What story do you tell yourself, your friends, your colleagues about your life? Do you quietly share your achievements, your joy, or, do you talk about your challenges, your struggles? Do you talk about a relationship that’s ended, a life that fell apart? A family who abused you? A business partner who sold their shares behind your back?
How we see our story depends of course on our perspective. Is yours one of thanks, of love … or … one of resentment, possibly bitterness?
Sometimes our story is our biggest excuse for not having the life we want. One of my clients, looking at her life story, said that her father had abandoned the family when she was 8, then later as a young teenager she had been sexually abused by her step-father, and her mother turned a blind eye to this. Her parents didn’t keep her safe; they didn’t take care of her needs. Consequently, she didn’t feel loved, valued or respected – she felt that she had no self worth and said she could never to trust.
As an adult, she didn’t trust her ability to make decisions – instead she constantly sought approval and had to do things “right” – according to what others thought was “right”. She didn’t trust the sincerity of her partner’s “I love you” and complained that the relationship was unequal, that her partner didn’t respect her. The question was how much did she love herself, how was she standing as an equal in her relationship?
The funny thing is…our excuses often feel so real and we can use them to justify whatever we feel is missing in our life. Sometimes, we almost become proud of our excuses, telling the world – look what I’ve endured!
What we need to do to get past being a victim is get clarity about the gift our past and put our past to bed! Then, we can quietly give ourselves credit for what we’ve actually achieved, and imagine what might be possible!
What new story do you want to write?
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