Just Who Do You Think You Are? : Letting Your Accomplishments Work for You

To Be Successful in Your Career Search and Advancement, It is Important to Self-Promote  and Advocate for Yourself

Unfortunately, this is difficult for many, due to the following attitudes:

Are you overly self-critical:

• Is it difficult to recognize and give yourself credit for the positives about yourself and /or your achievements?
• Are you uncomfortable publicly acknowledging or talking about your accomplishments?
• Is it difficult to accept compliments or positive feedback?

Do you operate as a perfectionist?

• Do you seldom acknowledge and enjoy your achievements? 
• Do you feel  not __________ enough (fill in the blank; i.e. smart, pretty, nice, good, etc.)? 
• Do you feel that you can never do enough or well enough?

Do you engage in negative, distorted patterns of thinking?

• Do you over emphasize your failures and mistakes and ignore or or under rate your achievements?
• Do you view a mistake or short- coming as never ending and / or unchangeable?

Society fosters messages that interfere with a healthy sense of ourselves:

• There is often an overemphasis on external measures of our self-worth. Specifically, the message is that our worth and value is tied to what we do, our productivity and what we have (i.e. money, material possessions, status, etc.). 

• To be humble and modest; not to be boastful or conceited is often strongly encouraged. This makes us feel that we are doing something wrong by feeling good about our success.

Empirical research demonstrates that having positive and compassionate attitudes toward ourselves enhances our health and overall well-being. Happiness leads to increased professional success. 

Therefore, in order to do well and be accomplished in our careers:

• We can change our minds and treat ourselves with a reasonable sense of compassion; recognizing that we can recover from mistakes and deserve to feel good about our achievements.
• We can learn to embrace our accomplishments as reflections of our positive qualities, skills and talents. This allows for a balanced and healthy sense of room for continued growth.
• We can strive toward success and acknowledge and receive our accomplishments that we earn and deserve.
• We can give ourselves permission to feel good about our strengths, recognizing that acknowledging and utilizing them will facilitate the success, for which we aim.