Right after college, I learned this concept of 'deservability' from some video or book -- I've been applying this to my life involuntarily ever since. Recently got some really long me-time (covid19 confinement) and realized that this is an ongoing thing. Writing this down so that I remember that it helped me survive most of my PhD.
I define deservability meter as a psychological barrier that one has to overcome in order to perform a rewarding action. The barrier can only be crossed after one answers yes to "do I truly deserve X?".
I am no expert, but I think this is borderline delayed gratification, but with a catch. Every time I apply this and someone asks me "why can't you do X?", I try my best to explain and most of them don't get it.
My on-point illustration:
