Every day, every hour, every minute, you base your decisions and actions on the story about you – what is the story that you tell about yourself? Is it updated, optimistic and encouraging or is it modest, one-sided and limiting? Usually we base our story on what we have heard about ourselves from others along the way, which traits have been favored and maybe even more importantly: what was expected. What has been said about you that you have adapted as your own truth?
Stories about ourselves often follow us for way too many years and form our path, our access to opportunities and the choices we make. We form a truth about ourselves that is often based on other people’s opinions and random comments or feedback. And it is often based on historic events and experiences which might not be applicable today.
Even if the story about yourself is not self-limiting it is very often not the whole story – As if we are only playing half the tones we actually hold inside. Whether we are aware of it or not, it forms everything in our lives and careers. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
In my practice I often meet people describing their flaws in great detail: I am too fast, too slow, too detailed or too sloppy, too soft or too hard. Moreover, their vocabulary about their positive traits is very limited. I know for certain that for most people, the private talk they have with themselves about who they are is way too often something that is hindering more than encouraging the next exciting and courageous endeavor.
Maybe you are stuck in the old stories about you? Every day we have an opportunity to explore new, creative ways instead of letting the old stories chose and decide. Even if we think we will always be the same, this development is constantly taking place and all of us holds way more than we are led to believe.
So… isn’t it about time that you revisit the story you tell about you?
How to do this:
- Observe the things you say about yourself – to others and yourself – and write them down.
- Is this the story you want to be true? Is it self-limiting in any way?
- If needed, start replacing elements in your story about you so that it is made up of what you really want to be true. Remember to include what might have developed over the last decade or just few years. Don’t forget that you can include wishful thinking here, no need for harsh realisme.
- Is there something that you really want to explore – aspects and/or traits you have not yet seen in yourself that you long to display? In some ways or another most traits live in all of us.
- How can you practice these things just a little bit more today?
