Hello everyone! 

This past summer I saw something random on social media and it said “Instead of “I’m proud of you” what about, “you should be proud of yourself”” 

That got me thinking, why don’t we say that to kids or even yourselves? Many of us rely on the validation of others. Maybe we weren’t taught that we could be proud of ourselves, maybe we don’t want to “brag”. There could be a long list of reasons why we focus on the approval of others. 

Well I’m here to tell you, YOU should be proud of yourself! For everything you’ve accomplished. 

Of course it feels great to hear “I’m proud of you” from someone you care about or look up to but when we don’t get that validation, we feel hurt… so why not be comfortable and secure being proud of yourself? 

Recently, I made some big changes in my life for the better and I was seeking that reassurance from people around me instead of reassuring myself that… yeah I’m doing this and I’m doing great! (Also, imposter syndrome we can dive into another time) 

Now it’s hard to break that habit for ourselves as adults but what if we could change the narrative for the kids? Now I’m not saying that we can’t say “I’m so proud of you” but why not add some new phrases so they know that even if they got a B on that test, they know they worked hard and that’s something to be proud of too! 

Here are some phrases I want to incorporate not only with my niece and nephew but also my adult friends! 

“I see the progress you’ve made”
“You should be so proud of yourself!” 
“You grew a lot from that experience” 
“That took a lot of work” 

Here is one of the many links I found that helps shift the narrative, this is more focused on children but I’m here to say it can go a long way for adults too!

You should be so proud of yourself for all your hard work because I am! 

Take care of yourself.
Love, Carrie Danger