I am good because…
I am good because…
This is the question that will drive us, will move us, and push us to conquer, to go above and beyond, to make every person around us happy. We are conditioned to look to external factors to assist us in answering this question. This is most likely because the first place we look in the process of developing a sense of self are our parents.
Parents, however, are human and don’t always notice the moments when their children are seeking self-building validation. If they are lucky, they get the chance to guide these moments. When we do something well, we hear “good boy” or “there’s my good girl.” When they leave us with someone, they tell us “be good,” or “make good choices.” When we fail, we are told to “do better.” So being good can mean pleasing our parents, complying when they don’t reciprocate, or when their actions don’t communicate “you are good,” a split can form.
A split is a mental or emotional division within how we experience ourselves. An example would be if a child asks, “Can I please have a snack?” and the parent replies, “Well, you asked so nicely, of course you can have a snack!” That child learns, if I ask for things, I will receive them. However, if the child approaches their parents differently and says, “I want a snack,” and the parent reacts negatively, stating, “You want a snack? We are about to eat dinner. Who do you think you are wanting a snack? You think these things grow on trees?” the child learns, if I ask for things, I’m not good.
As a parent, I have experienced both positive and negative reactions in similar situations. We are all flawed human beings, trying our best, yet to our children we are superheroes, the most valuable people in their world. Splits will happen, and if we are lucky, we get the opportunity to manage them.
As we grow older, that form of external validation shifts from our parents toward our friends. The question “Am I good? Am I acceptable?” emerges. It can feel like standing on a stage where everything we do, and do not do, is judged harshly, leaving us either basking in the adulation of acceptance or fearing being an outsider. Adolescence is a perpetual period of threading the needle: trying to be seen yet invisible at the same time. This process, called egocentrism, is natural within development. Our attention starts focused almost entirely on ourselves as we begin to notice and stake a claim in the outside world.
In this process of self-regard, as we seek to answer the question “I am good because,” we start to tell ourselves stories about others, about ourselves, and about our perceived shortcomings. We try on different looks and personas, experimenting with who we think we might be, hoping it will make us more acceptable, make us “good.”
This inevitably leads to comparison with those we believe “are good” and searching for ways to be held in the same regard. Cultural touchstones define what success looks like: romantic relationships, the car we drive, the college we attended, our careers. Milestones—getting married, having a good job, buying a house, having children—become shorthand for worth. We insulate ourselves with external factors that we believe provide value and recognition.
There is a story of a woman making Easter dinner for the first time. She and her husband had married that year and were hosting his entire family: his mother, grandmother, and great-grandmother. Amid the stress of preparation, her husband made an urgent request: “When you make the ham, we have to cut off the edges. My mom always does it that way, and it is always so good.” She complied to please him, though she didn’t quite understand why. Later, she asked her mother-in-law why the edges mattered. The reply: “That’s how my mother always did it, and it is the best.” She asked the grandmother, who gave the same answer, and finally the great-grandmother: “I couldn’t fit it in my oven any other way.”
Like the ham, the roles we take on—spouse, parent, provider—can dominate our view of self and become defining traits. From a young age, when asked about a career, we are often asked, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” Rarely are we asked, “What do you want to do?” The focus on being, on fitting in, on pleasing others, can pull us away from the core of who we are. Steve Jobs once said, “Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life”¹. Unless we pause to examine the roles and traditions handed to us, we risk living from someone else’s definition of “good.”
Many of the individuals I meet appear very successful “on paper.” They seem externally “good,” yet they feel empty, fraudulent, or imposter-like. The weight of their roles can lead to anxious, depressive, or codependent behaviors. Who we are outside these roles often feels lost, and the foundation we have built becomes a house of cards, vulnerable to the slightest breeze. Our roles bring value, but the weight of them can crush us when we are unsure who we are without them. We end up in a trap, relying on external validators to tell us, “I am good.”
I was once asked, “CJ, you are a husband, father, and a therapist. Those are your roles. I am not sure there is much beyond that.” Offended, I replied, “I am more than those things. I am.” The silence that followed made my heart sink. My entire value had been wrapped up in how well I performed these roles. Seeking validation from others created feelings of insecurity, irritation, and sadness when I did not feel seen, heard, or noticed.
The work I do with clients is to approach this central concept: being able to answer for themselves, “I am good because.” The process of affirmation can feel awkward, even cliché. However, clichés exist for a reason—they are often true. Brené Brown writes, “Owning our story and loving ourselves through that process is the bravest thing that we will ever do”². Affirmation and self-recognition can feel uncomfortable at first, but they are central to grounding ourselves.
Our roles provide clues to our core essence. For example, as a therapist, husband, and father, I am insightful, creative, compassionate, driven, confident, kind, persistent, determined, reliable, loving, encouraging, and validating. I cannot depend on anyone else to communicate that to me; it would be exhausting and unfair. External sources should only provide encouragement, not validation.
Gratitude is a critical practice in answering “I am good because.” Gratitude is not fealty or submission but recognition of how we have shown up. For instance, I am grateful I have electricity. Florida summers without AC would be unbearable. How did I get electricity? I earned it. I work to receive income and provide for myself and my family. From this, I can recognize that I am skilled, responsible, determined, and persistent. Gratitude leads to affirmation, and affirmation leads back to gratitude—they are inseparably linked.
Clarifying intention is essential. Actions motivated by honor emerge from alignment with who we are, not from the desire for external praise. As David Schnarch explains, differentiation means being able to “hold onto yourself in the face of pressure, but also being able to stay close to the people you love without losing your sense of self”³. And Viktor Frankl reminds us, “When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves”⁴. If I do something kind, it is because I am kind. If I show compassion, it is because it is the right thing to do. External recognition is welcomed but not required. Brené Brown captures this tension well: “Fitting in is about assessing a situation and becoming who you need to be to be accepted. Belonging doesn’t require us to change who we are; it requires us to be who we are”⁵.
When our actions are rooted in honor, not external validation, we can confidently answer: I am good because…
Footnotes / References
Jobs, S. (2005, June 12). Stanford commencement address. Stanford University.
Brown, B. (2017). Braving the wilderness: The quest for true belonging and the courage to stand alone. Random House.
Schnarch, D. (1997). Passionate marriage: Keeping love and intimacy alive in committed relationships. Henry Holt and Company.
Frankl, V. E. (1946). Man’s search for meaning. Beacon Press.
Brown, B. (2017). Braving the wilderness: The quest for true belonging and the courage to stand alone. Random House.