The Price of Feeling Worthy
Have you ever hesitated to spend money on yourself—but not even blinked when it came to your kids, your partner, or your work? In this episode of Unfolding, I’m diving into the worthiness wound—why it runs so deep, how it shows up in everyday choices, and what Human Design can reveal about the stories we carry about proving our value.
From the pressure to be the “good one” to the resentment that simmers beneath over-commitment, this episode invites you to gently examine your relationship with self-worth—especially if you have an undefined Ego Center or resonate with Gate 18 energy.
✨ Want to explore your own Human Design chart?
Book a free session with me at ericavoell.com/intro-new and let’s uncover what your chart says about your worth—and what’s not yours to carry anymore.
Resources Mentioned:
Transcript
Welcome to the Unfolding podcast.
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:I am Erica Voell.
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:I am a Decision Mentor and an Inner Trust
Guide, and I work with women mainly those
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:in midlife – trust their inner guidance,
understand their unique strengths, and
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:stop saying yes to what drain them.
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:Using Human Design coaching and reiki,
we clear the noise so that their no
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:feels powerful and their yes feels true.
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:You know how sometimes you'll
have a conversation with
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:a friend and things keep.
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:Popping up in your world that
remind you of that conversation.
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:I'm not talking about the weird
ads that suddenly appear in
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:Facebook or your Instagram feed.
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:I'm talking about someone else mentioning
the same thing to you that was not
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:part of the original conversation.
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:Or you see an article headline or you're
listening to your favorite podcast and a
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:guest starts talking about the same thing.
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:I know you've had these experiences.
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:Well, I've had that same
experience with the last few
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:podcast episodes I've recorded.
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:I recorded them.
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:I published them and then out of
nowhere, something completely related
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:comes up in a conversation with someone.
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:Someone who doesn't even listen
to the podcast, most likely.
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:So I'm taking it as a sign that I'm
not done talking about this subject
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:because it keeps coming up several
times in several different places.
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:It's happened after the last few
episodes about self-help books and
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:strategies and advice, and with the
expectations and the disappointments.
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:And maybe it's 'cause I need to learn
it more than you need to hear it.
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:Isn't that the case for most things?
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:I was at a gathering recently and the
conversation turned to spending money
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:on ourselves and it hit me again, this
is all connected, the wrong strategy,
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:the expectations and worthiness.
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:Someone said she had no problem
spending money to send her kid to
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:summer camp, but has a really hard time
spending that kind of money on herself.
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:Spending $600 on herself feels
unheard of, but she's willing
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:to spend that for summer camp.
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:Not for a retreat for herself,
or even a weekend getaway, or
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:even a a hundred dollars massage.
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:I get it.
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:I do the same thing.
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:If I do spend that money, then
there's that sense of guilt.
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:That money could have gone to buy
new shoes for my kid who seems to
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:outgrow them every few months or
groceries or something more practical.
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:When you fly, how often are you
told to put on your own oxygen
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:mask before you help everyone else?
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:It's every time you fly, but how
often in everyday life do you actually
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:put on your own oxygen mask first?
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:Most of the time as women, we
don't, because we're taught.
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:Especially as women in our society to
be self-sacrificing, even if it means
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:being over committed, we need to be the
helper, or we need to be the volunteer
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:for the school trip, or we need to
contribute baked goods to a group meeting
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:to be the good one or the reliable one.
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:And deep down resentment
really starts to build.
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:And our kids, and sometimes our
partners then begin to expect us
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:to drop everything for their needs.
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:And yeah, I know when kids are
tiny, they don't know any better.
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:But I'm talking about the teens and
the tweens and the adults, that then
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:creates this expectation that they
need to be the ones catered to and
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:that their needs come before your own.
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:And we wonder why we feel so
exhausted and sometimes invisible.
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:I talk to a lot of moms who are
just like, I just feel like I'm
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:doing everything for my kids.
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:And we start to believe that our
own needs come last or worse, that
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:our own needs don't matter at all.
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:Glennon Doyle says, "Every time you're
given a choice between disappointing
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:someone else and disappointing yourself.
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:Your duty is to disappoint someone else."
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:But how often do we actually do that?
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:I would bet it's less
than 10% of the time.
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:So many of us live in this fear.
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:This quiet fear of disappointing others.
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:We're afraid of disappointing our
kids or our partners, or our bosses
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:or our coworkers because we may
not see ourselves as good enough or
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:being worthy or deserving of that
time or that money for ourselves,
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:and we don't wanna spend the money.
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:And even worse, we don't
want to bother people.
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:We don't want to take up their time.
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:And here's what I wanna say, that
story, it did not start with you.
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:It was taught to us and crazily enough.
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:It even shows up in our human design
chart for some of us proving our worth
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:shows up in the ego or the will center.
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:That's the little triangle
off center in your chart.
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:And if yours is white or open, that
means worthiness has been a life-long
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:journey and it is a life lesson.
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:You have nothing to prove and
you are worthy just for existing.
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:That belief that you're worthy
just for existing is not something
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:that we were taught as kids.
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:I do think that things are getting better
for the younger generations, but for those
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:who are in Generation X and the older
millennials, it was not taught to us.
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:It was not taught to me, and
this shows up in my chart too.
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:It explains so much about my
entire life from about age six.
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:That need to prove that I need to
feel like I need to earn my worth,
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:that my worth was tied to how
productive I was, how good my grades
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:were in school, how kind I was, and
that gift that I made for a friend.
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:I believed that the more I did for
others, the more worthy that made me
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:of their love and their friendship.
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:And as I have dug into this, I have
learned that this isn't just me.
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:This is not a story that I, the
only person that inherited many,
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:many, many, many others did.
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:I taught a recent class on the human
design centers, and I asked everyone
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:to raise their hand if they felt that
they needed to prove their worth.
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:Every person that raised their
hand, I knew exactly who they were.
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:They all had an undefined
ego center or will center.
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:People with defined egos were shocked.
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:They had no idea that their friends, their
colleagues, or even family were walking
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:around with this heavy story of that I am
not enough and I need to prove my worth.
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:This didn't surprise me.
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:This has been the story of my life.
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:And I've learned that others who also have
this undefined, that this has also been a
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:struggle for their entire life, and that's
why human design has been such a life
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:changing tool for me and for my clients.
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:It's about finally having a language
for your lived experience and knowing
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:that there is nothing wrong with you.
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:It's a language that says you are worthy
even when you're not producing, even when
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:you say no, and that rest is valuable.
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:And then take this worthiness,
but then also pair it with the
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:cosmic energy that we're in.
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:In human design.
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:There are transits a lot like astrology.
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:It's the placement of each planet and
the sun and the moon within the system.
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:In human design, think of it as a large
circle divided into 64 sections or gates,
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:and that's comes from the Chinese I-Ching.
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:And right now at the end of September
into early October, the sun is in gate 18.
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:And 18 is all about wholeness, about
seeing where we cut ourselves into pieces.
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:The parts we like, and the parts that we
hide because we think they are unworthy.
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:Every gate has a positive side or healthy
side, and a negative or unhealthy side.
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:Sometimes you'll hear it called
the wisdom and the shadow.
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:And human design coach Christie Inge
wrote in her latest newsletter about
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:Gate 18, and it just gave me chills.
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:" On the positive end of the gate
18 spectrum, she wrote, human
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:design Gate 18 is the energy for
seeing the wholeness in all things.
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:Gate 18 understands that the only thing
that needs to be fixed is the stories we
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:tell ourselves about ourselves and others.
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:"It easily sees the stories of
brokenness that are playing out in
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:the collective and helps others to
transform those stories into wholeness.
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:"And on the negative end of the
spectrum, gate 18 is the energy for
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:beating yourself up with negative
self-talk or being hyper-focused on
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:the flaws and the mistakes of others.
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:"It drives complaining, gossiping,
worrying, and needing to be right.
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:This, of course, only perpetuates
stories of brokenness."
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:Wow.
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:Like I said earlier, when I read that
it gave me chills because I've been
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:there and I actually have gate 18 in
my chart, so it feels very real for me.
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:But let's be honest, we may know
we're worthy in one area of our life,
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:but there's another part of us that
doesn't feel worthy, like thinking
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:we're not worthy of a promotion or
of spending money on ourselves or of
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:someone else's time, whatever it may be.
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:It's a story we have attached to
ourselves and it makes us feel like
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:we either need to be right in an
argument or we're hyper-focused on how
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:others are not doing it right, which,
when we dig in a little deeper, is
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:really a statement about ourselves.
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:And these worthiness stories can grow and
grow and grow under the surface until one
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:day it pops up at the most random time.
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:For me, it often happened during
performance reviews at work, I
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:would underrate myself, even if part
of me thought, "I did this really
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:well, but I didn't do a plus work.
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:I only did B plus work."
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:And it's not always about money either.
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:It shows up in the stories we
carry about not feeling seen.
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:Not feeling like our work deserves
to be shared or feeling like we
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:don't want to ask for help because
we don't wanna bother anyone.
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:It's not trusting ourselves to
be worthy of taking up space.
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:I was on a call recently with
someone and I knew I had struck a
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:nerve when I asked if she felt stuck
because she didn't feel like her work
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:was worth being out in the world.
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:She paused and shared some things
with me, and as we kept talking.
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:I noticed it really came back to worth,
but she wasn't willing to say that.
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:Who was she to take up space with
her work when there are so many
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:others doing something similar?
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:But she can only do it
with her unique voice.
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:And, and that's what this episode
is really about, that quiet voice
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:that says, who am I to want this?
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:Who am I to do this?
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:And my answer is for
me and to you, You are.
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:You are worthy of this.
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:And that's all that matters.
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:That's enough.
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:So as we wrap up today, I
wanna leave you with this.
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:Where are you feeling unworthy?
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:Is there a part of your
life that you feel unworthy?
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:Is there something that
doesn't feel quite right?
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:Is there something that you're
telling yourself that you can't do
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:or somewhere you can't go because
you don't feel like you are worthy?
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:Maybe because you feel like you
aren't worth the money, not because
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:it's impossible, but because
you don't think you deserve it.
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:I truly get having financial constraints.
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:I'm right there with you.
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:But are you spending money on
your kid or on your partner?
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:And could you set aside some for yourself
to do what you truly desire, something
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:you really want to do, something that
may help you make that next step.
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:This is something I'm
working on with myself also.
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:So until next time,
thank you for joining me.
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:If you wanna learn more about your human
design, I invite you to hop on a call with
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:me so we can talk about where worthiness
shows up in your human design chart
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:and what it says about your worthiness
story, and we'll take a look together.
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:If you love this conversation, tap
the plus sign to follow the show.
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:And if you're feeling generous,
leave me a quick review so
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:more people can find Unfolding.
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:And of course, if there is someone
you care about who needs to hear
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:this, please send it their way.
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:Be well and I'll talk to you soon.
