Why “Believing in Yourself” Isn’t Really a French Thing

And what France that taught me about self-worth

On the walk to his swim lesson one morning, my then-four-year-old son told me he’d decided today was the day he would jump in the pool without floaties. He’d never been the fearless type around water, so I was surprised. But when we arrived, hesitation set in. He listed every reason not to try — and I recognized the instinct immediately. It was mine.

I knelt beside him and said, “You don’t have to do it because you told me you would. But you might want to do it because you made yourself a promise.”

He thought about it. Then he jumped.

And the moment he hit the water, I realized something I had never been able to name:
he didn’t jump for praise, or for me, or for anyone watching.
He jumped because he didn’t want to walk out of the pool carrying regret.

That was the first time I understood that self-worth doesn’t come from what others see in you but from who you choose to be when no one is clapping.

Hannah Arendt wrote that we become ourselves through action, and I felt the truth of that watching him. Self-worth isn’t a feeling you wait for. You build it as you go.

For most of my life, I’d done the opposite. I’d waited to feel “ready” or “legitimate,” hoping it would appear after enough achievement. I learned early to chase praise because it felt like proof I was on the right path.

But when I was promoted to Marketing Director at 29, something unexpected happened: nothing inside me changed.

I didn’t get a corner office. I kept the same spot in the open space, the same freezing computer, the same self-doubt. The title evolved, but I didn’t. I’d always assumed success would hand me belief in myself, but instead it showed me how shaky my foundation really was.

In France, doing a good job is simply expected. There’s no gold-star culture, no inflated praise. Annual reviews are for negotiating your raise, not receiving a list of your strengths. In the U.S., praise is baked into daily life — your work, your outfit, your ambition. Approval is a currency.

France doesn’t run on that economy.

French children grow up with correction more than celebration — filer droit, ne pas se reposer sur ses lauriers — but the message underneath is paradoxically liberating: you belong by default. You don’t need to earn your place through constant performance.

Americans often describe French women as confident, decisive, immune to the need to please. I used to think they were simply born that way. Now I see it differently:
they were never trained to question their right to take up space.

I grew up between these two worlds — lifted by American enthusiasm, then cooled by French indifference. It gave me ambition, but also the habit of scanning others for reassurance before trusting myself.

For years, I assumed I was confident because I functioned well: I could work, make friends, stay afloat. But functioning isn’t the same as self-belief. I learned that the hard way. A breakup, losing a job I loved, the long stillness of Covid — each one made whatever confidence I had collapse faster than I expected. I was steady only as long as external approval was steady.

But watching my son jump — entirely for himself — shifted something in me I’d avoided for years.

Maybe we’ve misunderstood self-worth entirely.
Maybe it isn’t a reward for having done enough.
Maybe it’s simply the decision to take your own wants seriously.

Not perfection. Not fearlessness.
More like granting yourself permission to exist as you are, and to choose what matters to you without asking the world for permission first.

Motherhood made this impossible to ignore. There comes a point — in parenting, in adulthood — where you have to decide whether to keep living inside the beliefs you inherited or start listening to the ones you’re meant to grow into.

Some people make that shift early. Others never do. And some of us take years to recognize the quiet ache that tells us we’re living smaller than we meant to.

I spent most of my twenties trying to be agreeable enough, modest enough, manageable enough. I kept my dreams on low volume so no one would feel threatened by them — not realizing that the person most threatened by my own ambition was me.

Growth still feels risky. I still catch myself shrinking — choosing the smaller version of myself because it keeps the peace or because it’s familiar. But I’m learning the cost of shrinking is high. It asks you to give up the life you actually want.

Some days I forget everything I’ve learned. Some days I’m brave for five minutes and that’s all I get. But those minutes matter. They’re evidence that I’m building something sturdier than the old version of confidence I used to patch together from other people’s reactions.

Maybe the French aren’t more confident.
Maybe they just never learned to apologize for existing.

I’m learning that later than I expected.

It hasn’t arrived as a dramatic transformation. More like a quiet unlearning — catching myself when I start to retreat, choosing the thing I said I wanted even when it feels risky, listening to the part of me that’s tired of living by other people’s comfort.

I used to believe validation made me real.
Now I’m learning it works the other way around.

When I remember that I matter, I stop scanning the room for confirmation.

I’m trying. And for now, that feels like enough.

Not to banish doubt. Not to feel worthy all the time.
Just to stop handing my worth to people who were never meant to carry it.

I’d love to know — have you had to learn self-worth like me, or did it come naturally to you?

À très vite,
Pamela

More dispatches from Paris — at The Parisialite.

Stepping into the life I’ve always wanted.