Recognizing The Lies We Tell Ourselves
For most of my life, I have felt like I was not enough. It started when I was a small child. I always felt I wasn’t pretty enough to be as popular as my sister. Or that I wasn’t talented enough to succeed at playing the piano. This carried on into my adult years. I remember thinking, I will never pass the CPA exam, I am not smart enough. I will never get promoted because I don’t talk enough to the right people. I just don’t have what it takes to sustain a long lasting relationship with a man. I am not thin enough to teach an exercise class. I am not creative enough to work for myself.
These are just a few of the examples of the story that ran through my head. Every time I had a success, I didn’t accept it and believe it, I just transferred those feelings of inadequacy on to the next thing or area that was in front of me.
What causes us to have these feelings of not being enough? It all starts with the stories/lies we believe about ourselves. Likely those stories start in childhood and are not founded in truth. During childhood we can hear things that we misinterpret. In my case, I heard many times how pretty my sister was. My childish mind took that to mean that I was not pretty. This is a story that I struggled with for many years. It wasn’t because my sister made me feel that may, nor was it because my parents said that I wasn’t pretty. It was all because I HEARD that my sister was pretty, but I didn’t HEAR those words applied to me. I began to believe a lie.
It actually wasn’t until the past few years, that I’ve begun to see these negative thought patterns and attempted to make a change. One of the things that have really helped me is giving myself an affirmation and repeating it every single day (multiple times a day). To start with, I don’t usually believe the affirmation. But by repeating it over and over, I can begin shifting my sub-conscience mind and consequently, my thought patterns. This has made a HUGE difference for me and my life. My closest friends and family will tell you, the Sherry of old would never have quit a well-paying executive job and jumped into the unknown. She wasn’t enough to handle all that! But I was and I am! And so are you! Go for your dreams. Ignore that voice within that says you can’t do it. You are enough. You. Are. Enough.
Sherry Parks is a Rediscovery Coach who helps women rediscover themselves and reconnect to the core of who they are.
To contact Sherry for more information about coaching join her women only Facebook group Lives in Balance.
Originally published at medium.com