Second, I think there’s a sense of “worth” which you have left off, and it’s quite an important one. This is the notion of worth to someone. (This Cracked article frames the notion particularly starkly.)
Note that neither universal worth (in the “all people deserve love / dignity / etc.” sense), nor personal accomplishment (“I did 100 push-ups!”), nor absolute accomplishment (“I successfully launched a rocket”), capture this sense of “worth”. It’s not the case that all people are equally valuable to any given person or people; your personal accomplishments—while not entirely uncorrelated with your value to others—are largely unlinked therefrom; and while absolute accomplishments are, indeed, likely to be of value to someone (though there are notable exceptions even here), they may not be of value to the specific someones you care about, or want to impress, or desire recognition from, etc.
And the fact is that people are moved to give compliments, just as they are moved to do most anything else, by what they care about, what is of value to them, what they feel serves their goals, needs, plans, etc.
All of these are simply facts about the world—“is” statements, not “oughts”. Yet without a doubt there is a temptation, for some folks, to read what I’m saying as “suck it up; if you’re not valuable to others, they won’t compliment you, not matter how ‘deserving’ you may be in whatever way you feel is relevant”. That is not my intent. In fact, the policy I would recommend (and the one I follow in my own life) is, in many ways, the inverse of that harsh reply. But we have to recognize the facts before we can do anything about them.
(continuation of sibling comment)
Second, I think there’s a sense of “worth” which you have left off, and it’s quite an important one. This is the notion of worth to someone. (This Cracked article frames the notion particularly starkly.)
Note that neither universal worth (in the “all people deserve love / dignity / etc.” sense), nor personal accomplishment (“I did 100 push-ups!”), nor absolute accomplishment (“I successfully launched a rocket”), capture this sense of “worth”. It’s not the case that all people are equally valuable to any given person or people; your personal accomplishments—while not entirely uncorrelated with your value to others—are largely unlinked therefrom; and while absolute accomplishments are, indeed, likely to be of value to someone (though there are notable exceptions even here), they may not be of value to the specific someones you care about, or want to impress, or desire recognition from, etc.
And the fact is that people are moved to give compliments, just as they are moved to do most anything else, by what they care about, what is of value to them, what they feel serves their goals, needs, plans, etc.
All of these are simply facts about the world—“is” statements, not “oughts”. Yet without a doubt there is a temptation, for some folks, to read what I’m saying as “suck it up; if you’re not valuable to others, they won’t compliment you, not matter how ‘deserving’ you may be in whatever way you feel is relevant”. That is not my intent. In fact, the policy I would recommend (and the one I follow in my own life) is, in many ways, the inverse of that harsh reply. But we have to recognize the facts before we can do anything about them.