What is your real value or worth?
Your value is not about how much you are actually paid, that's your end result. Your real value is about your skills, knowledge, abilities, and experience but above all its about your self confidence. Are you using yours to your advantage? If you've never thought about yourself in this way before, now is the time to start. We are moving rapidly into the age of 'information wealth', and you need to manage your personal capital by taking what you know and making it pay for you.
The dictionary has quite a few definitions of the word 'value' the more relevant ones to us in this business context are:
The quality (positive or negative) that renders something desirable or valuable.
The amount (of money or goods or services) that is considered to be a fair equivalent for something else.
The degree of importance you give to something.
Value, generally speaking, is based on perception, either yours or someone else's and at the end of the day, you are probably trying to get that other person to accept your perception whether it be monetary or otherwise. But how do you feel about your value?
Abraham Maslow described two kinds of esteem needs - the need for respect from others and the need for self-respect. Self-esteem entails competence, confidence, mastery, achievement, independence, and freedom. Respect from others entails recognition, acceptance, status, and appreciation. Without the fulfillment of these needs, we feel discouraged, weak and inferior. Both of these types of respect have a big impact on our ultimate business success both in getting the right type of work and being paid what we are really worth.
I discussed some of this in Have You Got Your Price Right? but in this article I want to focus on the Law of Attraction and how you can use it to build your value. It is really a five step process necessary to build your self esteem and thus your value.
Step One
Think Big and then Think Even Bigger. Imagine yourself achieving everything you want and more. Don't allow your logical mind to limit your thoughts by analysing them and giving reasons why you can't have them. When you have these big dreams in your mind, let your thoughts go to even bigger ones.
Step Two
Do Your Homework, don't just pick figures out of the air. You need to know what the current climate is in your business but this is only a basis of what you can charge. For example in every profession there a people earning millions of dollars from that profession and people doing it for nothing. What is making the difference? Find out, do your homework but I would suggest it is based on their self-confidence.
Step Three
Challenge your Comfort Zones in all areas. The best piece of advice I received many years ago was to break a comfort zone every day. It is a fantastic way to learn. While ever we remain in our comfort zones doing the same thing we are not learning and of course learning builds our self confidence and our value.
Step Four
Daily Visualisations and/or Affirmations. Can you see yourself already achieving your dream? How does it feel? Developing the real emotions of having attained your value is an important part of the process and self-talk in the form of daily affirmations will allow your mind to become comfortable with the idea and motivate you positively to make it happen.
Step Five
Act As If you already have it. When you do this it is only a matter of time before you actually achieve it.
When you follow the five step process and see, feel and imagine your real value, you will experience the joy of your true worth.
