Tricia asked me the following question:

"Dear Dr. Margaret, I was raised by parents who never affirmed me, and who were highly critical of me. I discovered Inner Bonding a couple of years ago and it's helped me tremendously, even helping me to stand up against their judgment and criticism and to reduce my contact with them. Recently I made a big change, moved to New York City and embarked on a project that ended in failure. I made the mistake of telling my parents what I was working on when things appeared to be going smoothly and even then I could hear in their lack of response that they didn't believe in me. I'm having difficulty picking myself up again because all I can hear is my father telling me 'I knew it wouldn't work out.' Ever since I had to cancel the project I'm stuck and fearful that I'll always be a failure and don't know what questions to ask my inner child to help her through this. Could you please help? Thanks so much."

Tricia, you are stuck because your wounded self is telling your inner child the lie that you will always be a failure, and your inner child is suffering because of this lie. Are you 100% certain that this is the truth? I'm certain that if you think about it, you will realize that you can't know this to be the truth.

The kinds of questions you need to ask yourself are about what you can learn from this situation.

• What choices did I make that led to the lack of success of this project?
• What choices could I have made that would have made a difference?
• Were there factors outside of my control that contributed to this failure?
• What does failure mean to me?
• Why do I believe I will always be a failure?
• How do I treat myself around my parents that is causing me problems?
• Was I looking for their approval when I told them things appeared to be going smoothly?

You might also want to give your little girl some approval and appreciation, such as:

• I love that you were wiling to take the risk of doing this project.
• It's less important to me that it failed than the fact that we were willing to make the effort.
• I love you for the efforts you make, not for the outcomes.
• You had a lot of courage in doing this project, and now we can learn from it so we don't make the same mistakes next time.

It’s vitally important that you stop defining your worth in terms of success or failure.

Instead, define your worth by the effort you are willing to make, and by your intrinsic qualities – such as courage, kindness, caring, compassion and a willingness to learn. You are stuck right now because you are defining yourself by the outcome rather than by your courage.

You are also stuck because you have integrated your parents' judgments and lack of affirmation into your wounded self – which we all do. This needs to be healed through your Inner Bonding process. You need to shift authority over you from your parents and your wounded self to your higher self. It is your spiritual guidance who has the truth about you – not your parents or your wounded self.

You will get unstuck when you make it okay to fail and you see failure only as a learning experience, rather than as a definition of your worth.

Join Dr. Margaret Paul for her 30-Day at-home Course: "Love Yourself: An Inner Bonding Experience to Heal Anxiety, Depression, Shame, Addictions and Relationships."

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