol fueled my confidence in going after all the other things I didn’t think were possible for me.

I didn’t know how to do it all. But the universe showed me my first baby step. And then the next right step, and then the next right step appeared after that. It wasn’t too long until I transformed my entire life. Built a business. Wrote a book. Became a coach. Left my day job. And today work with people I love and make an impact in their transformation.

I got my self-esteem back and regained the belief in myself. I continued to expand my self-worth and work on it to this day.

But I didn’t do it alone. I invested in a coach. I started working with someone who believed in me and helped me make sense of my inner world.

Because when that sneaky inner critic comes up and asks me,

“Who do you think you are?

You’re not worthy to live the life of your dreams. You’re not BLANK enough. (Smart enough, capable enough, brave enough, likable enough, connected enough).

You’re not enough.”

I need an ally with me ready to defeat it.

I need a guide to help me realize that yep, that’s my protection mechanism coming through and NOT THE TRUE STORY. It’s a story that keeps me out of risk, out of rejection, but also out of ultimate fulfillment too.

Because my playing small and suppressing myself doesn’t serve anyone. In fact, if anything, it’s doing a huge disservice to the world.

So in case you need a reminder today, (and I know some days I need one too):

You are worthy.

You deserve it all.

You were meant to express yourself fully and unapologetically in this ONE and ONLY lifetime.

You were meant to live life to your fullest potential, whatever that means for you.

You are enough.

You are worthy just the way you are. And I believe in you.

Because if you’re not worthy of the life you really want, why is someone else? Do they have more intrinsic value than you do?

And when will it be okay to show up unapologetically as you really are and go for what you really want . . . when you’re dead?

Your worth doesn’t come from what other people think of you. It doesn’t come from suppressing yourself and your dreams. It doesn’t come from you being any thing enough.

It comes from knowing that you enough just the way you are.

If you’d like some help to stop drinking and create the alcohol-life of your dreams, click here for details on my online course.