Imagine you woke up with amnesia…
You don’t remember who you were, you have no feelings about the person you used to be, you have no history.
You are a fresh sheet of paper, your story hasn’t been written.
You have the chance to recreate yourself. You can rebuild your mind with new thoughts and your heart with new feelings.
What new thought about yourself would you want to write down first?
Of course, this isn’t real, and you still remember who you’ve been up until now.
But what is real is that every day, you have this opportunity.
I know it doesn’t feel like it because you’ve got so many old thoughts and feelings filling up your mind.
But no matter what your past, and even in spite of your past, you can choose to think new thoughts.
Because your past isn’t your future.
Your past only brought you to this moment.
And for that, you can thank your past, it served it’s purpose.
But your past was never meant to define the rest of your life.
Because, the way I see it, life is all about moving forward beyond what you were given to work with in your childhood, or even just yesterday.
You’ve been given obstacles, and your life is about learning how to get over them.
And a big part of that learning is coming to the knowing that you have choices.
In this moment you can choose to drop the story of your past and create a new one.
Imagine you could drop just one story about yourself, one that’s keeping you from moving forward.
Which story would you choose?
In my own life, one story I worked on letting go of was “I’m shy”.
Because the shy person I was would never be able to stand in front of a group of people, and I really wanted to experience that.
I also chose to let go of “I’m small and weak” and decided to see myself as strong rather than fragile.
When I made that decision, I actually didn’t let go of being quiet and calm. Instead I determined that quiet and calm are strengths, not weaknesses.
And now I’m working on letting go of guilt and shame.
They’ve been such a big part of my life; they’re so familiar, like an old, cozy blanket.
But now I see that they’ve made me identify with my tired, worn out story that says “I’m not good enough.”
Guilt, and worse, shame, show up when I feel like I don’t hit the mark of being the kind of mother, daughter, girlfriend, friend, and person I feel I should be.
Now I see, through working on my thoughts, that guilt and shame keep me in a constant loop of second guessing myself.
They cause me to waste so much time by replaying in my mind where I could have done better.
With guilt and shame in my life, I’m never ever good enough.
But what if I didn’t have those familiar feelings in my life?
I’m pretty sure I would feel lighter, more confident, free to make decisions without the worry of failure, and I’d just be unapologetically me.
So, what about you?
What is one story about who you are that you can release?
Write it down.
Think about what it would feel like if that story was no longer true for you.
Write down how that would feel and what that would mean in your life.
Now, take a deep breath and step into that new space.
There’s nothing stopping you.
Keep moving forward my friend,
Debbie