How a question could change your life

Jenny takes a sip of her coffee and tries to calm herself down. Her breathing is shallow, and her heart is racing in her chest. She feels mild panic and wishes she could just hide. Normally she is able to gather herself and give her best in stressful situations, but there’s no denying. She feels nervous, in a nervous and fearful, and not nervous and excited way. Only 30 minutes to go till the dreaded meeting. This meeting is a good chance for her to showcase herself and her value as an employee. The stakes are high and her mind goes like 100 miles an hour: “I don’t want to go, I feel so uncomfortable speaking up and standing in the foreground. I may make a mistake; the others will think I have no idea what I am talking about. They will think I am stupid. I am insignificant; nobody cares what I think. I am not a decision maker anyways. I will make a fool of myself.” The reminder on your calendar goes off, and you take a few deep breaths. It is time. You pat off your sweaty hands and get off your chair in direction meeting room. After the meeting, you feel defeated and resentful. You put on your best poker face and made sure you looked calm and confident. You even spoke a few times, but you could have done so much better! You could have shared the ideas you had, that would have helped the project. But you didn’t. The fear of making yourself vulnerable and get rejected was much stronger.

The reminder on her calendar goes off, and she takes a few deep breaths. It is time. You pat off your sweaty hands and get off your chair in direction meeting room. After the meeting, you feel defeated and resentful. You put on your best poker face and made sure you looked calm and confident. You even spoke a few times, but you could have done so much better! You could have shared the ideas you had, that would have helped the project. But you didn’t. The fear of making yourself vulnerable and get rejected was much stronger.

It is time. You pat off your sweaty hands and get off your chair in direction meeting room. After the meeting, you feel defeated and resentful. You put on your best poker face and made sure you looked calm and confident. You even spoke a few times, but you could have done so much better! You could have shared the ideas you had, that would have helped the project. But you didn’t. The fear of making yourself vulnerable and get rejected was much stronger.

She pats off her sweaty hands and gets off her chair in direction meeting room. After the meeting, you feel defeated and resentful. You put on your best poker face and made sure you looked calm and confident. You even spoke a few times, but you could have done so much better! You could have shared the ideas you had, that would have helped the project. But you didn’t. The fear of making yourself vulnerable and get rejected was much stronger.

After the meeting, she feels defeated and resentful. She put on her best poker face and made sure she looked calm and confident. She even spoke a few times, but she could have done so much better! She could have shared her ideas, that would have helped the project.

But she didn’t.

The fear of making herself vulnerable and getting rejected was much stronger.

Do you tell yourself similar stories?

How you are not good enough, not smart enough, not fit enough?

Do you have others tell you who you are and what you can and can’t do?

Do you believe those stories?

During your life, you create and collect different stories about yourself. The expectations you have about yourself, and that people that matter to you impose upon you shape that story. We cherry pick the little sub-stories that support the storyline we have subconsciously chosen and leave out many others, which supposedly don’t fit.

For example, in the story above Jenny thinks she will make a fool of herself if she speaks up in the meeting. Maybe she did speak up several times before and felt she didn’t do well. Or, someone once told her what she said was stupid. So she has this picture of herself as not being relevant enough, and she ignores all other instances where her ideas have made a positive impact.

So like a Hollywood director, she leaves out everything that doesn’t fit, and only connects the dots that draw her main storyline. The storyline of a woman who is not enough. But there are many more dots. What if we could connect the dots differently, emphasize different events, experiences and thoughts? Could we maybe end up with a better story? One that helps us live a better and more fulfilling life? Life aligned with our values, hopes and goals for the future?

Harlene Anderson says that our self is “an on-going autobiography; or to be more exact, it is a self-other multifaceted biography that we constantly pen and edit.”

How empowering is that?

It is vital to become mindful and aware of the storylines that we are unconsciously developing in ways that are not serving us.

In the story of Jenny above, she could spend the whole meeting being silent and hiding below the table and feel even more worthless afterward.

Or, she could use a simple question to turn the story around.

“What if I could show myself in a positive light in front of my boss and everyone else?” What will the alternative story be? “I am excited to go to this meeting. We will be discussing an important topic, and I’m so glad I’m involved and can contribute. I will prepare the best I can and be confident and curious about moving forward with the topic. Even if I make a mistake, I will not doubt in my qualities and skill, but rather be open to what I can learn from it and get even better. Even the occasional step backward is better than staying still and invisible. I am smart and knowledgeable. My goal for the meeting is to find ways to contribute to the solution.”

It’s about shifting from fear to curiosity and from “not enough” to “how can I contribute?”.

For example, I often catch myself thinking “I can’t write”. And this is true. Writing feels like pulling teeth to me. For now. I could reframe it by asking myself “What if I could write one day? What if I just need enough practice and perseverance. How can I make the process less painful for me?”.

Or, saying to myself “I can never be as good of a painter as my favorite painters” – will make me dread painting and eventually quit. I could also become aware of my frustration and decide to mindfully shift my focus to finding ways to enjoy the practice and process of painting instead of on chasing imaginary perfection. Turn “I’ll never be good enough” to “how can I bring the joy back to my practice”.

I’ve tried several times to maintain a meditation practice, but have failed. “Meditation is not for me” could be turned to “how can I make meditation work for me”?

Change the story you are telling yourself about who you are and what is possible to you. Get curious about what is possible and ask yourself questions. “What if?” “How could I?” Be vulnerable and allow yourself to be less than perfect and to make mistakes. Trust that you will get better with time if you keep at it. Plan for possible difficulties and prepare strategies to deal with them.

It just may turn out that a question changed your life.