Why High Achievers Keep Undercharging, Overworking & Feeling Like They’re Not Enough
Our self-worth has an origin story.
Most of us never sat down and consciously decided what we were worth. We didn’t have to. Someone did it for us.
Long before we were old enough to question it, the adults around us were handing us a story about money, worth, and how much space we were allowed to take up in the world. They did it through what they said, what they didn’t say, what they ignored, swept under the rug, or made us responsible for carrying on their behalf.
For most of us, that story became the operating system running our lives long after we left home.
This is mine.
The following is an excerpt from my book, Running in Slippers:
In my junior year of high school, I saw a Paula Abdul dance VHS at Target. I was a fan of Paula during her peak, but this was several years after she peaked. I have no idea what intrigued me about that video. Maybe it was the merchandising magic of anything sold at Target. Every day, after school, I would immediately change clothes and dance with Paula in my bedroom before starting my homework. It was fun! And as an unintended consequence, I started losing weight. I wasn’t overweight to begin with, probably one hundred and twenty-five pounds, but being an overachiever, I soon became addicted to seeing the number on the scale creep downward. I don’t remember when it became unhealthy and out of control, but I weighed only a gaunt eighty-five pounds the summer before my senior year. I was miserable — yet oddly comforted that my internal world of disconnect and lack of love now matched my external world. Living with an emotionally closed-off family who swept everything under the rug, my skeletal appearance and obsessive eating habits were the elephants in the room. One day, during the fall of my senior year, Mom approached me to say that she had scheduled an appointment for me with a therapist.
She was finally concerned about how I was feeling!
Just kidding. But my friends’ parents were concerned. They had asked Mom about my emaciated appearance, and the questions were too embarrassing for her. Her words, not mine. My friends and boyfriend, like my family, swept it under the rug and pretended nothing was wrong. I felt disconnected in all aspects of my life. As much as I didn’t want to go to therapy, I was miserable and wanted things to change. My therapist, Rose, was just as emotionally cold as the rest of my family. And for some reason, she wanted me to go to an all-girls college, which was horrifying because I fantasized about finding a hot boyfriend in college. She seemed to prefer militant interrogation over the getting-to-know-me type of conversation. Her direct style quickly revealed that I was hurting about Dad being an alcoholic and emotionally unavailable. At the next appointment, she invited Mom to our session.
“How do you feel about your husband’s drinking?”
Mom was silent. I started crying. I don’t know if it was because my emotional pain was coming to the surface or because I was absorbing Mom’s embarrassment and discomfort.
“Would you feel comfortable having a family conversation about his drinking habits and how they affect the family?”
Tight-lipped, Mom was silent. On the way home, we stopped at Dairy Queen. I think it was an attempt to feed me high-calorie food to gain weight. We sat on the curb and, as I was eating my Oreo Blizzard, she interrupted the silence of me shoveling ice cream into my starving body. “I didn’t know Dad’s drinking bothered you.”
At this point, I had zero experience having difficult conversations. On the other hand, I could chim chiminey any damn thing under the rug. Thus, I had no response and stayed silent and dissociated by concentrating on the cold, sweet ice cream melting on my tongue. It was in this pause that Mom acted upon the realization that my eating disorder was more than something within me that could be fixed and was a larger problem that would require her to do hard work too. “Do you want to keep going to therapy?”
It was emotionally painful and awkward to talk to Rose, the rigid, all-girls school interrogator. Of course, I didn’t want to go back. “No.”
“Okay.”
But the problem was that my anorexia was still very present. By this point, I felt a lot of anger toward my parents, so much so that I counted down the days until I could go away to college and move out. Mom, of course, realized this. I gained the weight back fast, under Mom’s threat that I would have to live at home and go to community college if I didn’t gain weight. Fear is a great motivator. In less than two months, I gained forty-five pounds by stuffing my face with everything in sight. Mom was happy, but I felt fat, disgusting, and out of control. I went back to counting down the days until I could escape to college.
*End of excerpt
That was just one chapter in a much longer story, one that had been writing itself long before I ever stepped on a scale. And continued writing itself for decades.
Around the time of my Paula Abdul dance craze, my parents bought our family a Gateway PC. If you know, you know.
With it, we had a Carmen Sandiego game, which was super basic compared to the television show and only featured 15–20 world cities. One of those cities was Sydney, and the icon was a picture of the Sydney Opera House.
This was an era before Google and Instagram, so the only other Australian things I knew of fell along the lines of Crocodile Dundee and kangaroos. The Sydney Opera House cast Sydney in a non-whimsical way, yet this realistic version still seemed out of reach in this lifetime for a 17-year-old living in the Midwest.
The first time I saw the Opera House in person in 2023, I could feel a strong sense of pride for showing up for myself and giving 1997 Angie this opportunity to explore the earth.
But it was about way more than the Opera House. I had survived things that were supposed to break me. I survived almost dying.
High School Angie, who weighed 85 pounds, had no one coming to save her, so she saved herself.
When I finally stood in front of the Sydney Opera House twenty-six years later, I realized how proud I was of becoming the adult that seventeen-year-old Angie needed.
I didn’t get the mother who came to save me.
I got the mother who chose her own comfort over my survival, who swept my disappearing body under the rug because the alternative required her to do hard work too.
Children don’t question their parents’ version of reality. They question their own worth.
And for a long time, I believed her choices meant something about my worth. The real problem was believing the story that I was only valuable when I was being what others wanted me to be, only lovable when I wasn’t being a burden, and only safe when I didn’t have needs.
For years, I thought healing meant fixing the behavior, like being the “right” weight, having the good job, making the money, or achieving the goal. But none of those things rewrite the story by themselves.
Standing in front of the Sydney Opera House was powerful because I realized the girl who weighed eighty-five pounds and had no one coming to save her saved herself. She gained the weight back, packed her bags, went to college, moved to Chicago, moved to Hawaii, learned how to surf, wrote a book, quit a 20+ Corporate America career to start her own business, and built a life her younger self could only glimpse through a pixelated Carmen Sandiego screen.
High School Angie believed she had to survive to deserve her life.
Adult Angie believes she deserves a beautiful life because she exists.
Our caregiver’s story was never the truth about us. The things they believed about themselves often became the stories we believed about ourselves.
And the inner work isn’t about erasing what happened. It’s about stopping the story from making decisions for the woman you’ve already become.
You don’t have to keep living inside a story someone else wrote for you.
Whatever story you were handed, about money, about worth, about whether you deserve to take up space, be seen, be celebrated, or be loved, that story is not a life sentence.
It’s just a story.
And stories can be rewritten.
Glow Tip:
This Week’s Experiment
The next time you catch yourself thinking:
“I don’t deserve that.”
“I should just be grateful.”
“I’m asking for too much.”
“I don’t want to be a burden.”
“Who am I to do that?”
Don’t argue with the thought. Don’t try to replace it with a positive affirmation. Become curious and be an Identity Detective. Ask yourself:
Who taught me this?
What happened that made this story feel true?
Because most of the stories running your life didn’t begin with you. They began with a younger version of you trying to make sense of the world.
Don’t worry about changing the story yet. Just notice it.
Because awareness always comes before transformation.
Every time you catch one of these inherited stories in real time, you’re reminding your nervous system that you have a choice.
You don’t have to keep living by rules you never consciously agreed to.
And every time you choose curiosity over self-judgment, you’re taking one more step toward becoming the woman who trusts herself, takes up space, and knows her worth isn’t something she has to earn.
Stop asking, “What’s wrong with me?”
Start asking, “What story am I living?”
Every behavior leaves a clue. Every clue points to a story. Every story can be rewritten.
And that’s what it means to shine from the inside.
Have You Ever Caught Yourself Thinking: Why Am I Like This?
If so, you are not alone.
Have you ever started drinking your morning coffee and had no recollection of making it?
That’s autopilot.
And that’s exactly how money stories work.
So, if you have ever caught yourself thinking:
Why do I have no problem spending $300 on my friend’s birthday, but feel guilty spending $75 on myself?
Why do I keep saying, “I’ll do it when I feel more confident,” but confidence never seems to arrive?
Why do I receive a bonus, tax refund, or unexpected money, and somehow it’s gone before I can even enjoy it?
Why do I overprepare for every meeting, interview, or presentation, while someone half as prepared confidently shares their opinion?
They’re clues pointing to subconscious stories that have been quietly running your life for years.
The woman who constantly puts everyone else first may be living from the story: “My needs come after everyone else’s.” The woman who can’t seem to hold onto money may be living from the story: “Money isn’t meant to stay.” The woman who waits until she’s 110% ready may be living from the story: “I have to prove I’m enough before I deserve to be seen.”
Your behaviors aren’t random. They’re evidence.
And once you learn to investigate them instead of judge them, you stop asking:
What’s wrong with me?
And start asking:
What story am I living?
That’s exactly what we’ll be doing inside The Money Story Rewrite.
A 3-Day Live Zoom Masterclass to rewrite the money stories running on autopilot behind overworking, undercharging, impulse shopping, and waiting for the other shoe to drop.
DAY ONE: Rewrite the stories blocking you from receiving money.
You’ll discover where your hidden money stories came from and why the most powerful ones are the ones you can’t yet see.
DAY TWO: Rewrite the stories blocking you from keeping and growing money.
Receiving is only half the equation.
We’ll uncover why money keeps slipping away and build a relationship with it that finally feels safe, sustainable, and abundant.
By the end of Day Two: You’ll understand why money hasn’t been staying — and leave with a practical, identity-aligned strategy to change that.
DAY THREE: LIVE HOT SEAT COACHING!
This is where everything comes alive with live coaching, real-time identity shifts, and the dismantling of limiting beliefs on the spot. Get my eyes on your EXACT situation, i.e., “My parents said they couldn’t afford dance lessons but somehow found $3,000 for my brother’s hockey equipment.”
Because you don’t need another fancy budgeting app sending you guilt-inducing notifications or another money colored Post-it note on your bathroom mirror that says, “I am a magnet for money!”
You need to stop letting an old story make today’s decisions.
If you’re ready to become the woman who trusts herself, receives more, keeps more, and moves through life from self-trust instead of self-protection…
I’d love to have you in the room.
📍 Live on Zoom • ⏰ 4–5 PM EST • 🎥 Replays Included
🎁 Attend live for a chance to win a VIP 60-minute Signature Glow Session ($380 value).
Reserve your seat: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-money-story-rewrite-masterclass-tickets-1991810398520?aff=oddtdtcreator&keep_tld=true
