Your Results
Sherpa Level
Your score was between 20 – 29
This result suggests that you spend a great deal of emotional energy carrying what belongs to other people. Like a Sherpa, you may automatically take on the feelings, needs, problems, moods, expectations, and disappointments of others, even when part of you knows it is not in your best interest to do so.
At this level, your self-protective persona is more developed than your Authentic Self. You may know, intellectually, that you are not responsible for how other people feel, but another part of you still reacts as though you are. When someone is upset, disappointed, distant, overwhelmed, or unhappy, you may feel pulled to soothe, fix, explain, anticipate, accommodate, or take responsibility.
This does not mean you are weak. It means your nervous system has learned to treat other people’s emotional discomfort as something you must manage in order to feel safe, valued, or accepted.
You may find yourself putting your own needs aside until everyone else is okay. You may delay rest, ignore resentment, dismiss your limits, or tell yourself that your needs can wait. Saying “no,” “not now,” or “I can’t do that” may feel selfish, unkind, or risky, even when you know you are overextended.
This level often includes anxiety, self-doubt, guilt, over-responsibility, and the belief that being a good person means being available, useful, and emotionally accommodating. Your worth may feel tied to soothing, fixing, anticipating, or making life easier for others.
From a developmental perspective, the work at this level is to stop protecting the authentic self and begin supporting its development. Your needs, voice, preferences, limits, and emotional truth may have been pushed aside for so long that they need to be brought back into awareness with patience and care.
Developmental delays cause us to become stuck in adaptive patterns of behavior that prevent us from developing the capacities of our authentic self.
Become Who You Are Meant to Be
Your development is about changing the belief that you must carry other people emotionally in order to be useful, loved, safe, or valued. At this level, the work begins with recognizing the automatic stories and scripts that drive self-abandonment.
You begin by noticing the moment when someone else’s need becomes more important than your own. You identify the guilt that appears when you want to say no, the anxiety that rises when you stop fixing, or the fear that you will be seen as uncaring if you choose yourself.
This stage is not about becoming less caring. It is about learning to care without carrying. It is about recognizing that compassion does not require self-neglect, and that love does not require you to postpone your own life.
The developmental goal is to identify your core needs and begin giving them more authority in your daily choices. This means learning to name what you need, set graded limits, and create non-negotiable anchors for your well-being. You may begin with small, steady acts, such as pausing before saying yes, checking in with yourself before offering help, or allowing someone else to have their feelings without making them yours to fix.
As you practice needs-first sequencing, your anxiety begins to ebb. You start to learn that other people can be disappointed, and you can still be safe. Someone can be uncomfortable, and you do not have to abandon yourself. You can be kind without being available for everything. You can be loving without carrying the emotional load.
This stage helps you strengthen the voice of the authentic self so it can begin to lead more often than the self-protective persona. The work now is to stop making your worth depend on being needed and begin building a life that includes your own needs, limits, desires, and well-being.
Next Steps
Work With Me
At the Sherpa Level, the work is about recognizing where you automatically carry other people’s emotions, needs, problems, and expectations at the expense of your own well-being. Therapeutic coaching can help you identify the stories that drive self-abandonment, understand the guilt and anxiety that arise when you try to choose yourself, and begin strengthening the voice of your authentic self.
Explore working with me to stop carrying what is not yours and begin supporting your own emotional development.
My Approach
My approach helps you understand how the adaptive persona learned to equate safety, worth, and belonging with soothing, fixing, anticipating, and overfunctioning. At this level, we focus on bringing your needs back into awareness, developing self-respect, and practising small but meaningful shifts that help your Authentic Self become stronger than the old pattern.
Learn more about my approach to emotional development, self-awareness, and authentic change.
Book a Consultation
This result suggests that your self-protective persona may still be carrying much of the emotional responsibility in your relationships. A consultation can help you clarify where you are overfunctioning, what needs you have been postponing, and how to begin taking practical steps toward stronger boundaries, greater self-respect, and a more developed connection to your Authentic Self.
Book a consultation to begin releasing what is not yours to carry and strengthening the capacities of the authentic self.