In this episode, you're going to learn how to create a rich and meaningful life by learning how to focus on your values, the kind of life that you want to live.

Now, the day I was revising the draft of this section, I had an interesting conversation with one of my clients.

Brianna, which is not her real name, is a 15-year-old who's been having a hard time getting to school due to school anxiety and sleep problems.

Today we started talking about her self-esteem, and I asked her, how do you feel about yourself?

And she said, oh, I guess a five out of ten.

I said, hmm, that's not too bad. Tell me what you like about yourself. And she said, well,

I like my hair, my nose, my body. I have okay skin. And so she continues to mention a few other

physical characteristics she likes and a couple that she doesn't. And I say, well, that's interesting.

When I asked you about your self-esteem, you talked about your attractiveness.

Is that the main thing that matters to how you feel about yourself? I ask her. Oh, not at all,

she says. My personality is way more important than that. That's just the stuff I like about myself.

Oh, okay, I said, so do you like your personality? She says, uh, not really. I'm, I mean, I'm kind of mean, I'm not a very nice person. What do you mean? You seem nice enough to me, I said. What kind of personality would you like to have? What kind of traits? She said, you know, I really want to be nice. I want to help a lot of people. I want to be funny. So I asked her, you know, do you feel like those things are outside of your control?

She says, no, I just get so scared of being rejected. I mean, what if I offer to help someone and they say,

no, that would hurt? What if I'm nice to someone and they aren't nice back? I might feel sad. I just get so

scared. So I hate going to school. I never hang out with friends because I'm too scared that I might feel anxious.

So, you know, I told her, I said, you know, that makes sense on one hand, right?

Reaching out to people can feel scary. What you're telling me is that you're waiting for that fear to go away before you live the life that you value. You're basically saying,

you know, I'm afraid that I'll feel something painful if I be the person I want to be.

So instead, I'm just going to shrink back and hide, which then makes you feel like crap

about yourself in the long run. Is that about right? And she just laughed. She said,

well, when you say it like that,

you know, I've never thought about it that way. Now, this client, she thought that she was a bad

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