How to Let Go of the Need to Be Needed by Learning to See and Accept Yourself

The simple realization that became a gamechanger.

The need to be seen, heard, and valued. Isn’t that the core motivator for most of the things we do?

It seems as though we can run ourselves into the ground quite happily as long as it is benefiting someone else. So often I hear people around me bemoaning their lack of time to spend on the things they claim they love, and I wonder to myself, perhaps they love being appreciated by others more?

It was certainly that way for me.

For years I honed my organizational skills to perfection by managing to juggle faster and faster, so I could do more and more for others. If I could make myself indispensable then I would be valued, appreciated, and ultimately loved. I wanted to be seen through rose-tinted glasses that would soften any hard edges I have and make me into whatever was needed. Rather than risk saying no and finding that perhaps I wasn’t enough to hold their attention.

I took on tasks that I didn’t have time for and offered assistance to those that didn’t need my help but would gladly take it. All to constantly renew my place in their favor. The archetype of the martyr taken to the final step. I somehow didn’t see the unsustainability until it was too late, and juggling too fast I began to drop things, big things, letting people down, and worse still the people closest to me.

That’s when the lightbulb conversation occurred. What if I wasn’t just a reflection in someone else’s eyes? What if seeing myself and accepting myself could be enough? What if I could love this part of myself that had tried to protect me from abandonment by mistakenly abandoning myself?

When we create coping mechanisms we’re usually quite young and reacting to perception rather than a reality. These management strategies are effective self-defense tools, and as we age we refine them and ingrain them within ourselves. Yet the simple act of asking the question ‘Could I do this differently?’ instantly opened a space in my chest that felt like hope.

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