#491: What Determines Your Worth?

Heard an interesting question posed on a radio show this morning: "What determines your worth?"

Have you ever considered this in your own life? Is it being a wife or husband? A parent ? How about being a valued employee or neighbor ?

We derive some of our feelings of worth from these roles don't we but surely not all?

I submit that what largely determines our worth are the contributions we make to those with whom we come into contact and to our communities.

Something as simple as holding a door open for someone or thanking them for the work they do can magically alter someone's outlook for the better. Wishing them a happy day, helping pick up dropped items -- there are so very many ways to enrich others and in turn ourselves. Can you teach a youngster to ride a bike ? Teach an adult to read ? Help at a nursing home or animal shelter ? Every time we reach out to uplift others our worth increases many-fold.

Simply being the best we can at what we do and doing the best we can at all we attempt goes a long way toward validating us as people.

When circumstances threaten to drag us into the depths of despair, let's realize that we are all as unique as snowflakes and thus have unique abilities for which we should be thankful, abilities we can invest in others, raising our self-worth forever.