Discounting

 One of the most exciting words for a true-blue shopper to hear is the word “discount”.  It seems to accelerate the blood flow and one’s adrenalin brings forth lots of excitement and anticipation of paying less for something of a greater value or price.

For many people, receiving something at a discount is a very positive experience.  This is generally true when one is discussing merchandise and other material items.  Some people even handle their dislike of aging by stating how much money they save with ‘senior discounts’.

However, the word discounting can take on an entirely different viewpoint when it is used to describe emotional feelings, thoughts and behaviors within a human being.  Do we take a concept that we believe is positive in the commercial world and turn it into a less healthy concept within our personal emotional world?

If one talks with many counselors, we may find that many issues such as anxiety, depressions, frustration, etc. often have a discounting component in their causations and dynamics.  My experience tends to confirm that the discounting of self with many people creates various types of emotional pain within the individual and frequently in their relationships with other people.

What is emotional discounting?  Naturally it comes in many forms with so many unique individuals in our society and the degree of intensity can also vary from person to person. 

Basically, personal discounting is a feeling, belief, attitude, or behavior in which we see ourselves as not measuring up to the true value of a standard or goal we or others have set for ourselves and/or other persons.   Since the ‘true value’ of some part of our emotional self has not been met, we tend to see it as being discounted (worth less) from that real value.

Part of being in our society is learning to judge and be judged.  We are informed early in life by parents, family, school, friends, employers, etc.  that we are to establish expectations of others and ourselves. 

If we meet these expectations, we consider ourselves to be successful.  If we do not, then we tend to ‘discount’ ourselves with labels like failure, unsuccessful, inadequate, frustrated, etc.  These labels that we use on ourselves tend to lead us to see ourselves as not being as valuable as those who are successful (in our minds) and, therefore, we are discounted individuals – at least in the area where we have not paid the expected value/price.

Like any repeated behavior, discounting one’s own value can become a habit and easily spread to many areas of our emotional lives.  We can become anxious or depressed when we see our personal value as being discounted from our expectations.  We can become frustrated when our habits are not easily changed when our expectation is that those persons with full value can do so.  We convince ourselves to pay a cheaper emotional price for our efforts and accomplishments because we are not a full-value person.

Discounting self often leads to negative affirmations of who we are and what we can and cannot do.  How can anyone expect us to be as valuable as those who are of full value?  Why would anyone pay attention to be with me and my average intelligence when they can get a full-valued person who is bright?  

Doesn’t our society show us on a daily basis that we consider beautiful persons to worth full value and others who are not beautiful to be discounted and of less value?  Do we not see that these full-valued beautiful persons are worthy of a bonus in our time, attention, dating, promotion, etc?  Do we value cute children as having more value than those of less physical attractiveness?

Being a habit, developing a positive affirmation of our self just as we are is most difficult for most of us.   To easily change our attitudes and behavior into positive affirmations of being persons of  full value takes a strong amount of determination, expended energy and the desire to manage this change in ourselves.

As always, the choices we make in managing our lives are ours.  We are the ones who decide the emotional price to be paid for the value we determine ourselves to be worth.

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