Where do I find my worth?

     Of all the movies which I have seen in my life, I am almost embarrassed to admit the one which has affected the way I view myself the most is "The Joy Luck Club."  Every now and then I am reminded of the scene where one girl has to find her "worth" because she does not value herself and thus her own opinion. I find my own value in success, and that is the problem: how I define success is skewed.  I make mental lists daily and check tasks off that list when they are completed or accomplished.  At the end of the day there is a lot left I need to do, I feel like I didn't get anything done so I get frustrated and stressed.  Some people may say "but making a list is a great idea!"  But the problem is, when crossing something off the list becomes the measure of success and therefore self-worth, it becomes a disease.  Even relaxing becomes a task to cross off the list.  Which is frustrating because relaxing takes time away from getting other tasks off the list.  So my worth is based on how much I accomplished that day.  And when I don't accomplish as much as I should: at least enough to not fall behind, I feel like a failure, like my worth is not what it should be.

     This is where the operations person in me comes into play; some people make building relationships with a priority in their lives, other people make production a larger priority.  I am the latter: I like to get things done.  I am good at getting tasks done.  The American work culture has built this into me and I accepted it because I am good at it.  I'm too busy to spend time with people, especially getting to know them.  It's not that it isn't something I value, I really do.  Its just that I don't set it as the priority when something needs to get done.  And when you are the type of person who is good at getting things done, but struggles with building relationships, you default to the easier of the two.  Why?  Because it is self-satisfying to put priority on what you can accomplish.  When you can't succeed in what you put priority in, your self-worth decreases.

     So how do I break away from all of this without becoming unproductive?  The first step is to become better at being relational.  This shouldn't be too bad as I have been relational in the past.  The challenge is the mindset.  All day at work and school I am focused and forced to put the priority on production.  Being relational takes an entirely different mindset.  It is about taking the time to listen to someone else's story, get involved with it and seek to know more and understand them better.  This leads to connecting with them better.  The more time I spend with the mindset of being relational, the more I improve at doing it because there is a shift in my mindset.  What shall I do specifically to get to know people better?  To build relationships with others?  My wife and I were discussing it this week and decided that church is the place to start.  Before we had Sydney we took joy in going to lunch with others after church.  We have gotten away from that because it just took too long.  Part of the problem was the size of the groups we went with.  We have decided to go to lunch with smaller groups each week.  This way lunch is not an all day affair, plus we can focus in a smaller group of individuals so it is easier to get to know each other.  Sounds like a great plan, why blog about it?  Mainly because I want to write more and get into the "slow down and write" mindset.  But also because of the journaling factor.  By writing about this and posting it, I can read about it years from now and see how I did.  It is also a matter of accountability; do I really expect people to read this and then hold me accountable?  No, not at all.  But on the other hand, if I post it I have to make sure I do it because someone might read this and if I rush home from church every Sunday it will be obvious I am not sticking to the plan.  Sticking to a plan is after all, where I get my self-worth...