Enough & Always More: A Dialectic for Inner Peace
For as long as I can remember, I’ve struggled to feel enough. I grew up in a world that demanded constant improvement. Now, a new wave of self-acceptance—from body positivity to mindfulness apps—has emerged. These forces, to be and to become, seem at odds, but life flows smoother when they come together. The question is, how?
Consider these two statements:
I am enough just as I am.
I am forever committed to evolve, adapt, and grow.
At first glance, they seem to contradict each other. If I’m truly enough, why keep pushing to improve? And if I’m always evolving, can I ever really feel content? This tension lies at the heart of the human condition—the pull between self-acceptance and self-actualization.
Resolving this paradox is about learning to integrate the two—being and becoming—without letting either dominate. So let’s try to make the two sentences into one by adding the right word:
"I am enough just as I am ________ I am forever committed to evolve, adapt, and grow."
Of the many words I’ve scribbled, they all reduce to two. Though, if you discover another, I’d love to hear it.
Some people are SO people. In this view, both statements are true independently: SO people are enough as they are. SO people accept and expand—from a foundational love, they can grow, not out of lack, but as abundance. Growth becomes an act of gratitude built upon what already is.
Other people are BECAUSE people. As one of them, this path didn't feel like a choice; it felt like how I survived. BECAUSE people struggle to accept that simply by existing, they are enough. BECAUSE earns through expansion—it is from their commitment to pushing ever higher that BECAUSE people extract their sense of self. As Camus reflected on Sisyphus: “...the struggle itself towards the heights is enough to fill a man’s heart.”
SO and BECAUSE end in roughly the same place, but from opposite directions. SO sprouts from self-love and expands outward. BECAUSE brute-forces self-love through commitment to truth and toil.
Filling the gap at all—with SO or BECAUSE—is a big step. There is no more tragic a life than one spent too ambitious for acceptance yet too accepting for ambition.
Still, both paths come with risks. SO thinking can slide into complacency—contentment without challenge dulls the appetite for adventure. BECAUSE thinking, on the other hand, can burn too hot. If your worth is predicated on progress, pausing feels painful.
What works best for me is switching between lenses. When I’m overwhelmed, I start by reminding myself I’m enough (because that’s harder for me), and then shift to asking if I’d feel better earning self-love through action. First, recognize the two paths. Then, assess which one you tend to take. Finally, do your best to walk both—while we may end in the same place, how we get there matters.