I have been told throughout my life that I was strong willed and most definitely, stubborn. Both have definitely gotten me into trouble and gotten me where I want to go in life. Because of this I have been able to help others use these parts of themselves as strength and not a stumbling block. My personal goal is to have each person that comes into my office leave with a sense of empowerment.
So how do you do that? How do you leave with a sense of empowerment and how do you stop listening to outside messages?
First, let’s take a look at what you believe about yourself and the message- is it really true? Do you deserve whatever it is telling you? If a friend said this to you would you still be friends with them? So first, is this really true? Well, you might answer yes, probably, right? I mean otherwise you wouldn’t listen to it and follow it. And if it is a negative message you probably think you deserve something bad from it, as harsh as that sounds, I find that people who come into my office with big wounds because of negative voices believe what it says and believe they deserve it!! Ugh. I don’t think you would be friends with this person at all, so why keep believing it and repeating it?
Second, whose voice is it? Most people, when I ask that question, say it is theirs however, I have found through a lot of digging that the voice is someone/something else. Not theirs. If it was truly theirs, it would be positive and helpful. See when we try to “swallow whole” outside messages from other people the message often becomes twisted. Something like- “You should wear that more often” can sound like “You don’t look good in other clothes” or “You should be nice” can sound like “You are a bad person”. Now, you might be thinking, well it is up to me to not think this way. Which is true, however, until you start to explore and question you will be living with a bunch of “shoulds” in your life.
Now, of course some messages that come from others are really helpful and give a lot of value to our lives. Exploring what our bodies say to us when we hear an outside message is crucial; something like does our stomach sink, or does our heart rate speed up or how is your breath? These could be warning signs. Then exploring what comes next, what kind of thoughts do we have and most important- whose voice comes with these thoughts. With just these few steps you will be on your way to finding what is going to benefit you most and which messages to stop listening to.
