We spend our lives trying to correct an imagined flaw. We call it self-improvement, but it’s often self-rejection in disguise. The wound of shame whispers that something in us is fundamentally wrong. Healing begins when we realize that growth is not about becoming good—it’s about remembering that we were never bad.
The art teacher, Mrs. Chen, stood before her fifth-grade art class with paint-stained fingers and a warm smile. "Today's assignment is simple," she announced, carefully placing a fresh sheet of white paper on each desk.
"Draw something—anything—that shows me who you are"
The classroom instantly erupted into motion. Pencils scratched against paper, colored markers clicked open and started squeaking, and watercolors bloomed across pages. Tommy sketched a soccer ball mid-flight. Maria painted her grandmother's garden, petals spilling off the edges.
But in the back corner, eleven-year-old Sophie hunched over her desk, gripping her pencil so tightly her knuckles turned white. Brows furrowed, she drew a line, then erased it. Drew a circle, erased that too. Each attempt left ghost marks on the paper—shadows of ideas that hadn't quite measured up.
Twenty minutes passed. Thirty. Forty-five.
When Mrs. Chen called time, students proudly held up their creations. Soccer balls and butterflies, rocket ships and violin bows filled the air like a gallery opening. But when the teacher reached Sophie's desk, she found only a sheet of paper covered in a constellation of eraser marks—layers upon layers of faint gray smudges where drawings had once been.
Begun and abandoned, started and stopped, created and destroyed, her self depiction stood in what felt to Sophie as tatters for all the world to see. Tears welled in her eyes.
Mrs. Chen knelt beside Sophie's desk, studying the paper with the same attention she'd given the brightest paintings. "What happened here?" she asked gently.
Sophie's voice came out as barely a whisper, her reddened eyes fixed on the ghostly marks.
"I kept trying to make it better," she replied.
Mrs. Chen saw the look on Sophie's face and asked, "Tried to make what better?"
Sophie replied, "First I drew a tree, but the branches weren't right. Then a picture of me, but the eyes were crooked. Then my cat, but it looked more like a potato." Her shoulders sagged. "Nothing looked right."
Mrs. Chen held the paper up to the window light. The eraser marks created an intricate pattern, like a storm cloud, or maybe fog lifting off a lake at dawn. It was almost nothing, yet somehow it carried weight—the attempts, the doubt, all compressed into one scene.
"You know what I see?" the teacher said. "I see someone who cares so deeply about getting things right. I see someone brave enough to keep trying." She smiled. "Sophie, this might be the most honest self-portrait anyone's ever turned in."
Sophie's eyes wandered up to Mrs. Chen's face, and slowly lit up with a knowing that next time, she'd know what to draw.
When self-improvement is self-rejection in disguise
Have you ever seen Anger Management? At the beginning of the movie, Adam Sandler's character is required to go to a group therapy session to deal with his anger. There he finds Jack Nicholson's character, the therapist, who asks him "who are you?" over and over again—causing Sandler to erupt in frustration.
What is it about the question of "who are you?" that causes us to feel such frustration?
Michael Singer dedicates an entire chapter of his book The Untethered Soul to this question. He points out that every time we answer the question, we are simply pointing to some material manifestation of ego—some part of our identity that's tied to the physical world.
Who are you? > I'm Dan.
No you're not, Dan is a name. Who are you? > I'm a man
No, a man is a gender. Who are you? > Fine, I'm a human.
Wrong. You have the body of a human, but your body has regenerated itself several times since you've been born, and you go somewhere else when you dream, but your body stays where it is. Who are you?
(And on and on goes the questioning)
If any of us found ourselves in such a line of questioning, I'd imagine we'd feel just as frustrated as Adam Sandler's character in that scene from Anger Management—as if someone is just trying to screw with us.
But we know why we're frustrated.
That same frustration is what drove Sophie to keep erasing her drawings. She had a deep, inner knowing that she was not one thing, but many. She knew this so deeply, and knew her own complexity so well, that if left untended, this knowing could, over time, develop into a wound of not being enough—of never being enough for herself or others or the world.
It is in our searching for the answer of the "who am I?" question that leads many people to think they are improving themselves. They'll develop their careers to develop a career identity. They'll get married to develop a relationship identity. They'll go on an epic adventure (and post it on Instagram) to develop a social identity.
All of these identities are distractions for our core self—the soul that holds the Wound of Not Enough. It is from the pursuit of this core self that we can finally discover ourselves and our value in order to heal the wound.
The Wound of Not Enough
There are many wounds of the soul, and this is one of the most common, especially in western countries. The core feeling that the Wound of Not Enough creates is insecurity. This insecurity can manifest in many forms:
A shopaholic desperately trying to fill a void with Amazon boxes
A bombshell Instagram model finding the perfect pose to get more and more followers
An investment banker willing to do anything to make it to the top
A star student foregoing a social life in order to study
Western culture, especially in the United States, is structured around the core belief that "I'm not enough." Competition in sports, grades in school, the looming threat of homelessness and hunger, fashion and status signals, the ostracization of the poor and uneducated, and many other facets of our society all reinforce the belief that if you don't keep striving to be something you're currently not, you'll be branded a failure, lose your home, be cast out, and probably die.
The insecurity of "not enough" is rooted, as most wounds are, in fear. This particular fear is connected to two primary energy centers: our root (connected to safety) and our solar plexus (connected to identity). So the Wound of Not Enough is based in a fear of death and loss of identity—hence its power over every area of our lives.
This fear results in us doing all kinds of weird stuff in order to fit in, acting as expected, and not veering from established norms. Why would we—when the downsides are so huge?
It takes a lot of confidence to push against those norms—confidence that comes from knowing that we're sufficient and enough. And that knowing can only exist when we know who we are. How else can we escape the fear of death and loss of identity other than discovering the unbreakable, immortal part of ourselves?
Stop telling me what you are and tell me who you are
This search for our core, immortal parts is what Michael Singer talks about throughout Chapter 3 of The Untethered Soul when he asks: “Who am I? Who sees when I see? Who hears when I hear? Who knows that I am aware? Who am I?”
When no answer seems to suffice and we've gone through all of our labels, it starts to become clear that our real identity isn't something that can be nailed down. It's ineffable. According to many faiths and traditions, we each are an observing consciousness experiencing the outer world through our senses and an inner world through our conscious awareness.
Your job will change, your interests will change, and your relationship status may change. Every part of you that is based in the material world will change to some degree or another over the course of your life.
So what's left that is unchanging? What can we lean on when the last bastion of our ego—our body—finally croaks and we're put into the ground? What can we reliably say lasts?
Figuring out who we are isn't a task relegated to some personal brand workshop. It's nothing short of the purpose of our lives. In the Hindu tradition, yoga provides a process of self-discovery that leads to samadhi, or union with divine source. But you don't need to be a yogi in order to realize that you are more than your labels. You are more than what people see or expect.
When we realize this, it becomes abundantly clear how ridiculous it is to cling to the labels and expectations of others. This is the moment we find our confidence—because it is the same moment we begin to embrace the creative and changing nature of material identity. The idea of clinging to our past decisions, the satisfaction or expectations of others, money, and power suddenly becomes hysterical notions of a past version of you who was under the delusion that you weren't in fact, immortal.
Questions to reflect on
Below are a few questions related to the Wound of Not Enough that will turn over the soil of your mind. Given time and space, they can uncover blind spots, awaken new levels of awareness, and highlight areas of growth for you to focus on moving forward.
How can I stop telling everyone what you are and start showing them who you are?
What would it look like to walk through life as a fully sufficient being, sufficiently distanced from my deepest desires in order to be in control of every urge I've grown accustomed to?
How would I respond if someone asked me who I am?
What labels am I too attached to?
How am I defining myself to others in ways that are inauthentic?
