Does this sound familiar?
You have goals – big, soul-centred desires that you want to realize. And if you let yourself be honest about it for a moment, it feels incredible, doesn’t it?
That sense that something extraordinary is happening inside of you.
It can also feel scary.
(Real Talk: But if it doesn’t make you pee your pants just a wee bit, is it actually worth pursuing?)
You know what I’m talking about, though, don’t you? That vibration of YES within you that you KNOW is calling you to do something incredible, but it just needs to find the light of day to happen.
So you lean into the call, and you pursue it. You pursue all the things that you feel are pulling you in.
And your rise begins.
You resist it a little, but you push past all the societal pressures, your past identity and move past all of the conditioning you’ve been exposed to over the years.
And no matter how many steps forward you make, you can’t help but feel a little “activated” by the perception of where other people are in comparison to you.
Or maybe you find yourself getting disappointed in yourself about where you are (or aren’t) in life.
I bet the answer is YES – of course!!
Well, I’m here to tell you that it’s so natural to have these emotions, and I want you to know that I’ve had them so many times in my life. Those feelings don’t mean you aren’t on the right path. They mean you are growing.
But if you aren’t careful, those emotions can really derail your mental health and all your progress in reaching those big, soul-centred desires you finally decided to go after.
It can escalate into a continuous loop inside your head that tells you that you aren’t good enough. And then, suddenly, all of those vibrations of YES quickly feel like vibrations of NO.
Don’t listen to those vibrations.
When the negative emotions start to run amuck, here’s how I like to approach it:
1. FEEL all the feels.
I’m not telling you to BUY into the feelings, but I am telling you to feel all of the emotions that come from that antagonistic banter inside your head. Just settle down for a moment and lean into the thoughts:
“I’m behind.”
“I’m not good enough.”
“I’m not smart enough.”
“He/she/they do it so much better.”
“I’m so bad at this.”
2. Get curious.
Okay, now that we’ve let those thoughts freely flow through our minds (and without too much judgement, I hope), we have to start getting to the bottom of it.
Ask yourself these two questions:
What am I feeling?
Why am I feeling this?
Try teasing out the root of these thoughts by asking yourself a series of exploratory questions.
3. Resist the urge to shame or judge yourself for feeling what you’re feeling.
There’s very little room for growth when we are in shame or judgement. These thoughts and feelings only mean as much as you let them mean.
And spoiler alert, they don’t have to mean much at all.
4. Tell yourself the truth of it.
We do actually know the truth of it. When we slow ourselves down and truly ask ourselves the big questions, we can pinpoint the source of our angst.
Here are a few examples of how this type of inquiry can play out for you:
Statement: I’m being hard on myself.
Truth: “Growth takes time, and although I’d like to be further along, this is expected and reasonable to be where I am right now.”
Statement: I am resisting making the decision that I know is holding me back.
Truth: “Time to push back my resistance and make it happen.”
Statement: My thought process is holding me back.
Truth: “I need better strategies and some outside perspective around this. Time to hire a coach or find a mentor.”
We often don’t give ourselves enough credit for what we actually know about ourselves.
But here’s the truth of it:
Growth takes time.
We don’t see the work others put into their success. It’s silent. It’s behind the scenes.
It’s a combination of thousands of imperfect steps.
Try this quick strategy and see where it takes you the next time you find yourself on the continuous loop of negative thoughts.
There is so much less standing between where you are and what you want than you may believe.
