The Choices You Make

Everyday Enlightenment: The Twelve Gateways to Personal Growth
by Dan Millman

(Page 3 of 8)

The central theme of the first gateway is that you subconsciously choose or attract into your life those people and experiences you believe you deserve. In everyday life pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional-a by-product of poor choices.

Your sense of worth or deservedness shapes your life by creating tendencies. If you feel worthy and deserving, you tend to make productive choices. (“The world is my oyster.”) If you feel unworthy and undeserving, you tend to make destructive or limiting choices. (“Beggars can't be choosers.”)

At each and every crossroads you are free to choose the high road-by being kind to others, working hard, finding supportive partners, and following good role models. Or you may choose the low road-by burning your bridges, using drugs, or choosing destructive relationships. Your sense of self-worth tends to influence whether you choose to learn easy lessons or difficult ones, to strive or to struggle, to cave in to difficulties or rise above them.

Such choices determine your educational and income level, your health habits-even your longevity. Those of us with a strong sense of self-worth are less likely to get caught up in self-destructive habits with tobacco, alcohol or other drugs, or the abuse of food.

Coming to appreciate your worth can, in some cases, dramatically improve your circumstances by changing the choices you make and the actions you take. And as you begin to treat yourself with more respect, other people begin to do the same, since we subconsciously “train” others how to treat us through messages we send through body language, tone of voice, and other subtle cues and behaviors. Discovering your innate worth and living from that place allows you to make more constructive choices-to choose the higher roads of life.

Since you are exploring this gateway, maybe now is the time for you to take stock, to reflect upon your own circumstances and sense of worth, and to determine if your life is working as well as you would like.

Are you now where you want to be?

A Self-Worth Wake-up Call

There is a danger of studying self-worth from a distance-exploring the issue the way some people explore Africa from an air-conditioned bus. Keeping a safe distance is more comfortable but far less useful than feeling its impact on your life right now.

Since your sense of self-worth (and tendency to self-sabotage) is usually subconscious, awareness of the problem is part of the solution. Here are three complementary methods to become aware of your sense of worth.

© 1999 by Dan Millman

About the Author

Dan Millman is a former world champion athlete, college professor, and bestselling author whose eight books, including Way of the Peaceful Warrior and The Life You Were Born to Live, have inspired millions of people in more than twenty languages. His books and seminars have influenced people from all walks of life, including leaders in the fields of health, psychology, business, education, politics, entertainment, sports, and the arts. A youthful grandfather, he lives with his family in northern California.