Building Self-Leadership from Within: How Self-Awareness and Self-Validation Unlock Your Unique Value

Self-Awareness as the Bridge: A conversation about self-leadership and intrinsic worth is not possible without first discussing the importance of self-awareness. In social psychology, self-awareness can be traced back to the work of Shelley Duval and Robert Wicklund. They proposed that, at any given time, people can focus their attention on self or on the external environment. Focusing on self allows people to compare themselves to a standard of correctness and thus change their thoughts and behaviors in line with those standards (Self-Awareness Theory, 2024). This is why self-awareness is necessary to have any self-control or managing one’s response to external stimuli.

When we think of self-leadership, we cannot lead ourselves if we aren’t aware of how we are feeling, how we are responding, what we have affinities to and biases against, or even valid gauges on our achievements.

Recognizing Unique Qualities and Contributions  

I want to dig deep here to challenge you to think about the dependence you might have on external validation and why this can jeopardize your ability to effectively lead yourself. Together, we will explore potential roadblocks to true self-discovery such as imposter syndrome, lack of confidence, negotiating based upon your own value, your ability to communicate your worth and boundaries and burnout as the ultimate roadblocks to demonstrating strong self-leadership attributes.

This is important because it will be difficult to continue this journey of self-discovery if we don’t get to the bottom of many of these issues. As it is often said, “we need to get out of our own way.” Said differently, “we are our own worst enemy.” In the context of a self-leadership discussion, our ability to be our own solution versus the thing that stands in the way of our success is the only way through and to the life we want for ourselves.

The Role of External Validation   

Intrinsic worth is the value that we have by our very existence. Ideally, we should feel good because we are alive, we exist and therefore we are good. That’s it. No other proof needed. You are great and wonderful and worthy of all you want just by being.

Do you feel worthy just because you are alive?

If you are like me, you sometimes struggle with owning your intrinsic worth and feel like your life is a constant measure against others’ ideas of what you should be. You seek validation or recognition in others and whether you get it or not determines, in your mind, whether you feel, in fact, good enough.

It should not be like this. We have got to stop holding onto that internal dialogue.

I have a confession: This might be my number 1 barrier to leading myself more effectively than I do now. I am an only child, and early in my life I received many nonverbal and verbal messages that I wasn’t good enough or worthy. I was born into an interracial, interfaith family, and my maternal grandparents rejected different parts of me from the beginning. Growing up I was excluded from many large family events, because I was who I was and what I looked like.

Later on, like most women, (and on top of my already beat up self-confidence) I received messages that I was too fat, my hair was too straight or too curly, which also meant I wasn’t good enough. Unfortunately, I believed those words and cues. For a long time I didn’t feel good enough. It is only in my 50’s that I am coming to terms with the fact that I am good, because I am.

Something that has helped me when my mind wanders into the self-sabotaging dialogue is this mantra – repeat it mantra with me: “I am good, because I am.”

The Pitfalls of External Validation  

Yes, it is true. Many of us do all kinds of things to seek recognition or external validation of our worth. In recent years social media has only exacerbated this issue. Millions of people, including me and most of you, take to social platforms to get as many likes and hearts and comments and followers and shares as possible. The creators of these platforms understood our psyche better than we did. Since the majority of us doubt our self-worth, the creators of those platforms got filthy rich on their awareness that we deeply wanted external validation of who we are as a form of acceptance many of us never really felt we had. They bet we would get addicted to that validation. Their bets paid off and are still paying off. We are hooked!

Is the solution to get off social media? No, that wouldn’t be realistic. Although the people who voluntarily delete these apps and turn off the notifications are much more content with their lives than those of us who live in comparison mode for our use of these platforms. (Southern, 2023). Many have reported to me that they are less stressed, less self-critical, more energized by human interaction–  the list of benefits go on. Will I give it up anytime soon? Probably not. No matter, we need to be aware of the impact to our emotional well-being and how much the time we spend there negates any work we do to deeply understand, “I am good because I am.”

At work, we have this same addiction. We are waiting for and seeking out validation from coworkers and our managers. It’s like an unending search for the dopamine we experience every time we receive recognition. Unfortunately, that steady stream will come to an end. We need to find a way to ground ourselves in our own self-worth, learning to validate ourselves.

Over-reliance on external validation can undermine self-leadership, because by definition, self-leadership includes growing inwardly to shine outwardly. That requires a knowledge and appreciation of what’s already inside us. It will be hard or almost impossible to get there if all our worth is tied up in other’s view of us. How can we ever measure up? What if we don’t have the same value system? Will they ever see you the way you see you?

Self-Validation Practices  

If external validation is the antithesis of self-leadership then, self-validation is the wind beneath your wings. In other words, self-validation is accepting your own internal experience, your thoughts, and your feelings. (Hall, 2014). Validating your thoughts and emotions will help you calm yourself and manage them more effectively. Validating yourself will help you accept and better understand yourself, which leads to a stronger identity and better skills at managing intense emotions. Self-validation helps you find wisdom. (Hall, 2014).

I see self-validation on three levels: our past thoughts, our past behaviors and our present reality. All three of these are grounded in self-awareness and using mindfulness to center ourselves in these areas. When we think of our past, it might drum up thoughts of shame about something that happened to us, fear that the thing could happen again, apprehension about our ability to conquer that thing into the future. We might doubt ourselves completely because of how we handled or failed to handle something before. We might even see that our past fully dictates our outcomes today.

Why do we judge ourselves so harshly, yet work harder to give others grace? In a recent March 2024 Linkedin poll conducted by Employee Fanatix, when asked, “What do you think contributes most to self-doubt and imposter syndrome when attempting to assert your voice in the workplace?”, 42% of respondents cited fear of making mistakes and past experiences of criticism. Unfortunately, many of us feel the same way. We have allowed external voices to overshadow our own. We have not worked on listening to our own voices and ignoring the others as we do so. What we need to do is to focus on recognizing the emotions we have regarding our past thoughts and behaviors, normalize or accept that those emotions are valid and justified and then just lean into who we are whole-heartedly and without judgment.

In my earlier personal story, I felt a lot of rejection from my mother’s side of the family, which made me doubt my own value, worth, and deservedness on so many levels. I was explicitly excluded from going to weddings, bar mitzvahs, funerals and most family events. I remember wondering why I couldn’t attend my own grandfather’s funeral and why my dad wasn’t allowed to attend many of these events. Without any direct explanation, I began to make my own conclusions. That maybe I would stick out, that my family was ashamed of me, that I was never going to be enough to fit in. For much of my life, I allowed those external voices and judgements to be my truth.

After many years of feeling like this I had a realization: I needed to realize that I am on this planet for a reason and it was not to be the brunt of someone else’s views of the world. I exist separate and apart from anything any one person could think of me. No one else could grant me access to my life like I could. That realization turned my life around. I started to get to know myself and with time I realized what my unique value was.

As you move forward in this journey of self-discovery and self-leadership, remember that the foundation is built upon recognizing and validating your intrinsic worth—independent of others’ perceptions or judgments. Each of us has unique qualities, strengths, and experiences that define our personal value, and it’s essential to own and honor these. While we may sometimes seek validation from the outside world, true growth and confidence come from within. Cultivating self-awareness and self-validation allows us to set our own standards and, ultimately, to lead our lives with greater purpose and authenticity.

Written by Heather R. Younger, JD, CSP. 
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