When You’re Out of Alignment (And Don’t Even Know It)

The other day I was listening to an episode of The School of Greatness podcast with Lewis Howes, and his guest Brendon Burchard said something that seriously stopped me in my tracks.

He was talking about being in alignment with yourself. And I don’t know why, but that hit me so hard. Like… yes. That’s it. That’s the thing I didn’t even realize I’ve been craving—alignment.

Because let’s be honest, a lot of us are not in alignment. We’re doing what we think we’re supposed to do, trying to be who we think we’re supposed to be, chasing all the things we think will make us feel fulfilled. But underneath it all, we’re off. We’re disconnected. And the craziest part is—we don’t even know it most of the time.

Especially now (and yes, I know I sound like I’m 100 years old when I say this), but especially now—we’re drowning in information. Notifications, social media, news, fake news, opinions, pressure, comparison… it’s non-stop. And it chips away at us. It makes us question ourselves, doubt ourselves, believe we’re not enough, that we’re doing it wrong, that we’re too much or not enough or just plain lost.

We’re told to “just be ourselves,” but then everything we see makes us wonder if ourselves is good enough.

And look—I’m not trying to be cynical here. I’m not saying everything online is fake. But we do know that most of what we see is the highlight reel. The curated version. People aren’t posting the arguments, the anxiety, the money stress, the self-doubt, the “I’m barely hanging on” days. They’re posting the beautiful vacations and the cute outfits and the happy moments—and sometimes those moments are real. But a lot of the time, they’re carefully staged. And when we compare our messy, unfiltered lives to someone else’s polished version, it’s hard not to feel like we’re failing.

And that brings me back to alignment.

We can’t be in alignment when we’re constantly trying to meet someone else’s standards or prove ourselves to people who don’t really see us. But it’s hard to break that cycle—especially when deep down, we’ve been carrying around old wounds we’ve never even named.

The other day I came across a sentence in an article that hit me straight in the face:
"If you sought validation from the wrong places and people, it’s because you were never given the love you deserved."

Oof.
That was me. That is me.

I spent so much time chasing validation—from people I had no business chasing it from—because I didn’t know how to love myself. I had trauma, hurt, confusion I never processed. I didn’t even know I needed to process it.

Like… I still remember inviting girls over for a sleepover in grade school—girls I thought were my friends—and they completely trashed my room. Threw my clothes everywhere. Just wrecked everything. And I remember laughing along, thinking we were having fun. But we weren’t. They were making fun of me. And that moment stuck.

Or the fact that I never got asked to a single high school dance. I played it cool, acted like I didn’t care. But the truth? I felt like a loser. I felt invisible. And that stuck too.

All those moments—they added up. They built a story in my head that I wasn’t lovable, that I had to earn love or attention or worth. And that story pulled me further and further out of alignment with who I actually am. It made me small. It made me hide. And it made me vulnerable to people who took advantage of me, because I didn’t know I deserved better.

And here’s something I’ve learned the hard way:
When you’re vibrating low—when you feel unworthy, ashamed, not enough—you will attract things and people that match that energy.

We attract what we believe we deserve. Let that sink in.

So how do we get back in alignment?

We do the work. We get honest. We dig into the parts of ourselves we’ve buried. We give attention and compassion to the wounds we’ve ignored. And we start shifting the story.

Because when you start to heal? When you start to own your worth and stop hiding your hurt? Your whole energy shifts. And that’s when the real magic happens. That’s when you start attracting what actually aligns with your true self—your purpose, your people, your joy.

It’s not easy. It’s messy and emotional and sometimes painful. But it’s also beautiful.
It’s coming home to yourself.

And you are worth that work.
All of it.