You have tendencies of dismissing yourself as well as other things. You believe that you are not good at what you do because you are not trained. Yet, were a barber for 20 years. And you are a chef now. You have always had customers willing to pay money for your services. I bet that you have even undervalued what you do. A haircut can make people feel special. It can make them feel human instead of a mess. A lovely meal can bring a smile to someones face and fill their belly. Food is essential to life. If they didn’t eat well their mood would drop and their performance at work would suffer. You have helped a lot of people and I bet you don’t even recognize that. I would say that the quality of your work speaks for itself and the thing is that if you want to learn something you can. You don’t have to necessarily go on a course, but you can if you like. There are lots of successful people out in the world who don’t recognize their worth because they lack qualifications. I think it’s really unfair that society pushes this on people. You know, only the generation before you grew up learning on the job with very few qualifications. I have met lots of inspirational, hardworking, highly skilled, intelligent people who don’t have qualifications and it doesn’t make them any less as people.

You dismiss the local temples as being inauthentic. Buddhism sounds like a really good fit for you. It is all about lessening suffering. I think that Roberta’s idea of visiting local temples is a great one. You can still visit the authentic ones on holiday. Buddhism has been very helpful to me for lessening suffering. If there is even a small chance it could be helpful, isn’t it worth a visit?

You dismiss enjoying food as a shallow experience. Everyone enjoys different things. It’s okay for you not to enjoy it, especially considering your job. It doesn’t mean that other people are shallow though for enjoying something that you don’t. You value spirituality, so perform Buddhist spiritual practices everyday and let it bring you a few minutes of comfort in what you find meaningful.

Evidence shows that people who are judgemental of themselves are judgemental of others. If you work on being less judgemental to others, it can also help you.

Certain behaviours have a function for us. Protecting us from things. Dismissing is one of them. It can protect us from disappointment. What if I try and it doesn’t work out? It’s not helpful? What if it takes me out of my comfort zone? Going outside of my comfort zone is scary and it opens me up to being hurt. But there are good experiences that are also missed out on. Life can surprise you if you let it.

My number one advice is to learn from the people who have been through what you have and recovered. Number two is to have good experiences and spread time with good people.