Feeling Unworthy and Intimacy

In the past, I was trained to "know my place" and to see myself as inferior. Because of this, I have trouble making friends, the pressure to be worthy of someone's friendship is prohibitive. How do I move past this?

Daniel's Response...

A deep sense of unworthiness understandably is a huge stumbling block to achieving intimacy or participating in the process of creating intimacy or friendship. Self-consciousness and pressure to feel worthy, when you believe, and were taught that you’re not, squashes spontaneity. When there is emotional baggage from your upbringing, it is not possible to enter into a fresh, new encounter with a “clean slate.” The burden of shame you carry will weigh you down. You’ll never be able to be yourself, operating in life as if from a prison cell.

One of the ways you could get through the effects of your past, i.e., your inferiority complex, is to begin to learn and apply some basic principles in your everyday encounters with other people. Opportunities will, no doubt, present themselves. Despite the challenges you’ll inevitably face, you could still get yourself mentally, emotionally and spiritually prepared in such a way that you’ll be able to walk away from the encounter feeling better about yourself regardless of the outcome, regardless of whether it turned out the way you had hoped. “Knowing your place” is a conditioned internalized belief that can be undone by a clear sense of purpose. Read my book, Relational Recovery Empowering the Transformation of Relationships.

You are right though, that the application of principles in the real world is limited to the extent that that deep festering wound has healed, or, at least is being addressed in therapy. Ultimately you must embrace that part of yourself that is above, or can get above your conditioning, internalized shame or training (as you put it); that knows from within the truth, and begin to act in a way that is in keeping with that truth. You are really not much different that anyone else needing love and searching for a deeper connection that continues to elude them. I won’t venture a guess as to how many of you there are.