What is Your Relationship with Your Self?
During an interview for my book, Move on Motherf*cker, Toni Jones from ShelfHelp (ShelfHelp.club) asked me the most interesting question I’ve been asked in a long time. She asked, “What is your relationship with yourself?”
I asked my self, and my self replied, “Conflicted.”
I love the idea of being my own best coach, and I try to practice that. At the same time, however, I behave in ways that don’t create a lot of trust.
Here is what I do:
I set a goal for something I want. When I reach that goal, I almost always say to myself, “That’s nice, but you really need to…..” I move the goalpost farther away. I set a higher goal. There is never a “there,” and there is rarely any kind of celebration of the pseudo-goal.
It’s a little like Lucy and Charlie Brown on a Peanuts episode. Lucy puts down the football for Charlie Brown to kick. He gets a great running start, and then she moves the ball. It is deceitful.
While this sort of behavior pushes me to work harder and is driven by the positive belief that I can do more, it is also related to the negative message that what I achieve is never good enough. It’s also saying “just kidding” too often about serious issues.
I now realize that I’ve gotta get better at self-coaching. It is a tough balance, but it is possible to push harder AND recognize the win at the same time.
What is missing for me is the celebration of forward momentum, and I suspect a lot of us have this problem. Our brains are wired to always be looking for the next problem so that we can be prepared. The pitfall is that our vision becomes clouded with the negatives, and we too easily brush aside the positives.
These days it is especially important that we take time to intentionally recognize what we are achieving because it can feel like we are drowning in a world of problems. Don’t our achievements deserve an equal amount of recognition as our problems? Time goes by, and we lose sight of all the forward momentum. It is too easy to feel stuck and exhausted on a road to nowhere.
I promise you that there are plenty of wins along the path, but we are too distracted by what is not going well or not getting done.
Any good coach will tell you that humans do not respond well to receiving only negative or corrective feedback. We have to celebrate every step toward our goals to reinforce what is being done well. Goal attainment is typically a series of events rather than one monumental achievement. When we acknowledge all of the steps along the way, we also make it more likely that we get what we want. If we then decide to shift the goalpost, it should be an intentional decision alongside a celebration of the initial goal.
We are coming up on year’s end, and it has been an incredibly troublesome year, which is even more reason that we need to intentionally review what achievements we have made in 2020 — big and small. I also strongly recommend that we all get into a daily or weekly habit of writing down the wins. It can be surprisingly uplifting to see and acknowledge our efforts and the achievements that we typically brush aside. At least give the wins equal time compared to the challenges.
After giving it some thought, I am okay with being conflicted. I feel like the conflict will keep me on my toes, but I need to work harder at really acknowledging the wins. While so much in our world lies outside of my control, I am reminded that I control the kind of relationship I choose to have with my self.
Find out more about how to best your best self in my new book Move on Motherf*cker: Live, Laugh, and Let Sh*t Go avaible on Bookshop, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and New Harbinger.
