Lewis Hamilton’s Lessons on Self-Value

Lewis Hamilton is a Formula 1 racer born in Stevenage, Hertfordshire, England, in 1985. By age six, he was showing a preternatural gift for racing remote-control cars, so his father bought him a go-kart.

After participating in and winning karting championships, Lewis joined the McLaren Young Driver Programme, securing his place in the Formula 1 pipeline. He ascended the proverbial ladder of open-wheel racing in Europe. In 2007, McLaren promoted him to the Formula 1 team. Since then, he’s won multiple Formula 1 World Championship trophies.

Self-value is the belief you are worthy of respect, love, and well-being. Self-value is different than selfishness or self-absorption. A healthy sense of self-worth means you feel confident discussing your perspective with others.

Your perspective encompasses your personal outlook on a given situation and on life in general as a result of the unique experiences, including your childhood experiences, you’ve endured as a human being. Learning how to be comfortable sharing your perspective with others is an important step toward developing and reinforcing healthy self-esteem and a strong sense of self-worth.

A healthy sense of self-value allows you to approach everyone else in your life—family, friends, colleagues—with self-confidence and feelings of dignity. With this as your bedrock, you can commit to self-care and let go of negative thoughts. Focus instead on your positive qualities and work toward your personal and professional goals with self-compassion and high self-esteem.

Valuing your unique perspective begins with developing self-love and practicing self-acceptance since you and you alone determine your value in the world. Here, Formula 1 racer Lewis Hamilton reveals lessons he’s learned from sharing his perspective in the world of racing:

• Commit to the search. Claiming your worth is an ongoing project, and it’s a challenge. But Lewis’s story suggests that it’s not only possible—it’s essential. Before you can strive for success and fulfillment, you must find that place inside yourself that feels certain of a central truth: I am, and that is enough, and I can. If you’re dedicated to the search, you’ll discover what confirms (and feeds) your feelings of inherent value. “There are a few people I looked up to when I was … young,” Lewis explains. “One of the things I thought of Muhammad Ali was, one, he looked like me, so he showed me that it's possible for someone like me to be able to succeed at something. … He would say, ‘I'm gonna go out there and win,’ and I think those were … positive affirmations. The lesson … for me was speaking positively. Telling yourself you can do it. … That's what I tell myself.”
• Continue to push. Lewis brings to the forefront a dialogue about diversity in his field. During the 2020 Styrian Grand Prix post-race ceremony, Mercedes-AMG engineer Stephanie Travers joined Lewis in the winner’s circle to accept a trophy on behalf of the team; in that moment, she made history as the first Black woman to ever set foot on a Formula 1 podium. “It’s the first time I’ve been up there with anybody else of color,” Lewis says of celebrating alongside Travers. At the same time, commentary surrounding the moment made him acknowledge the work that lies ahead. He adds, “At one point, someone said, ‘Oh, see? Diversity.’ And I was like, ‘You're kind of getting it. But it’s still a long way to go.’”
• Cope with failure. Lewis spent more than a decade climbing the ladder to Formula 1, frequently joining new series. Sometimes, he won the championship in his rookie season; other times, he came in fifth or twentieth. One year, he crashed so much he wondered whether he had what it took to race professionally. “I slip up every now and then,” Lewis says. “You don’t have to be perfect … It’s about being on the journey and learning from the lessons.” Build self-esteem so your feelings of self-worth do not fluctuate according to your personal wins and losses. That way, even if external factors result in imperfections or impede your progress toward your goals, you will still love yourself and be able to celebrate your efforts.
• Do the ongoing work. People will doubt you. Don’t let their negativity influence your interior voice or make you feel like you’re not worthy of love. Instead, find ways to reconnect with your superpower, then reaffirm your confidence and push away any self-doubts. Make your worth into an inexhaustible wellspring that’s always at your disposal. Of course, none of this is easy. But it can be done. As Lewis says, “The most important thing that I’ve learned is investing in you, investing in yourself—that’s not about spending money on yourself, it’s about taking care of yourself, looking at what’s gonna benefit you in the long run.”
• Turn worth into strength. Since his earliest days racing go-karts, Lewis has been one of the very few Black people—or the only Black person—on his team. Taunts and abuse followed him into motorsport’s highest ranks; when he made his Formula 1 debut in 2007, fans arrived at the circuit wearing racist costumes. Lewis didn’t say anything. Neither did his team or the race officials. The flip side of claiming your worth, he now suggests, is accepting you might not be like anyone else around you, including your peers, and making the choice to embrace yourself regardless. “If you feel like you don’t fit in, that’s not a weakness. That’s a strength,” Lewis emphasizes. “It took me a long time to realize, as a youngster, coming through school and coming to those kart races, that being different was not a bad thing at all.”

Winning takes more than skill—just ask Formula 1 driver Lewis Hamilton. Learn how Lewis remains motivated and overcomes challenges when you sign up for the MasterClass Annual Membership.