Tiny Buddha

Tag: self-doubt

  • How I Learned to Trust Myself One Small, Simple Step at a Time

    How I Learned to Trust Myself One Small, Simple Step at a Time

    “Sometimes, the hardest person to trust is ourselves. But when we do, everything changes.” ~Unknown

    For a long time, I thought the key to changing my life was out there—somewhere.

    I thought that if I just found the right program, the perfect plan, or the expert with all the answers, then I’d finally feel in control and like I was doing it “right.”

    So, I chased every plan, bought the books, signed up for the courses, and followed all the steps.

    And for a while, it felt good—safe, even. But deep down, I still didn’t trust myself. Because no matter how much I followed, I was still outsourcing my power. I didn’t believe I could create lasting change without someone else telling me how.

    It wasn’t until I hit a moment of pause—when life got quiet and the excuses disappeared—that I finally asked myself: What do I actually want? And can I trust myself to go after it?

    The honest answer? I didn’t know. I’d been listening to everyone else for so long, I’d lost the sound of my own voice.

    And that realization was equal parts terrifying and freeing.

    Because if I didn’t know what I wanted, I had to figure it out for myself—and that meant letting go of what everyone else thought I should be doing. It meant tuning out the noise and tuning in to something I hadn’t prioritized in years: me.

    Self-Trust Doesn’t Come from Thinking; It Comes from Doing

    That was the turning point.

    I realized that self-trust isn’t something you just wake up with. It’s something you build. And for me, that started with the smallest steps.

    I began showing up for myself in tiny ways—drinking water first thing in the morning, walking for ten minutes, writing for just a few minutes a day. Nothing fancy. But they were promises I made to myself—and kept.

    Each small habit became a tiny brick in the foundation of self-trust.

    And slowly, those micro-wins turned into momentum. I didn’t need a full plan anymore. I didn’t need someone to tell me what came next. I was proving to myself, day by day, that I could count on me.

    When I first committed to writing ten minutes a day, it didn’t feel like a big deal. But doing it every day—even when I was tired, or uninspired, or unsure—was quietly revolutionary. It wasn’t about how good the writing was. It was about showing up for myself and keeping a promise. That shift became a building block not just for my creativity but also for my confidence.

    That consistency created a ripple effect. If I could trust myself to write, I could trust myself to move my body. If I could move my body, I could nourish it better. If I could nourish my body, I could speak more kindly to myself. Each action reinforced the belief that I could do this—that I didn’t need to be fixed; I just needed to believe.

    And let’s be honest—it wasn’t always easy. There were days when I didn’t feel like doing any of it. Days I wanted to hide, to go back to following someone else’s checklist. But I reminded myself that this time, I was building something that belonged to me.

    Consistency Builds Confidence

    It wasn’t perfection that changed me. It was consistency.

    Every time I kept a promise to myself—even something as small as sitting in silence for two minutes instead of reaching for my phone—I sent a powerful message: I’ve got you.

    And the more I showed up, the more my mindset shifted. I stopped asking, “What should I do?” and started asking, “What feels right for me?”

    That’s when everything changed. Not in a dramatic, fireworks kind of way. But in a grounded, real way.

    And that realness is what made the change last.

    I wasn’t becoming someone new—I was returning to myself. And it felt like coming home.

    You Don’t Need Another Plan; You Need to Believe in Yourself

    We live in a world that constantly tells us we need to be fixed. That someone out there knows better. That the answers are just one step away—if only we buy the next thing, follow the next leader, or change just a little more.

    But here’s what I’ve learned:

    You don’t need more noise. You need more trust.

    You need to know that you already have wisdom inside you. You just have to give it room to speak—and find the courage to act on it.

    And that starts with showing up for yourself in small, meaningful ways. Not perfectly. Just consistently.

    When you build a solid relationship with yourself—when you become someone who keeps promises to yourself—that’s where the shift happens. Not because you’ve mastered some fancy process, but because you’ve started living in integrity with the person you’re becoming.

    And in doing so, you step into a quiet kind of power—one that doesn’t need to prove itself to anyone.

    Start Small, Stay Honest, and Keep Going

    If you’re in a season of doubt, or if you’ve forgotten what your own voice sounds like, you’re not alone.

    Start with one tiny habit that reflects the person you want to become. Let that be your anchor. Let that be your proof.

    Because self-trust isn’t a lightning bolt. It’s a quiet build. And one small shift at a time, you’ll hear your voice again—and this time, you’ll believe it.

    And when you do, you’ll find something even better than the perfect plan—you’ll find your power.

    And that’s where real change begins.

  • Bulletproof Self-Love: How to Build an Unshakeable Relationship with Yourself

    Bulletproof Self-Love: How to Build an Unshakeable Relationship with Yourself

    “Before you put yourself down, please consider everything you’ve accomplished to get to this point, every life you’ve touched, and every moment you’ve pushed beyond your fears. You are a champion, a fighter. You are worthy of nothing less than the deepest love you have to share.” ~Scott Stabile

    It seems that we’re being bombarded daily with heart-felt messages to love ourselves more. It’s everywhere—from our Instagram newsfeed to handprinted tote bags to the “You are worthy” mural at your local coffee shop.

    I appreciate the society-wide agreement we seem to have made to remind ourselves to choose self-love.

    But endless commandments like “Put yourself first!” and “Remember your worth!” rarely explain how to actually follow through with it. We talk about self-love and self-worth as though it’s a matter of remembering to floss your teeth at night—as if you can choose better relationships, set healthy boundaries, and take care of your body by just remembering to do so.

    If it doesn’t come easily, loving yourself might feel like walking into a new job with no training and being expected to figure it out without a manual or supervisor. Through no fault of your own, you may not have developed the muscle for self-love and care.

    I know this because I’ve had in-depth conversations with people who flat out told me, “I don’t know how to have compassion for myself.”

    You don’t have an arduous, uphill struggle to feel worthy and self-loving because you lack the inner capacity for it.

    If you know how to feel hand-on-chest, lower-lip-puckered-out sympathy and compassion for others—even if it’s for endangered polar bears—then you have the capacity to cultivate this feeling for yourself. And it’s not your fault if you feel lost on where to begin.

    Working with Your Unloved Parts

    The culprits that thwart your best efforts to practice self-love often come from your shadow—an unconscious receptacle that safeguards all the parts of yourself that’ve been rejected and pushed away. Your shadow deploys a lot of unconscious strategies to make sure you keep sabotaging yourself and avoiding your rejected parts.

    Because laziness was deeply entrenched in my shadow, I learned early in life to cope with my unlovable parts by overworking myself. Every nook and cranny of my calendar was chock full of social outings, chores, hurried “leisure” walks, and things to occupy my mind. I only felt good enough when I was constantly busy, so I developed a wicked good avoidance strategy that kept the inner scarcity just below my level of awareness.

    Eventually, I noticed this endless game of tag between me and the horrific emptiness. I learned to stop pushing it away and instead developed a capacity to be with the sensations it stirred up in my body.

    There are remarkable benefits to working with any fear or disgust you have toward your shadow parts, but a lot of folks run into roadblocks because we’re wired to avoid pain and move toward pleasure.

    When the terror of shadow parts arises in the body, our visceral reaction is often to push it away, lodging it further away into our psyche.

    Neuroscience has also shown us that negative self-talk can actually give you a dopamine hit if it’s what your brain thinks is “correct,” even if the beliefs are negative and sabotaging.

    This leads us to push away our unloved parts and berate them.

    Thankfully, there’s another option.

    Integrate your shadow parts by creating a safe space for them—more specifically, for the uncomfortable emotions that emerge around them. For example, if you habitually feel anxious in social situations because you think of yourself as being awkward, you can practice integrating your “awkward self” by creating space for the disgust or fear associated with it.

    Being with difficult emotions means being with the sensations without feeding them negative thoughts. This actually sends signals of safety to your brain and nervous system that lowers the internal red flags. With continued practice, your brain loses a reason to push the pedal to the metal on stress responses like anxiety, and the uncomfortable sensations begin to subside. This is the true meaning of “facing your fears.”

    When you reach the other side of a difficult emotion, it often feels divinely euphoric and empowering—like you’re walking across the finish line of a marathon. Allowing emotions to pass through your body builds resilience. Every time you practice the art of allowing, it becomes easier to anchor back into your power.

    Practicing Self-Love

    Nurturing your capacity to think self-loving thoughts, be self-loving, and feel the sensations of self-love is also a necessary practice.

    You might be surprised to learn that you could be projecting all your love onto other people. Whether it’s a romantic partner, friend, or tv character, if you shower them with adoration, there’s love inside you, but perhaps it doesn’t feel quite at home. Parts of you might feel deeply flawed or incomplete—whether you’re conscious of it or not—so you’re shoving your love into the hands of someone else instead. Projecting love onto others is a way of defending yourself against inner parts you’ve deemed unlovable. Everyone does this in some form or another.

    The remedy to this situation is taking back those projections and investing time and energy into finding and loving those qualities in yourself.

    We all have a negativity bias in our brains, so we pay more attention to what’s wrong, unsafe, or not good enough about ourselves and the world around us. If this default setting is left unchecked, it leads to major brain ruts—and well, we’ve all met a curmudgeon before!

    If you want to lean into what’s radiantly loveable about yourself, you have to shamelessly focus on what you want to love about yourself. If you’re not sure what that is, then choose something and nurture the hell out of it. Tenacity goes a long way when you want to reverse old patterns.

    Around the time I began learning to face my own inner void, I took myself on a journey of self-love and self-care through embodied sensual movement and pole dancing.

    I call it my divine intervention.

    Seemingly out of nowhere, I instinctively knew one day I wanted to become a pole dancer. Even though I had literally zero background in dancing or physical exercise in general, I realized that I had a dancer’s heart inside of me. As luck would have it, a brand-new studio had just opened up in my city six months earlier.

    I signed up for an assortment of classes, but it was the feminine movement pole dancing class that captivated me. I’d been in a rush my whole life—for no particular reason at any given moment—but this slow-as-honey practice forced me to start paying attention to myself in ways I never had before.

    I invested in myself by taking these classes. It allowed me to stop feeling guilty for being lazy. I didn’t need to overstuff myself with work, relationships, or other outside sources of validation anymore. I learned to slow down, feel my body, and take better care of myself.

    Learning to love yourself and know your worth is like having direct access to your inner authority. The self-doubt, sabotage, and low self-esteem lose their power and you finally get to take the helm. If you’re ready to stop second-guessing and minimizing yourself, here’s how to get started.

    5 Ways to Start Loving Yourself

    1. Expand your capacity to be with your unloved parts.

    Every time you create space for an unloved part, you’re changing the relationship between you and that part. Even if you have lots of deep wounds, your relationship to yourself is always changing. The key to creating safe space for your parts is staying with the sensations of fear or disgust and away from stories. If you allow thoughts of worry or self-judgment to run the show, the unloved parts won’t get reconditioned.

    The best way to do this is to work with emotions in real time. Find a quiet place to breathe through the sensations. Emotions run a lifespan of ninety seconds at most if you don’t retrigger the emotion with negative thoughts.

    2. Open up your nervous system to receive love.

    This is about practicing the art of receiving goodwill and kindness in all forms—positive feedback, compliments, and words of affirmation.

    How often do you fully accept a compliment? How often do you pause to let kind words—whether it’s a thank-you email from a friend or gratitude from a stranger—land in your body? We’re so quick to brush off affirmations, so what if you rewarded yourself by unapologetically receiving them instead? Make a practice of slowing down enough to take it all in. When you do, you’re reinforcing the pathway to connection and self-love in your nervous system.

    3. Affirm yourself with the love you give to others.

    If you already have the capacity to love others, then there’s an existing pathway to self-love. It just needs to be rerouted back to you.

    On a neurological level, if self-love feels like a stranger to you, the neural networks related to your self-image probably have a poor association with the biochemicals related to emotions around love and worthiness. Thankfully, neurons that fire together, wire together!

    Try this exercise in front of a mirror. Think of someone you deeply love and would describe as being super “loveable.” Close your eyes, see that person in your head, and think about why you love them so much that you can literally feel the tingly sensations coursing through your body. Then quickly open your eyes and repeat to yourself while looking in the mirror, “I am so loveable” with an extra emphasis on “I.” Make sure to work up the feeling on a visceral level in your body before you open your eyes. You’re “borrowing” the feel-good neurons while activating the self-image neurons to create new neural pathways.

    Have fun with this and change out “loveable” with other qualities you want to feel toward yourself in each round. Repetition matters, so make this a regular practice.

    4. Create actionable self-love.

    If you truly loved yourself in the way you wanted to, what would you do differently? Make a list of specific behaviors you want to change. For each one, ask yourself, “What’s the absolute smallest step I can take to work toward creating this behavior—something so small, I can do it right now?”

    Hint: the smallest step is always smaller than you think. For instance, if you want to ask for the pay raise you deserve, you might think the next smallest step is writing a letter of justification. If you feel head-to-toe inspired to do that right now, by all means, please do! But give yourself permission to start even smaller if the thought of drafting a letter immediately gives you anxiety. The goal is to start building momentum right NOW, so keep the steps super small and easy to do.

    5. “Drop in” to your embodied self-worth.

    You have access to your self-worth any time you want because it’s inherent. There’s nothing you ever need to do to earn it. Even if you’re not sure what it feels like, your worthiness is always there, waiting for you to reconnect to it.

    Getting into your body senses is a fantastic way to find where dignity lives in your body so that you can deepen your relationship with it. Make it a regular practice to take a few minutes to turn inward and “get to know” your non-negotiable worthiness. Where is it located? If it was a color, what color would it be? If it was a shape, what shape would it be? What’s the texture, movement, and sound of your self-worth? Bring it to life and revisit it often. Remember that every good relationship requires nurturing.

  • My Deepest, Darkest Secret: Why I Never Felt Good Enough

    My Deepest, Darkest Secret: Why I Never Felt Good Enough

    “Loving ourselves through the process of owning our story is the bravest thing we’ll ever do.” ~Brené Brown

    Lunge, turn, reverse, jump, land and rebound, push, pull, cut, run, double turn, fling, pause…

    Not good enough! Smooth the transitions, make it cleaner, find more ease!

    Heart pounds, ragged breath, muscles burn…

    You need more weight on the lunge and point your damn feet when you jump. Do it again.

    Repeat. Lunge, turn, reverse, jump, land and rebound, push, pull, cut, run, double turn, fling, pause…

    What is your problem? Why is it so sloppy? Clean it up! Do it again.

    Not good enough, do it again carved a deep groove into my brain, branding it like a wild bull by a hot iron. Not good enough. My mind, not my teacher, was brutalizing me, taunting me, teaching me “discipline” to improve my dancing.

    I improved—enough to become a professional dancer—but I couldn’t internalize or recognize any of my accomplishments. 

    Even after being asked to join a dance company before I graduated college, I continued to struggle with “not being good enough.” Despite the many compliments I received for my performance and choreography, I brushed them away thinking that they were lying to me, just placating me with false praise.

    I faltered in my performance, felt paralyzed by fear that would not always fade away once the performance began, distrusted my ability to remember the choreography, always fought the anxiety of being in front of an audience, and cried oceans of tears because I could never reach the bar I had set for myself. My confidence and faith in my ability to perform to the level that I wanted to plummeted.

    I loved dancing so much. I loved moving my body through space, the creative process, and working with a group of talented dancers to create shows. I loved rehearsals because I felt relaxed and at ease, like I could perform with the freedom that I couldn’t feel onstage. I loved refining and smoothing transitions and was described as a “liquid” dancer. I loved expressing my style through my movement.

    But the tension between my passion and my insecurity created an internal trip cord. I didn’t trust myself. In rehearsal I was militant about practicing the steps over and over, even when everyone was exhausted, because I still didn’t trust that I knew the choreography.

    I had made mistakes before, blanked out onstage, and felt deep humiliation and shame for not performing someone else’s choreography as well as I should have or meeting a paying audience’s expectations. I was proud that I had so much stamina to rehearse twice as hard as I needed to. If I rehearsed extra. then maybe it would finally quiet the critical voice in my head.

    It didn’t quiet the critic and the cycle continued.

    The shame of being a mediocre dancer led to working harder, but fear of making mistakes or not reaching the goal led to fear of being seen as mediocre, which led, once again, to shame. Shame is dark, subtle, slippery. Over and over, I went through this cycle, the shame cave becoming deeper and darker, until I was lost in it, burned out from so much effort and so little reward.  

    After ten years of pushing myself to learn, pushing against my fears, pushing myself to excel, and beating myself up along the way, I couldn’t push through any longer. I had nothing left to give. The trickling current of anxiety and depression became a flood and swallowed me up into a profound depression. Everything felt arduous, even the simplest daily tasks.

    I looked at people in the streets around me and thought, “How is everybody not depressed? How is anybody smiling?” But they were—smiling, laughing, moving through their days effortlessly, accomplishing wonderful things—and I was not. I was depleted of all vitality.

    I quit performing and turned to my yoga practice to help heal from the burnout. I learned therapeutic yogic principles about balancing effort and ease, surrender, non-grasping, contentment, non-violence (even toward oneself).

    It seemed only natural to become certified as a yoga teacher and, as I began to teach, I encountered the same insecurities. The same thoughts arose—I need to be an excellent yoga teacher, need to create excellent sequences, have excellent pacing, use excellent language to help guide students into an excellent experience. I felt the same performance anxiety—debilitating self-consciousness. 

    What are they thinking about me? Am I giving them what they need? There are so many different people in my class. They are different ages with different bodies and different life experiences. What do I know to teach other people?  I have only ever been a dancer so how do I know what other people need for their bodies?  

    I didn’t want to harm anyone because I didn’t know enough or have enough information and, once again, I quit after a couple of years.

    My deepest darkest secret, feeling inherently flawed and chronically inadequate, took up space in my heart and my throat. Rent-free. In fact, I was paying for its unwelcome residence. 

    My next strategy was simply to take the pressure off myself. I chose low-pressure jobs that didn’t require a big performance from me. I was lucky and these were jobs that I liked that suited me well as I slowly healed from years of chronic self-abuse.

    In my early forties I came across a term that I identified with—imposter syndrome.

    High achievers’ fear of being exposed as a fraud or imposter. Unable to accept accolades or compliments or awards for one’s talent, skill, or experience.

    Imposters suffer from chronic self-doubt and a sense of intellectual fraudulence that override any feelings of success or external proof of their competence.

    I thought, “That sounds like something I can relate to,” but I wasn’t ready to face it head on. I was finally feeling contented in a job that I liked, without the pressures of performing in ways that touched that deep insecurity, and I wanted to soak that contentment in.

    And then Covid-19 happened, and I lost that job.

    Midway through the pandemic, in an effort to be proactive about the next phase of my life, I turned my attention to developing a yoga therapy practice. Create a mission and vision. Come up with content and language. Identify my audience. Create a website and so on. And again, I came up against the deepest darkest secret that had been so blissfully dormant for several years. I was surprised at its potency, but I decided I was ready to face it head on.

    I remembered imposter syndrome and started researching again. Again, I checked all the boxes—except one. In so many articles that I read, examples were given of well-known people who struggled with imposter syndrome. These are people who have achieved extraordinary things, are in the public eye, and have either overcome or pushed through their demons to go on to incredible accomplishments.

    Naturally, I thought, “Well, I’m no celebrity, have no major awards or accomplishments to speak of, and I haven’t achieved that much in my career, so this probably doesn’t actually apply to me.”  

    Such is imposter syndrome.

    Comparison to others (who we deem higher achieving than we are) will trigger a cascade of shame and doubt. 

    Few people actually talk about imposter syndrome—either they don’t know about it or don’t want to discuss it because of the deep feelings of shame or insecurity that accompany it.

    I want you who silently struggle with imposter syndrome or dysmorphia or profound shame and insecurity to know that I, too, have struggled, but it’s getting better.

    Drop by drop, my cup fills as I take every opportunity to be kind to myself where in the past I would have criticized.

    Having studied positive neuroplasticity, I now understand our brains’ negativity bias and the protective role of the inner critic. I have a newfound appreciation for our natural protective mechanisms and gratitude for the ability of the brain to learn and grow new skills.

    I’m starting small, taking small steps to create an inner garden of welcome. A beautiful nurturing place where I invite one or two for tea and laugh and share experiences and stories.

    And after some time, I hope the garden will expand and the walls begin to crumble a little and I can have a small group for tea, stories, and dancing. And then gradually over time, the garden will expand further so that I can host more people in for tea, stories, dancing, and games.

    I can imagine that remnants of the walls will remain as a reminder of where I’ve been, and I can look at them with gratitude for keeping me safe for a while as I softened and settled and tended to the garden within.

  • A Simple Plan to Overcome Self-Doubt and Do What You Want to Do

    A Simple Plan to Overcome Self-Doubt and Do What You Want to Do

    “Don’t let others tell you what you can’t do. Don’t let the limitations of others limit your vision. If you can remove your self-doubt and believe in yourself, you can achieve what you never thought possible.” ~Roy T. Bennett

    Ahh yes, self-doubt. Something that affects every single one of us at different times and at different magnitudes—even those that seem supremely confident.

    Why do so many of us experience self-doubt, and how can we overcome it?

    On a personal note, I can tell you my self-doubt comes any time I am trying something new. I’ve learned over the years where this stems from, and it may be similar for you. It comes from my parents.

    Although my parents were always encouraging, they’d also say things like, “Are you sure this is the right move?”, “Are you sure you want to do this?”, and “Be careful.” In fact, every time I left the house, that’s what my dad would say: “Be careful.” “Drive safe.” Not, “Have fun,” “Have a fantastic time,” or something along these lines.

    In my twenties I realized that it had been ingrained in me to always be cautious, which then led to me doubting myself in certain scenarios, though I’ve never been someone who shies away from challenges or holds myself back. Over the years, I learned to identify what contributes to my self-doubt and then push through it.

    Now, this isn’t the case for everyone. Other things that contribute to self-doubt are comparing ourselves to others; feeling a lack of means, intelligence, or other things we think we need to succeed; past experiences; possibly being criticized; and the natural fear that we feel when attempting something new.

    When we doubt our ability, we are allowing fear to settle in and hold us back from forging forward and taking a leap. Without trying, we are feeding the self-doubt, which means it will likely compound the feeling the next time we are faced with or offered a similar opportunity.

    So how can we detach from self-doubt and make sure we are not missing out on what could be an amazing opportunity or journey for ourselves?

    First, we need CLARITY.

    We need to first get clear on where this self-doubt is coming from.

    What is striking this feeling within you that makes you think you shouldn’t try it or you can’t make something happen? Is it the fear of the unknown, or is it the feeling of not having the ability, or something else you think you need to succeed? Are you comparing yourself to someone else in the process? Or do you think you couldn’t handle it if you failed?

    Second, we need to recognize the FACTS.

    What do you know to be true? For example, what do you know about yourself that can help prove that you can attempt or accomplish this? Have you had any similar experiences that prove you can do this?

    If you’re comparing yourself to someone else, what are the facts in this? Meaning, are you comparing yourself to someone who has already succeeded? Or are you comparing yourself to someone who is at the same stage you are? Nobody gets from A to B without experience, practice, and even failure. So, try not to compare yourself to others, as you may not know the complete story to their success.

    There was a time when I was contemplating which direction to take my business degree. I’d majored in marketing because it’s a creative field that allows for variety, which aligns with my values. But as I was working in my first couple of “corporate” jobs, I was enticed by sales.

    My father wanted to steer me away from sales. He said that it’s a hard career, it’s mostly male-driven, and it’s extremely stressful and unpredictable. But what I saw was the fun interaction sales teams had with their clients and prospects. How they were able to basically chat on the phone 80% of the time and attend fun events.

    It was a fact that sales is stressful, unpredictable, and male-dominated, but I knew myself. I knew I was different than my father. I knew I was up for a challenge and taking risks, whereas he was risk adverse. I knew if it didn’t work out, I always had marketing to step into or maybe other options, whereas my father was opposed to change.

    I had to recognize that he was from a different generation. That although what he expressed was true, there were other factors to consider. If I compared myself to the majority of people occupying these roles I likely wouldn’t have attempted it and enjoyed a fifteen-year-plus career in sales and business development.

    Finally, GO FOR IT!

    The best way to conquer self-doubt is to put yourself out there, take action, and see what happens. No success comes without failure. If it works out, you’ll be glad you did it, and if it fails you’ll learn and can progress.

    Without acting on it you will never know. At least if you push through the doubt and try you will understand yourself and your ability a lot more.

    There was a time when I was considering making a big move that I had dreamt of for so long. I loved my friends and family, but I didn’t love where I was living or the lifestyle I was caught up in. When the timing was right I decided to take the leap and move to the other side of the county alone, without a job.

    I heard things like: “Do you really want to go?” “It’s so expensive out there. How will you afford it?” And “It rains so much there, and people get depressed.”.

    If I had listened to others’ fear and angst about the move I would’ve likely lived in a miserable cycle. Instead, seventeen years later, I still feel this was the best thing I’ve ever done for myself, for my life, for my soul.

    The move brought me an even greater awareness of how resilient we are when faced with change.

    And if it hadn’t worked out, I would have had an adventure, and who knows where it may have taken me? Maybe it would have led me to something else I didn’t even know I wanted until I opened myself up to new possibilities. New possibilities I would never have known about had I limited myself based on other people’s fears.

    —

    Don’t let others’ doubt or success deter you from going after what you want or trying something new. Recognize that you can either let your doubt leave you with regret or feel the satisfaction of taking action. Who knows, your action might actually inspire others to ditch their doubt and take a leap into a life they’ll love.

  • Why You Should Stop Looking for Your Purpose and What to Do Instead

    Why You Should Stop Looking for Your Purpose and What to Do Instead

    “The meaning of life is to find your gift. The purpose of life is to give it away.” ~Pablo Picasso

    Twenty years is a long time when you know you’re meant to be doing something, but you don’t quite know what it is or how to go about doing it.

    To cut a two-decade story very short, I found the seeds of my purpose when volunteering in a hospital playroom with pediatric cancer patients in Romania one summer when I was twenty years old. And, though I have made many an attempt over the years, I am only now beginning to truly live the purpose I’ve felt a fire for these past two decades.

    Purpose anxiety is a common twenty-first century affliction. 

    So many of us today seem to struggle with this quest of finding our purpose. And then there’s the other side of that search; when you actually find what it is you’re here to do, how do you go about living it? And if you feel called to do something that feels so much bigger than yourself, how do you go about living up to that vision?

    I have struggled with both the before and after of finding my purpose. In the end, it took one small change to terminate my two-decade to-and-fro, and to finally start living my purpose  Though it might seem such an insignificant detail, what kept me stuck for so long was the word purpose.

    Purpose is just a seven-letter word, but it has a huge emotional charge.

    Purpose conjures up so many ideas, ideals, shoulds, and fantasies before you even start to consider what yours is. The pressure is on from the get-go. And this pressure isn’t conducive to finding it.

    The other thing about the word purpose is that it seems to live outside oneself—like something lost that you have to find. Another commonly used word for purpose is calling. It has the exact same effect. It’s like something is out there somewhere, guiding you to it, and you have to go on a search to find it.

    What finally set me free was changing the word purpose to another.

    I clearly remember the moment when I made this change in vocabulary and it all just clicked. I was, maybe quite cliché, looking out onto the horizon while walking along the beach and at the same time wrestling with my purpose-related demons.

    That day I seemed to see deeper than ever before into my patterns of self-sabotage and self-doubt, my fear of failure, and what failing would mean to my self-worth. And I remembered something I had heard recently about coming at life from the perspective of what we can give instead of what we can get from it.

    I realized that the dark clouds of fear and doubt had made me lose sight of the reason I was on this path in the first place. And I knew I had to get back to my purpose roots—to get back to just giving.

    The simple word swap was from purpose to gift.

    From that very moment I stopped chasing my purpose and started focusing on giving my gift.  With such a profound change in my attitude and action from such a simple change in terminology, I started reflecting on how powerful each word was and what shifts in perspective came from the switch.

    Here are three lessons I have learned from replacing the word purpose with gift.

    1. You finally end that external treasure hunt.

    When you change “What’s my purpose?” to “What’s my gift to share with others?”, the magnitude of the question diminishes. Your gifts live within you. You don’t have to look elsewhere to find them.

    So it no longer feels like a treasure hunt with no tools; instead, it becomes a realization that a purpose isn’t a mystical calling that visits us one day in a beam of light. It is quite simply a path of giving our gifts to the world.

    2. You realize that you don’t need to live just one true purpose.

    The trap of looking for our purpose is that we assume it’s just one big treasure chest that we are on a voyage for.

    When I made this subtle change in vocabulary, I suddenly saw that not only did I know what my gift was, but I realized that I had multiple gifts that I wanted to share (including writing). When we look at it as sharing our gifts, we realize that there are so many ways we can live purposefully, and that it can all be part of our purposeful journey through life. So the anxiety of “but is this my true calling?” diminishes.

    3. Those feelings of self-doubt or fear around doing something bigger than yourself break away.

    Over those twenty years my purpose had taken on a life of its own. If fact, you could say that living my purpose had become my purpose! I had built it up so much in my mind that, in the end, it felt an almost impossibility to make come true. I can’t tell you the number of times I froze at the first hurdle for fear of not living up to the 4D vision I had in my head. I felt incapable of bringing my purpose to life.

    But the day I flipped purpose on its head and started seeing it as merely sharing my gift with others, I instantly knew that I was so very capable of that. And the fear, self-doubt, cold feet, and self-sabotaging all just seemed to fade.

    So for anyone reading this who identifies as a purpose-seeker, I invite you to try being a gift-giver instead.

    Because after all, the point of purpose is to live it, not look for it.

    What gifts do you have to share with the world?

  • Discovering Pleasure in Movement Instead of Exercising from Fear

    Discovering Pleasure in Movement Instead of Exercising from Fear

    “The choice that frees or imprisons us is the choice of love or fear. Love liberates. Fear imprisons.” ~Gary Zukav

    I come from a family of runners. When I was a young girl, my father would rouse us out of bed on the weekends to run the three-mile par-course at the local park, competing with my siblings for who could do the most sit-ups at the stations along the route. We would end the event with a bunch of chocolate eclairs from the local 7-11 as a reward.

    As benign as this story may be, it describes a pattern of connection between exercise and food that, by my late teens, became a rigid and dominating force in my life.

    The rules were clear: if you run or swim, you’re allowed to eat ice cream (my favorite treat); if you burn enough calories each day, you are a valuable human being who deserves to be on the planet and feel good about yourself. These beliefs crept in and took hold in my mind and became a kind of religion, complete with rules and a doctrine, as well as self-inflicted emotional punishments for deviation.

    As many of us do, I received messages from the world about needing to control my body and food.

    One family member told me that “making friends with my hunger” was an admirable power I should strive to achieve. Another time a complete stranger hit on me in a bar and when I declined to talk to him further, he said he thought at first I was “fat” (or maybe “phat”?) but now decided I was just “large.” I guess one was a compliment and the other an insult, but I found both mortifying.

    In a strange way, I think becoming bulimic saved me from this rigidity. If I ate too much and didn’t feel like exercising, I had another way to repent of my apostasy: I could always purge. I read somewhere that people with bulimia can be described as “failed anorexics,” and maybe this was true for me.

    By the time I reached my early twenties, I had made great strides in healing my eating disorder through psychotherapy, taking a deep dive into spiritual practices like meditation, and tuning into bodily wisdom and intuition. But my inner critic continued to torture me with demands for intense exercise.

    I gained more weight than I ever had before as I let go of the most dangerous part of the eating disorder—the purging—yet it was more difficult to surrender the last line of defense between me and the fat, ugly, undisciplined mess I was sure I was doomed to become.

    One of my mentors made a gentle suggestion that I give up exercise completely. I thought she was out of her mind! Her suggestion posed a threat to my ego’s fragile illusion of control over my body, so I pretended to entertain the idea but secretly shoved it away.

    Eventually, though, I took a good, raw look at the state of my body and mind. I had chronic shin splints from high school and college sports that had never fully healed; my body was always hurting as a result of developing an autoimmune disorder; I had come to hate exercise; and outside of the ephemeral moments of peace I found during meditation, I was depressed and anxious.

    It was time to put things on the line and test out the radical new approach to self-love, of not exercising.  So I decided that I wouldn’t exercise unless my body asked for it. For-real asked for it, not obeying the dictates of mental compulsion.

    I waited.

    One month passed.

    The first month was the hardest. Lots of self-criticism emerged, as well as fears about gaining weight. I breathed and talked to friends, did manual work cleaning houses (my gig at the time), journaled, meditated, prayed to a feminine divine presence whose wisdom I had begun to trust—if only just a little bit.

    Then the feelings came. Lots of feelings. Crying, memories of things I had forgotten about from a childhood riddled with trauma and loss, fear about the future. Feelings of shame about my eating disorder, my body, my lack of accomplishments despite a higher education.

    The second month.

    I started to notice more pleasant feelings. Pockets of peace and well-being, even moments of joyful laughter began to open like surprise packages from myself. Without exercise, my days became slower, more meandering and unstructured, and I felt free for the first time since I was quite young.

    The third month.

    I became aware of an effervescent feeling inside my legs, a bubbly, tingly sensation. I asked myself—what the heck was that? Then it came to me, my body wanted to move!!

    That day I took the most delicious walk in Golden Gate Park, not having any agenda about where I was going or how long I’d walk for. I found a grove of eucalyptus trees that shrouded me in complete silence, the kind of silence that is a palpable presence against your skin, like a hug, and I sat down in the middle of the grove and wept with joy. In that moment, I knew I was going to be okay.

    In that moment, I didn’t care how big or small my body was. I just wanted more of this moving-for-pleasure, this moving that comes from deep within. Moving because I’m in a body that wants to express itself with joy, grief, play, and all the emotions in between.

    That’s what happens when we stop pushing ourselves from a place of fear—fear of losing control, gaining weight, and not being good enough. We eventually feel pulled by a sense of love—for ourselves, for our bodies, and for the deeply satisfying and invigorating act of moving.

    Did I ever feel “fat” again and try to force myself to run to make the “feeling” go away? Or suffer an attack from my inner critic? Yes, of course.

    But what I discovered was that the journey out of an overexercising pattern doesn’t come from listening to the same old toxic and relentless demand for exercise. I had to rediscover the deep and spontaneous source of my body’s own desire to move in order to begin to heal.

    Once I found that natural aliveness, even though the old fearful and manipulative thoughts preyed on my mind from time to time, they didn’t have as much power as before, and I could hear another, kind and compassionate voice, stemming from deep-body-listening.

    My practice after that was to wait for that tingly bubbly feeling in my legs, which usually happened every four days or so, and use that sensation as a guide. Then I would take my bus pass, put on my running shoes, and walk or run as far or as little as I wanted.

    Sometimes I made it miles to Ocean Beach and sat on the wall meditating, then took the bus back.  Other times I just went to my favorite grove of trees and prayed and cried and felt so incredibly lucky to have listened to the small, quiet voice bubbling up from within.

  • Where Our Inner Critic Comes from and How to Tame It

    Where Our Inner Critic Comes from and How to Tame It

    “Your inner critic is simply a part of you that needs more self-love.” ~Amy Leigh Mercee

    We all have that critical and judgmental inner voice that tells us we’re not good enough, smart enough, pretty enough, etc.

    It tells us we don’t do anything right. It calls us stupid. It compares us to other people and speaks harshly about ourselves and our bodies. It tells us all the things we did or said “wrong” after communicating or connecting with someone.

    Sometimes it projects criticism outward onto others so we can feel better about ourselves. Other times we try to suppress our inner critic through overachieving, being busy, and accumulating more and more things.

    Sometimes it’s a protective mechanism that’s trying to keep us focused on our self-judgments so we won’t be authentic, because, if we are, we may be rejected and not get the love and acceptance we want.

    But, by doing this, we’re creating even more pain and suffering because we’re disconnecting from and rejecting our own essence.

    Just ignoring the critical voice doesn’t always make it go away. It may initially, but soon enough it will resurface if we haven’t healed/embraced our hurts, traumas, and wounds and shifted our internal patterning, which is where it comes from. 

    Have you ever heard the expression “What we resist persists?” Have you ever told an angry person to “just calm down” or a screaming child to stop crying? Does it work? Not when our energy is in a heightened state.

    Why is someone angry? Why is a child screaming and crying? Because there’s something going on internally that’s creating how they’re behaving. There’s often an unmet need or pain that’s asking for attention.

    Thinking a more positive thought to compensate can sometimes work, but sometimes it just creates an inner debate and mistrust in ourselves because deep inside we don’t believe what we’re saying.

    As children, many of us were taught to suppress those “bad” feelings because if we expressed them, we may have been or were punished. Welcome to the beginning of the critical voice; it’s often a frightened part of us that’s wounded and asking for attention. It wants to be seen, heard, and understood.

    My dad used to get really frustrated with me and constantly told me, “Damn it, Deb, you never do anything right.” Hearing that many times left an imprint in my subconscious. I started living with that interpretation of myself, and the critical voice kept me “in check” with being this way.

    For me, the critical voice was my dad’s voice as well as the deep shame I was feeling for making mistakes and not doing things the “right way.”

    I was holding in suppressed anger, sadness, guilt, unforgiveness, resentment, traumas, and pain that I tried to keep hidden with a smile on my face, but eventually it turned into a shame-based identity.

    My inner voice criticized me whenever I fell short or wasn’t perfect according to society or my family’s expectations.

    Just like when we’re triggered by another person, our critical voice is asking for our attention and guiding us to what needs healing, resolving, forgiving, understanding, compassion, and unconditional love.

    When it comes to the surface, we’re experiencing an automatic regression; it’s a part of us that’s frozen in time. It’s a reflection of our unhealed wounds, which created ideas of not being enough or that something’s wrong with us. Basically, it’s a trance of unworthiness.

    When we’re in a trance of unworthiness, we try to soothe ourselves with addictive behaviors. It’s hard to relax because we think we need to do something to be better and prove ourselves, so not doing anything, resting, isn’t safe.

    When we’re in a trance of unworthiness, it’s hard to be intimate with others. Deep inside we think there’s something wrong with us, so we don’t get close because they may find out and leave. This keeps us from being authentic because we don’t feel okay with who we are.

    Deep down I felt unworthy, unlovable, and undeserving, and the critical voice showed me what I was feeling and believing. I didn’t feel safe in life or in my body. How could I? I was living with so much hurt, pain, and shame inside.

    The critical voice is often stronger for those of us with unhealed wounds and who are hard on ourselves, and it tries to get us with shame and guilt. We’re always looking at ourselves as the “good self” or “bad self,” and if we’re identified with a “bad self,” we’ll act in accordance with that in all areas of our life.

    If we’ve become identified with the critical voice, it’s who we think we are; it just seems normal. And when we start to be more kind and loving, it doesn’t seem right because our identity becomes threatened and our system registers that as danger.

    That happened for me. Eventually I became identified with being a “bad girl” who’s critical and hard on herself, and, even when I started being a little kinder, more compassionate, and more loving, I felt an angst in my body. It wasn’t familiar, and even deeper, it wasn’t okay for me to be this way. My survival was at stake, so I would automatically go back to self-criticizing and judging, without conscious awareness.

    The critical voice didn’t only speak to me harshly; it also told me to do self-abusive things like cutting my wrists and face, starving my body or eating lots of sweets, and exercising for hours like a mad woman to get rid of the food I ate, whether it was a carrot or sweets, because I felt guilty. 

    Even after twenty-three years of going in and out of hospitals and treatment centers, taking medication, and doing traditional therapy, nothing ever changed; the critical voice had a hold on me.

    It was a powerful force, and when I tried to stop it, it would get louder. It thought it was protecting me in a backwards sort of way; if it hurt me first, no one else would be able to do so.

    When people used to say to me, “Debra, you just need to love yourself,” I looked at them like they were crazy. I had no concept of what that even meant because I had no experience of it.

    What I’ve come to see with myself and those I assist in their healing is that the more we keep our deep hurts, traumas, anger, guilt, shame, and pain hidden, the more the critical voice chimes in.

    And, for some, like me, it seems overpowering, so we try to find relief through smoking, drinking, eating, or being busy, and/or we experience severe depression, anxiety, or self-harming.

    When we’re consumed by the critical voice, we’re disconnected from our true essence, and when we’re disconnected from our true essence, the love within, we feel a sense of separation; we don’t feel safe with ourselves or others, and we don’t feel lovable for who we are, as we are.

    This is why many people can change, be happy for a day, but then go back to their critical and/or judgmental ways. Our automatic programming, stemming from our core beliefs, kicks in. It’s just like an addiction, and in a sense it is.

    We can try meditating, deep breathing, and positive thinking, but, unless we address the underlying cause, we’re likely to keep thinking the thoughts our internal patterning dictates. They come from a part of us that doesn’t feel loved or safe.

    So, what do we do when the critical voice comes to visit?

    What do we do when it’s what we’re used to, and it just happens automatically?

    What do we do when we don’t know how to be with ourselves and how we’re feeling in a kind and compassionate way?

    What do we do when we have no concept of what it even means to experience self-love or ease in our bodies?

    First off, please don’t blame yourself for how you’re being. Awareness isn’t about judgment; it’s about kindness, compassion, and love.

    Working with and healing our traumas, where the critical voice was formed, is key in shifting our internal energy patterning. Many people call this inner child healing and/or shadow working. 

    This is a soft and gentle process of moving through the layers of trauma with compassion and love and making peace with our protector parts.

    Through inner child healing, we can shift and transform that “negative” patterning and how the energy is flowing in our body. We can help that part of us that’s frightened, hurting, and maybe feeling separate have a new and true understanding so we can feel loved and safe in our bodies.

    When we pause and take a deep breath when we first hear or sense the critical voice, it allows our nervous systems to reset and helps us come back to the present moment; this allows space for compassion, healing, and investigation.

    Why do I believe that?

    Where did I learn that?

    Is it true?

    How does my higher self see this and me?

    Does the critical voice totally go away? No, it may still chime in; it’s part of being human. But once we realize where it’s coming from and heal/shift that energy pattern, more love can flow through, and we can experience our truth. When we learn how to be our own loving parent and meet the needs our caregivers didn’t meet when we were children, the critical voice often softens.

    Remember, the critical voice is just a scared part of us who really wants attention, love, and a way to feel safe. When we no longer take it personally, when we’re no longer attached to it as our identity, we can offer ourselves compassion, understanding, love, truth, and whatever else we’re needing.

    Life can be messy, and our thoughts can be too. This isn’t about perfection; this is about experiencing a deeper connection with our loving essence.

    There’s a sweet and tender spirit that lives within you. This spirit is your deepest truth. This spirit is the essence of you. You’re naturally lovable, valuable, and worthy. You’re a gift to humanity. So please be kind, gentle, loving, and caring with yourself.

  • 8 Ways to Stop Worrying About What Other People Think of You

    8 Ways to Stop Worrying About What Other People Think of You

    “You can’t force anyone to value, respect, understand, or support you, but you can choose to spend your time around people who do.” ~Lori Deschene

    It can be paralyzing.

    The worry about what other people think about you, I mean. That worry can hinder you from pursuing your dreams. It can stop you from expressing your true nature and stand in the way of the life you so badly want to create.

    This worry can easily get your mind wandering to dark places and trigger feelings of insecurity, anxiety, and self-doubt. When it has a grip on you, you do anything to avoid rejection, ridicule, and potential embarrassment. Better to be unseen than negatively judged, right?

    You know that you shouldn’t worry about what others think of you. But that’s just easier said than done.

    For a long time, I felt stuck because I was afraid of other people’s opinions. Due to this fear, I was terrified of pursuing a new career path. Eventually, I reached a point where I couldn’t take it anymore.

    I knew I had to deal with the fear and worry of other people’s judgment, or I wouldn’t be able to live the life I wanted. And I was not willing to compromise on that—neither should you.

    To help you move past the fear of other people’s opinions, I’ve put together a list of ideas that have helped me. Use this list as your go-to whenever your worries about what other people’s opinions get the best of you.

    1. Know that you’re not a mind reader.

    I used to assume that I knew what other people thought of me. But assumptions often lead to bad conclusions.

    When I left my corporate job to travel and pursue my own entrepreneurial endeavor, I was afraid of ex-colleagues judging my decision. I thought they would see me as naive, reckless, or foolish for making that decision.

    Turned out I couldn’t have been more wrong. During the following months and years, many of them became my greatest supporters! Some said I was brave for walking my own path, others opened up about their desires to do something similar. The takeaway here is: You never know what people think about you unless you give them a chance to speak.

    2. Understand that it’s never about you.

    This has been a game-changer for me! Hear this: Another person’s judgment about you is never about you—it’s about them. It’s a reflection of their fears, limitations, and perceptions.

    One of the closest people in my life told me that I was making a mistake by quitting my corporate job to start my own business.

    First, I felt that he judged me and didn’t support my decision. Later on, I realized that his reaction was a mirror of his beliefs, fears, and view on the world. For him, staying at a corporate job meant security, safety, and a good life.

    When I realized that he always had my best interest at heart, I felt nothing but compassion and love for him. To make sure you navigate your choices right, ask yourself: What do I want? What is the right thing for me to do?

    3. Stop judging yourself.

    Many times, we’re so aware of what we find awkward about ourselves that we look for others to confirm our beliefs. So, the judgment we fear from others is really a reflection of what we judge ourselves for. Sneaky, right?

    Be honest with yourself, what do you judge yourself for? It can be related to your health, career, relationship status, living situation, or looks. Then ask yourself why you judge yourself for this. What beliefs are driving the judgments? Do you believe it’s wrong to prioritize career over family? Do you believe it’s bad to be the center of attention?

    Once you challenge these beliefs and stop judging yourself, you’ll be able to make peace with who you are and the choices you’ve made, good and bad. Once you’ve reached acceptance, you won’t fear the judgment of others because you stand behind yourself.

    4. Stop judging others.

    The more we judge others, the more we tend to believe that they judge us. It’s a vicious cycle. So, instead of judging others for their choices, character, religious views, ways to dress, or something else, choose to be curious about the differences and diversity.

    Ask yourself what you can learn from this person? Why this person is in a certain way? Maybe there are reasons for it. As Wayne Dyer said, “When you judge another, you do not define them, you define yourself.”

    5. Use your worry as guidance.

    What is it that you worry other people will judge you for? Perhaps it’s your job position, living situation, relationship status, insecurities, looks, or intelligence. That worry tells you there’s either something you need to accept and make peace with or something you need to change.

    For example, maybe you can start pursuing a new career path that feels more aligned with your values. Or maybe you can choose to view your situation today as a stepping stone to something better. When you approve of yourself and your life, other people’s opinions won’t matter as much.

    6. Expect reactions from others.

    Instead of trying to avoid getting reactions from others, expect them! If you try a new plant-based diet, change career paths, or decide to go all-in on that geeky hobby of yours, expect people to say something about it. And take it as a good sign because it means you’re doing what’s right for you, even though people will have opinions about it.

    As Aristotle said, “There is only one way to avoid criticism: do nothing, say nothing, and be nothing.” And that’s not you, right? You are here to live to the fullest, follow what excites you, and be the incredible person that you are.

    7. Focus on long-term happiness.

    Judgment and criticism from others can hurt. But it will never hurt as much as regret. Do you know what most people regret on their deathbed? This: “I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.”

    Be willing to take judgment and criticism in the short term, in exchange for what will serve you long term. Focus on living life true to yourself and not on the life others expect of you.

    8. Approve of yourself.

    Acceptance of yourself is what it all comes down to, right? Once you approve of yourself, you stop worrying about other people’s opinions. You have the one approval that matters most: your own.

    Look at your imperfections, flaws, and the choices you wish you had made differently and accept it all. Know that you are enough. Know that you’ve done the best you can, from where you once were. We all want you to be the person you are meant to be—including the quirks, flaws, and imperfections.

    —

    Living with the worry that other people will judge you is hard. It can keep you stuck, paralyzed, and separated from the life you want to live.

    It’s time to take your power back. Use this list, choose one or two points that resonate, and practice them. Then, once you’re ready, come back to the list and choose another point.

    Stop living in accordance with other people’s expectations and start living life true to yourself.

    Now, go out and show the world what you’re made of. We are waiting eagerly.

  • Perfectly Imperfect: How to Embrace Your Insecurities

    Perfectly Imperfect: How to Embrace Your Insecurities

    “Cut yourself some slack. You’re doing better than you think.” ~Unknown

    Your stomach is tied up in knots.

    Another crisis has arrived, and everyone is looking to you to have the answers, to be the leader. You can’t blame them either because you think you should have all the answers. But you just don’t.

    Though you look calm on the outside, inside you’re a tangle of nerves and anxiety, terrified someone will expose you as the fraud you feel you are.

    In the past, you’ve been able to pull a rabbit out of a hat to save the day, but those were just flukes. It wasn’t because of anything special you did, things just happened to fall in place at the right time. Truth be told, you doubt you could pull off such a trick again.

    Your shoulders are so tired from carrying the weight of everyone’s expectations that you’re sure everything will come crashing down at any moment. The thought of an impending doomsday gives you so much anxiety that it keeps you up at night.

    Feeling like an imposter is something many of us know all too well. When we’re faced with a challenge or a new opportunity opens up, instead of rising to the task, our minds quickly fill up with anxious thoughts.

    I remember being so filled with fear and anxiety that I would dread going to work on Monday, from the Thursday before. This, of course, completely ruined my weekend and kept me in a cycle of fear, self-doubt, and worry.

    Being in this constant state of negative emotions brought on weekly migraines that would stay for two to three days. Living in fear was affecting my work/life balance and my health. After managing the situation for as long as I could, I decided that this wasn’t the way that I wanted to live my life.

    If you’ve ever felt like your emotions were permanently stuck on negative and wished you could get off this cycle of anxiety, keep reading. I’ve got some tips for you.

    Welcome to the Club

    With negative emotions, you often feel alone, as if no one understands what you’re going through or why. This further makes you feel ashamed, on top of already feeling isolated and like a complete failure.

    Have you ever noticed how one negative emotion brings more of the same, until you’re just one huge pile of sadness and depression?  

    For an unlucky few, you might even have someone in your life who seems to have it all together, bringing your failings into sharp focus.

    According to a study conducted by psychologists Pauline Rose Clance and Gail Matthews, about 70% of the population experiences feeling like an imposter (aka Impostor Syndrome) at one point in their life.

    That means right now, nearly everyone around you feels like they don’t know what they’re doing, like they don’t deserve their accomplishments, and they’re terrified that they’ll be exposed as frauds.

    Doubting yourself is normal. Everyone battles the little voice in their head telling them “you’re not good enough.”

    In fact, what’s odd is not feeling insecure.

    A Dose of Insecurity is Good for the Soul

    Everyone has areas of their life where they feel insecure. It’s a natural part of the human experience.

    Which, as it turns out, might be a good thing as only about 1% of us has no fears or insecurities at all. The clinical term for people like that is “psychopath.”

    A healthy dose (the small amount that doesn’t stop you from living and enjoying life) of self-doubt actually helps you to regulate yourself and your interactions with other people. Dr. Ellen Hendriksen, a clinical psychologist, posits that “we doubt ourselves in order to check ourselves.” Self-doubt helps us adjust our behavior in line with social norms.

    Have you ever noticed that when you’re faced with a new situation, place, event, or people you feel a tad bit off kilter or insecure? It’s your body’s defense mechanism working to keep you out of danger in unfamiliar circumstances. This is a trait found in every organism that helps them stay safe and alive.

    Self-doubt can even work to propel us to look inward and motivate us to do the necessary work to improve and change.

    Self-doubt is not all bad. The key is to keep it down to a healthy level.

    But what do you do if the self-doubt, fears, and anxiety you feel are more than doctors recommend? How do you stop from overdosing on these emotions?

    1. Wallow in your feelings.

    The first step is acknowledging your feelings.

    Burying your emotions and hoping you’ll just snap out of it isn’t going to work. Never, in the history of ever, has ignoring emotions helped anyone. In fact, the exact opposite seems to be true.

    Yet, out of shame or ignorance we continue to downplay and overlook our feelings. Since that’s not working, why not try something different? Why don’t you give yourself permission to feel your emotions?

    What’s the worst that could happen?

    Own up to your feelings and examine what is causing them. If you’re feeling inadequate, ask yourself why, what is causing that emotion. When you feel fear and self-doubt creeping in, ask where they’re coming from. What exactly are you afraid of?

    Drill down to the root cause. Is it something someone said? Is it an unrealistic expectation you have of yourself? Is it an actual fear of something tangible? Is it a fear of something intangible?  Perhaps the fear isn’t even yours, but something projected onto you by a well-meaning “friend.”

    By breaking down your emotions this way, you find the cause. And once you’ve found the cause of the problem, it becomes so much easier to find a solution.

    2. Check your pride at the door.

    This next step requires a bit of humility.

    After drilling down to the root cause of your negative feelings, try to figure out how you contribute to feeling this way and what can you do to change the situation.

    It’s easy to blame all our problems on someone or something else. While it lets us off the hook, it also puts us in the victim mind space, where things happen to us and we’re powerless to do anything about it.

    The truth is, sometimes the fault lies with us.

    For example, you’ve realized you’re feeling inadequate at work because your boss keeps belittling the reports that you send  Is it possible that your boss might be right, and your reports do actually need work?

    Or perhaps the reason you’re terrified of being exposed as a fraud is because you have a skill or knowledge gap?

    If you feel inadequate in a particular area, is there a valid reason you do? Look at the situation objectively, can you improve in any way?

    Now don’t get me wrong. It’s not in every scenario that you cause your own self-doubt. There are some people who take joy out of ripping the self-confidence of others to shreds.

    However, I’ve found that more often than not, if I can do (or not do) something just a little differently, the circumstances surrounding my negative emotions will improve.

    3. Dear diary ain’t gonna cut it.

    I’m all for writing in a journal. It’s a great practice that helps me get out of my head. After a stressful day at work, nothing feels better than coming home to do a brain dump in my journal. I write the good, bad, and the ugly, with no filter. And no judgment.

    Studies have shown journaling to help patients suffering from depression and anxiety disorders. It even helps with stress management. Journaling is great at helping to identify negative thought patterns and in gaining self-awareness. Writing in a journal is a great way of releasing pent-up feelings. Who doesn’t want that?

    If it’s so great, then what’s the problem?

    Many of us stop at just writing about our fears or the crappy day we’ve had. But we need to go deeper to actually develop a plan that addresses our insecurities. Journaling helps you to figure out what (or who) triggers your negative thought process. After you’ve drilled down to the triggers, go deeper into figuring out how to get rid of them.

    Maybe I just love putting together a good plan, but any time I do, I find that my mood improves. I believe it’s because I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, and I know the end is in in sight rather than just stumbling about, hoping for things to just magically change.

    4. Stop broadcasting your inadequacies.

    I had a friend who felt quite insecure about his lack of education. He once asked me if I was ashamed of the fact that he wasn’t very intelligent.

    I was taken aback because his question came out of the blue. I had found him to be intelligent and well-spoken. I’d never even noticed his lack of education. We’d had great conversations and he taught me about things I hadn’t been exposed to before. I honestly didn’t know where his insecurities were coming from.

    But do you know what happened after that? I started to see where the cracks were. Truthfully, I probably wouldn’t have noticed if he hadn’t pointed them out.

    Everyone is worrying about their own problems and inadequacies. They’re probably not even aware of what you see as your glaring shortcomings. And if they don’t see them, why tell them about them?

    What is the purpose of sharing your shortcomings? What do you hope to gain by doing so? Are you trying to undermine yourself?

    If you’re looking for reassurance or support, then by all means share. But if you’re only pointing out your inadequacies because you assume they’re obvious to other people, think again.

    5. Just be yourself.

    You’re not perfect, you don’t know everything, and you don’t have all the answers. But let me let you in on a little secret, no one expects you to, either.

    We all battle our self-doubt and fear. We all have our shortcomings. Cut yourself some slack. You’re not the worst (insert whatever fits) to walk the face of the earth.

    The only thing you can do is keep trying to improve and better yourself.

    Even that one person that looks like they’ve got it all together is working through some stuff. They have some areas where they falter. In fact, they’d probably have a good laugh at you for thinking they’ve got everything figured out.

    Just like you’re not the worst (insert whatever fits) to walk the face of the earth, struggling to be the best (insert whatever fits) can be just as damaging to your psyche. It’s a goal one can never reach. And if by some stroke of magic you manage to attain that impossibly high bar, staying there for any length of time is unlikely.

    By setting the bar so high and continually missing the unrealistic standards that you’ve set for yourself, you’re continuously chipping away at your self-confidence and self-worth.

    In order for you to maintain your mental health, you need to make peace with being happy by being yourself.

    You’re perfectly imperfect.

    “You alone are enough. You have nothing to prove to anybody.” ~Maya Angelou

    Feelings of inadequacy and self-doubt creep up to overwhelm us at critical moments, whether it be when we step into a new role at work or when we witness the birth of our child or when we’re faced with a new challenge or opportunity.

    In these moments we are bound to feel like we don’t measure up, either to our own high standards or the standards of those around us.

    The trick is to not let these feelings fester, grow, and rob us of our inner peace and self-confidence.

    When thoughts of self-doubt and inadequacy start running through your mind, try any of the techniques mentioned above to remind yourself that you are enough and to get yourself on track to handling any challenge that arises.

  • I Will No Longer Allow My Doubt to Convince Me I’m Not Good Enough

    I Will No Longer Allow My Doubt to Convince Me I’m Not Good Enough

    “Whether you think you can, or you think you can’t, you’re right.” ~Henry Ford

    Self-doubt is a killer. It may start off quietly in the back of your mind when you’re a kid. You may not even notice its presence, but if you let it, it can keep growing bigger and bigger like a balloon that never pops.

    “Did I make the right decision?”

    “Should I have said that out loud?”

    “Should I apply for that job?”

    “Am I good enough?”

    For most (including myself), it’s that last question that haunts you no matter what you’re trying to do.

    Growing up, my self-doubt tiptoed into my mind by silently questioning my dancing. After I satisfied my inner critic by quitting dance practice, it moved on to question my grades, my personality, and everything else about myself.

    Fast-forward to my mid-twenties, and my self-doubt grew considerably in size. Amped with a larger space in my mind, my self-doubt attacked my writing and my job as a writer and questioned if my articles were even worth reading.

    The belief that I wasn’t good enough stopped me from sharing any of my work with my friends and family. It stopped me from even looking at my own articles.

    Over the next few months, I went on to write about twenty opinion pieces on global politics, none of which were a source of pride for me, because that is what I told myself.

    A few months after I quit my job to focus on personal health issues, I decided to go back to the website that published my work. “Maybe I can look at my writing with a fresher perspective,” I thought.

    Unfortunately for me, the company that I’d worked for decided to change their business model and redirect their efforts to create an app. All my articles had been wiped clean. Months of hard work, research, and slaving away over 700-word articles vanished at the click of a button.

    “Why didn’t I save any of this?” I asked myself. Because my self-doubt told me it wasn’t worth saving.

    It was only then that I realized, every hobby, passion, or profession I’d tried had been stunted by my own debilitating inner monologue. Moreover, I had failed to recognize that even if my articles weren’t “good enough” by someone else’s standards, they were still mine. They were still a product of my mind and tangible proof that I had ability to create something despite the obnoxious voice in my head.

    At first I thought, “What am I doing that keeps making that bubble grow bigger?” But I already knew the answer. I was feeding it. Right from the moment I quit dancing, my doubt bubble began growing bigger and bigger till it became the only thing I knew.

    I’m currently in the process of restarting my work, hobbies, and passions, with a different mindset. Here are some of the things that have immensely helped me change the way I perceive myself and my work.

    1. Keep showing up.

    Your doubt grows bigger every time you let it win. Every passion you give up, every offer you decline because you think you’re not equipped to handle it, only fuels the machine that produces more self-doubt.

    Stop yourself from going round and round the vicious cycle by understanding that even if you’re not good at something today, that does not mean that you will not be good at it tomorrow. I can’t stress enough the importance of keeping at something every day. No one starts at their best; they build to it. So show up, do it again, then do it again, and your defeatist inner voice will quiet over time. Nothing slows down that inner monologue faster than being aware of its presence and choosing to ignore it.

    2. Focus on your successes, not your failures.

    Many of us fail to see all we’ve accomplished in our lifetime because we let our failures eclipse our achievements. For me, my mind would shine a light on the missteps in my dance practice, the mistakes in my writing, pinpointing and ridiculing even the smallest of grammatical errors.

    Only upon closer inspection of my own thoughts did I begin to notice the pattern of ‘selective memory,’ where the humiliating, humbling, and haunting memories of failure and shame were constantly at the forefront of my brain.

    Now, I consciously and purposefully shine a light on the hours of effort, focus, and perseverance it took me to even get this far. I remember that, good or bad, I didn’t give up. Like everything else, it takes a bit of practice. The reward? The warmth of the realization that you are not your mistakes.

    Instead of reminding yourself over and over how you’ve fallen short, hold on tightly to the things you’re proud of. Keep reminding yourself of the things you’ve excelled at, because your focus will guide your choices.

    If you berate yourself for your failures you’ll feel too scared to try anything new. If you celebrate your successes you’ll feel empowered to keep doing your best.

    3. Trust the journey.

    For me, comparison has always been the biggest killer of ambition. When I think I’m not good enough, it’s often because I’m comparing myself to someone who’s made strides in their own journey.

    What I fail to realize, every single time, is that everyone’s journey is different. You don’t know where someone’s been and you also don’t know where they’re going. You don’t know how many ‘failures’ came before their success, or if they even feel successful in the life they’re living now.

    As cliché as it sounds, trusting your journey (failures and all) is an integral part of dissolving self-doubt. All you need to do is focus on moving forward in your own journey, trusting that you’re always where you need to be, moving at the best pace for you, learning the lessons essential for your own growth.

    If you stop yourself from moving just because someone else seems to have gone further, you will never know how far you can go.

    —

    I lost my articles because I didn’t see the value in my work, because I thought it wasn’t good enough. I now know that they were proof I was trying—which is the only way to learn and grow. And realizing I’m learning and growing helps me move forward in spite of my doubt.

  • How to Feel More in Control When Life Gets Overwhelming

    How to Feel More in Control When Life Gets Overwhelming

    “When it is obvious that the goals cannot be reached, don’t adjust the goals, adjust the action steps.” ~Confucius

    I’m in the middle of a career transition and it hasn’t been easy. For the first few months after quitting my job—a job which I thought should have been perfect, where I thought I would stay for years—I was paralyzed into inaction regarding anything career-related. I had lost confidence in my own judgment; after all, I had thought that job would be the one and it wasn’t, so did I even really know what I wanted?

    This kind of self-doubt makes me second-guess myself to the extreme—my goals, my desires, and even the validity of my feelings. This often means I start doing something, question what I’m doing and how I’m doing it, feel stressed and overwhelmed, and then end up doing nothing.

    I’m still in this transition, but where once the self-doubt and overwhelm paralyzed me every day, I’m now taking back control and beginning to shape my life how I want it.

    First, let me present you with a story. Jessica is a high school student in the middle of taking the SAT. She really wants to do well because she knows that getting a higher score improves her chances of getting into her dream school and qualifying for scholarships.

    Everyone has told her how important the SAT is, how hard it is to do well, and (unfortunately) how unlikely she is to get her goal score. On the test, she reaches a tough question and has no clue how to answer it. Here are two of her choices:

    -Option A: Jessica racks her brain, her mind filled with thoughts of her dream school slipping away; she tries a few different methods but only manages to eliminate one incorrect choice; she second-guesses herself and then realizes that time has slipped away from her and, feeling anxious and flustered, she rushes through the rest of the test.

    -Option B: She skips the question, continuing with the rest of the test and answering all the questions she feels confident about. When she returns to the difficult question, she finds that it is not as hard as it first seemed and is able to solve it with confidence. She remains in control of her test experience and finishes the test with confidence.

    What does this example have to do with those of us who aren’t high school teenagers and are going through stressful times? A lot in fact.

    When Jessica encounters an obstacle in an already-stressful time, she can try to force her way through it, as in Option A, or skip the question and come back to it, as in Option B.

    As a test prep instructor, I teach my students to do the second option through a guided exercise, and the students are surprised to find how much easier the “hard” questions are after answering the easier ones. The second approach builds up confidence, while the first approach increases test anxiety.

    I wondered if I might be able to apply this test-taking strategy to life or if it was too ridiculous to work. As it turns out, by temporarily turning my attention to something else—’skipping’ the problem with the intention to return to it later—I was able to minimize my feelings of overwhelm and take steps that I was once paralyzed to take, steps like learning new skills.

    When faced with overwhelm, the best way to handle it is to stop and do something else. This holds true whether we are taking a test or facing a more complex source of stress.

    We rarely do this because it is counterintuitive. When we feel overwhelmed, we often feel that there’s too much to do, there’s not enough time or resources, we don’t know where to start, and in general our goals feel unattainable. If there’s so much to do and so little time, how can we justify “wasting” time doing something else? Won’t that just delay our goals further?

    However, by seeing how ineffective Option A is for Jessica, I realized there might be a parallel to other aspects of life. In the same amount of time that Jessica could spend being frustrated or anxious, she can choose to say “not yet” or “not right now” and move on to something else, knowing that the problem will be sitting right where it was.

    Now, whenever I notice the constricting sensation of overwhelm, I know that my next step is to stop whatever I’m doing and switch gears. I could be ruminating, folding laundry, or writing, but no matter what I must stop and do something else.

    An amazing thing happens when I do this: I regain control over the shape of my life.

    I may not have control over all my life circumstances or even my emotions, but I do control how I react. When I choose to react in ways that nourish my sense of well-being and provide me with a sense of accomplishment, I am able to face challenges for what they are.

    If sitting down to write a blog post seems especially daunting right now, then I’ll do some chores. If the chores seem difficult, I’ll go for a walk. If a walk seems like too much, I’ll journal stream-of-consciousness.

    The specific task that overwhelms us and the task we choose to do instead aren’t what matters most for this method. It’s the inherent power of choice that allows us to brush off societal definitions of success and pursue our own ever-evolving sense of success.

    While it’s not possible to provide specific alternative actions for every scenario, here are some general ideas of things to do when you’re feeling overwhelmed:

    -Go somewhere. It could be as simple as going to another room or going somewhere across town. The change of scenery can bring a fresh perspective to a prior problem.

    -Make something. You could draw, cook, or fold a paper airplane. When we engage our creativity, we have fun and build confidence through effort rather than results.

    -I often feel energized but directionless when I am overwhelmed, and maybe you do too. Enjoying your favorite type of exercise can improve your mood and release pent-up energy.

    -Whether you connect with loved ones or with a spiritual/religious practice, connecting with others helps us feel supported when we try something new.

    While overwhelm is bound to happen in our lives, we can choose to react in ways that enable us to feel confident and in control. It’s not the same as running away from your problems; it’s finding a circuitous route that has an immediate benefit of improving your sense of well-being and long-term benefit of helping you take action and find solutions.

    By taking charge of the content of our lives, we can find that even when overwhelm happens, we have the tools to work with it and the power to shape our lives through our choices and actions.

  • A Simple Practice to Help You Appreciate How Wonderful You Are

    A Simple Practice to Help You Appreciate How Wonderful You Are

    “Stop criticizing yourself for everything you aren’t and start appreciating yourself for everything you are.” ~Unknown

    Are you your own best friend, your own worst critic, or somewhere in between? Do you tend to focus on what you see as your flaws, mistakes, and imperfections, comparing yourself to others you think are better than you? Sometimes, do you even wish you were someone else?

    It’s easy to get trapped in that way of thinking, especially in today’s consumer culture. From magazine ads to TV commercials, we are trained to compare ourselves to others and are subtly told we are not enough—not attractive enough, smart enough, popular enough, etc.

    While I try to practice mindfulness and not fall into this trap, living in this culture, I am not immune to that way of thinking. I was reminded of this just the other day, when I met a young couple who came to stay in a suite my husband and I rent out in our house.

    Having been doing housework and, not realizing the time, I opened the door with no make-up, in faded jeans, an old tee shirt, and sneakers. On the other side of the doorway, the young woman stood with perfectly applied make-up, perfectly styled hair, a cute dress, and heels, looking like she had just left a fashion magazine shoot.

    Meanwhile, the young man stared at me with a blank expression, which I took to mean he did not like me. I felt intimidated and inferior.

    A few days later, my husband saw the couple and had a short conversation with them. In it, he later told me, they actually raved about me!

    They said they were deeply impressed with a calm, “Zen” quality they sensed I had and instantly felt comfortable and relaxed around me. Considering what I had thought of the encounter, I was astonished to hear that. This taught me an important lesson.

    While we might worry about what we see as one of our flaws, others might not even notice it and instead be dazzled by one of our virtues.

    If others can see us in this positive light, so can we. But how?

    After studying several personal growth books, articles, and online classes, I gathered some key points about self-appreciation and wove them into a powerful practice. It helped me tremendously and I share it here in hopes it will do the same for you.

    Through it, you might experience for the first time in your whole life a real sense of self-appreciation and self-love. It’s something you can do any time you feel self-doubt or self-judgement or inferiority. It can help you relax into the knowingness that you are a unique, wonderful being.

    Embracing Yourself Practice

    Sadly, we often overlook the miracle that’s closest to us. It’s available to us from the moment we’re born to the moment we die. It’s ourselves.

    This practice is designed to help you connect with your own miraculous nature and appreciate how wonderful you really are.

    1. Centering yourself

    To get the most from this experience, feel free to turn off distractions like the TV, the ringer on your phone, and any kind of message alerts. Put your mental to-do list aside, just for now. It will still be there after this experience.

    Create some quiet, uninterrupted time to step back and nourish yourself. Give yourself permission to pause and receive the gift of this time. Make yourself comfortable, either sitting or laying down, preferably laying down.

    Gather your thoughts and energy from all the different directions they’ve been going. Bring them in and let them rest for these few moments, while you turn your attention to being here now.

    Take one slow, calming breath and release it. Take another deep breath and release it.

    2. Appreciating your body

    When you’re ready, rest your hands over your heart. Can you feel your heart beating?

    Breathing in, feel your lungs expand with air. Breathing out, feel your lungs relax. Again, feel them expanding in and relaxing out.

    Leave your hands over your heart or wrap them around your torso in a hug. Breathing in, feel your lungs expand. Breathing out, feel your lungs relax.

    Breathing normally, think about the amazing processes happening in your body right now, this very moment—the blood being circulated, the oxygen being exchanged, the cells absorbing nutrients, the nerves and neurons allowing you to hear the sounds around you.

    Feel the sensation of sitting or lying down where you are.

    Reflect on how a thought sends an impulse from your brain to your spinal cord, to your nerves, to your muscles, allowing you to move. Feel appreciation for your body for allowing you to experience life in this way.

    3. Appreciating your essence

    Now, reflect on your uniqueness. Of the billions of people on this planet, there is only one you.

    Think about the spark of life that animates your body, your essence that makes you, you. You might think of it as your personality or your spirit.

    Can you sense it? Do you feel or see anything related to it? Feel awe and appreciation for it.

    Think of the special qualities that make you a unique individual.

    Think of one quality you are grateful for about yourself. Maybe that quality is the fact that you are trying your best or something else. Whatever quality comes to mind, appreciate that about yourself.

    Feel grateful for another thing about yourself, maybe your intelligence or something else. Then feel grateful for another thing about yourself, maybe your kind heart or something else.

    Reflect on this idea: Life has good reason for expressing itself through you.

    4. Sending yourself love

    Feel the warmth of your hands on your heart or your torso. Feel appreciation for the unique individual you are.

    Think to yourself or say out loud, “I love myself.” Pause.

    Think or say again, “I love myself.” Pause.

    Think or say again, “I love myself.” Notice how that feels. Let that love sink in.

    Add anything else positive you’d like to say to yourself. What do you need to hear right now?

    Appreciate yourself for doing this practice. Rest your mind, taking a few more deep breaths. Look out and around you from this place of connection with yourself.

    Feel free to do this practice as often as you like, maybe a few times a week before getting up in the morning or before going to sleep at night—any time you’d like to feel a greater appreciation for yourself, any time you’d like to remind yourself that you are a miracle…because you are!

  • Highs and Lows Are Part of Growth and It All Makes Us Stronger

    Highs and Lows Are Part of Growth and It All Makes Us Stronger

    “Just like a muscle needs to tear to grow stronger, sometimes we need to wade into our own darkness to find a brighter light.” ~Lori Deschene

    Sometimes we need to journey into the deepest, darkest, scariest, most painful places inside in order to reach the next level.

    This is what happened to me earlier this year.

    When I was younger, I was in an abusive relationship that created a lot of stories in my head. These stories became beliefs that I carried around for a long time. Beliefs like, “I’m not good enough,” “Relationships are painful,” “I don’t have a say,” “I need someone else to show me I’m worthy,” and “I need to be perfect to receive love” (just to name a few).

    As a conscious adult, I’ve done a lot of healing work and spiritual development around this, and am proud of the growth I’ve experienced between where I was then and where I am now. But even still, I have setbacks. We all do.

    None of us are immune to the fears and self-doubt that pop up when “life happens.” None of us are safe when the ground we’ve worked so hard to establish gets ripped out from us.

    After lots of self-development and work around relationships and love, I recently declared to the Universe that I was no longer afraid of being alone and that I was no longer afraid of being vulnerable and my “true self” in a future relationship. So, the Universe delivered. Big time.

    I met someone new. He wasn’t like the other men I’ve dated—men who are safe and stable, and who give me a sense of being in control of the situation. He was uncharted territory for me. Hard to read. Mysterious. Kept me guessing.

    He would surprise me with nice gestures like showing up with sunflowers, sending me unexpected notes about how beautiful I am, you know… the works. Not to mention the sex. THE SEX! For the first time, possibly in my whole life, I felt really seen, appreciated, valued and truly beautiful while having sex. There was nothing awkward or uncomfortable or weird or threatening about it. I had met Mr. Perfect… or so I thought.

    What I know now that I didn’t recognize then was that this guy was an assignment. The Universe heard me loud and clear when I announced that I was ready to be alone and/or in a vulnerable relationship (which is actually a very confusing declaration to make in the first place, so… no wonder stuff got weird!), and so I was sent this guy—let’s refer to him as Mr. Perfect from here on out—as a test.

    Mr. Perfect was an opportunity for me to put into practice all of the things I had learned about myself over the past twenty-five years.

    Let’s just say that I failed that test. Miserably.

    After an all-out eight-day binge on this guy, we were both like a couple of strung-out addicts, totally manipulative and controlling and hopeless about our futures, but pretending everything was just groovy. We were practically playing house together when we hadn’t even known about the other’s existence just a month earlier.

    Somewhere throughout the week with Mr. Perfect, my energy shifted. I went from this high-vibe, loving, independent, strong version of myself, to this weird, controlling, self-conscious, anxious, creepy version of me. I went from Jennifer Aniston status to that chick in Mean Girls who’s obsessed with Regina George way too quickly, and my old limiting beliefs started to take over.

    Suddenly, I was operating from that old, abusive relationship version of me.

    The version of me who thought that being vulnerable in a relationship meant getting hurt.

    The version of me who thought that the guy needs to control everything, and that I am not safe to speak up about what I really want, because you never know how he’s going to react.

    The version of me who felt uncomfortable in her own skin, so tried really hard to look pretty, say the right thing, and always do something more in an effort to be noticed.

    The version of me who thought that I needed a man to “save me,” or that he was the one answer to all of my problems in life.

    You can only race like that for so long until you crash.

    And so, eight days of passionate sex, cute notes, sleepless nights, hours of butterflies in my stomach, several dinners, one brunch, way too much tequila, and two bouquets of flowers later, we bottomed out. Both of us.

    Mr. Perfect and I took a crash course in “How to Not Date as Intentional, Conscious Human Beings 101.” Our worlds both went spinning—his, with a huge f*ck up at work, likely the result of us spending too much time together; mine, reversing to harmful coping behaviors that used to show up when I was younger.

    When I got the text from Mr. Perfect that started with “We need to talk,” I went into a downward spiral of emotion and drama. He wanted to end things. I wanted to die. I literally paced outside my apartment building for three hours trying my very best to not have a heart attack.

    I questioned everything. Was any of it real? Did I mean anything to him? How could I screw this up? How could I fix it? I needed to fix it. How could I mess up such a perfect thing?

    But suddenly, I had a beautiful recognition. I noticed that there was a shift. In my heart space, I could feel the presence of my Higher Self. The part of me that’s connected to something bigger. The part of me that knows these stories of not being good enough are complete BS.

    And just like that, I was no longer living in the stories that were sending me into a near panic attack. I was above that. I knew that I was better than that. That I deserve more. That it wasn’t my fault. That I didn’t do anything wrong. That I was still just as worthy as love and acceptance and beauty as anyone else on this planet.

    In that moment, I forgave myself.

    I forgave myself for the behavior that caused him to end things.

    I forgave myself for the fact that I let it get to the point where we even engaged in an eight-day binge on each other.

    And most importantly, I forgave myself for all the negative and self-doubting talk, limiting beliefs, and lame stories I told myself when it happened.

    I saw that the stories were keeping me stuck. I saw that they made me revert back to this old version of me that I no longer was. And I saw that I had the awareness and the power now to intentionally choose to believe a different story instead.

    I chose to believe that this story was no longer serving me, and that I could rise above it.

    That I actually didn’t need a man to “fix” me or to complete me, but that I had actually been doing that work on my own all along.

    I decided that I was done with this belief of not being good enough.

    I was soooo done.

    I decided then and there to stay committed to this path of personal growth and transcendence, because I see now how all of the pain and struggles that I’ve been through actually happened for me, not to me.

    All of it was for a reason.

    You can do the same. Everything that you’ve been through—every negative thought or limiting belief or fear that you’ve had that’s kept you from what you want the most in life—it’s all within your power to change. If you decide that you deserve it.

    Healing is not linear. There will be highs and lows, laughs and tears, moments of total bliss and moments of complete uncertainty and self-doubt. But your Higher Self is there through it all, and S/he wants to see you come out stronger through each and every assignment that the Universe throws your way.

    S/he is cheering you on from the sidelines and always there for support as your #1 fan, no matter what crazy stuff comes across your path. And that person, that part of you, needs you to show up to these assignments. To really face the fear head on, to feel the pain, and to move through it.

    Because on the other side of fear and pain and struggle and darkness lies your greatness.

    Looking back at it now, I don’t think I failed the test the Universe sent me. I think I passed it. Because I chose my Higher Self, I chose self-love, and I chose me.

    Maybe that was the lesson all along.

  • How Surfing Helped Me Turn Fear and Anxiety into Confidence

    How Surfing Helped Me Turn Fear and Anxiety into Confidence

    “If you want to conquer fear, don’t sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.” ~Dale Carnegie

    Not too long ago I went through an extremely chaotic and emotional two-week period. Anything that could go wrong or be difficult did and was. I thought it would never end.

    When it began, the little hiccups were easy to let roll off my shoulders. After about a week, I was feeling pretty worn down and was in tears daily. At the end, I felt numb, and when things kept going wrong I would say to myself “Sure… Okay …what’s next?”

    These two weeks were filled with miscommunications, the realities of parenting a teenager, negative art critiques, the end of a three-year business relationship, technical difficulties with my social media accounts, a shoulder injury, and an art block, and none of my efforts seemed to put any of the proverbial fires out.

    Not to mention that we were surrounded by literal fires here in Southern Oregon, which brought oppressive smoke and stress.

    I was tired, scared, tired, hurt, tired, irritable, and physically taxed. And did I say tired? Usually getting into the art studio and painting is the best way to bring me back around, but that wasn’t working either. I would stare at my painting and just not know what to do, so I would do nothing.

    About a week in, I drove myself to the coast to surf for the day, thinking that getting out of the smoke and into the ocean would wash away the negativity. But the conditions were not in my favor, and the day was frustrating as I paddled my way from one side of the beach to the other searching for waves. I drove back into the smoke feeling defeated, complacency of the crapolicious period of time setting in.

    The next week, I decided that there was nothing left to do but treat myself with some kindness and compassion. I rested, ate a carton of ice cream, and watched schlocky movies. I thought that maybe by just not fighting it anymore, the procession of poop would lift. But no, the hits just kept coming.

    I felt the depression creeping in as it has a tendency to do after anxiety has beat me into submission.

    For me, anxiety and depression have a way of cultivating more anxiety and depression. As the challenges arose in continuum, seeing the positive became harder and harder. The negativity took the lead and thus started a downward spiral of adversity and uncertainly. It is a horribly stagnant and uncomfortable place to live.

    So, I decided to participate in a surfing competition. Wait… wha?

    I had actually planned to compete months before. It was not something that I had ever done prior, and it is generally an activity that I would consider completely out of my comfort zone.

    I’ve never been interested in competitive sports; I’m nervous when put on the spot and I am not comfortable being the center of attention. A friend who competes annually told me it would be casual fun, but it didn’t necessarily sound like a good time to me. It sounded nerve racking.

    Nevertheless, I had registered to compete. The timing couldn’t have been worse. I already felt like I had been hit by an emotional mac truck, and the physical ailments were tagging along like uninvited hitchhikers.

    I decided that I would go, but if I wasn’t feeling it, I would back out and just be there to enjoy the beach and support my husband and our friends. And so, we prepared for a long weekend at the coast.

    The day before our departure my husband got a cold and I could feel one coming on. The morning we left I woke with a migraine.

    “Oh, this is starting out fantastic,” I thought to myself, but I kept my snarky remarks to myself, climbed into the van, and off we went. Hubbie sniffing and sneezing and me unable to keep my eyes open for very long.

    I have to admit that I was glad to get out of my art studio. Staring at my painting that I was stuck on had been a source of irritation that I was relieved to take a vacation from.

    We arrived at the beach to find almost non-existent waves, which would make a surf competition pretty difficult. Then, I received a not such fantastic report from a friend whose father is in poor health and I realized that my parents had missed my daughter’s volleyball game because I had told them the wrong time. And my shoulder was killing me. Would it ever end?

    The more it came, the more indifferent I felt. The apathy was only interrupted by sporadic bursts of tears followed by the need to collapse and sleep.

    I swear the sole reason that I didn’t back out of the competition was simply because I just couldn’t walk back up the beach one more time to get to the registration table again. Plus, I started to question if I would be disappointed in myself and regret it if I surrendered.

    So, I went on. My heat was at 11:40 the next morning. I would have twenty minutes to catch as many waves as I could, only two of which would count toward my score. The waves were ankle height. How on earth was this going to work? I ate some chocolate and went to bed.

    The morning of the competition, I woke with small butterfly flutters in my stomach that in the hours leading up to 11:40am turned into a swarm. I was nauseous, shaky, and terrified. At least I had seemed to have beaten the sickness and my migraine was gone. Focus on the positive, right?

    I paddled out in to the water with my six competitors and sat for what seemed to be an eternity. Then the horn blew and my twenty minutes began. I caught as many waves as I could and it was actually going okay.

    The horn blew again ending my heat and I came out the water with the biggest smile on my face. I had done it. I was happy with how I had surfed but mostly, I was just psyched that I had gotten out there. All of the crap from the previous two weeks melted away and all of a sudden, my problems didn’t seem like such a big deal.

    “Look what I just did!” I exclaimed. I felt proud and accomplished, the sky seemed bluer, and the world brighter. I felt ready to tackle anything. I found out that I came in dead last in my heat but it didn’t matter. I had gone through with it.

    I brought that feeling home and immediately was able to resolve the painting I had been stuck on. The technical problems I was having got fixed, and harmony seemed to be on its way to restoration. I, once again, felt I could take on the world.

    I am a highly sensitive person who struggles with anxiety. When things are going well, it feels like the good will never end. When life is not working in my favor, I feel as though I’ve been sucker punched and then repeatedly kicked when down. Like all of the warranties have just expired. Like I’m making all the wrong choices and doing all the wrong things.

    It can be hard to stand back up again when I’m questioning every option. The fear is overwhelming and paralyzing. But I now realize one way to effectively shake off these negative cycles, which are inevitable: I can turn fear on itself by doing something that intimidates me.

    I can fight fear with action.

    During this particularly bad negative cycle, I became scared of everything and it was hard for me to move forward, as I was petrified by all of the possible outcomes. It destroyed my confidence.

    My everyday coping methods of dealing with anxiety were not working. But by doing something that scared the crap out of me, something completely out of my comfort zone, I showed myself that I am strong.

    Also, I am aware that surfing, skiing, hiking, and mountain biking are all activities that force me to engage with the present. I can’t think about what’s happening in other areas of my life when I’m dropping into a wave or flying down the side of a mountain. It’s like jet-fueled mindfulness. I am reminded that there are things that I cannot control, and I become aware of the smallness of my problems.

    In this particular instance, I was so lost in doubt and confusion that merely going to the coast for a surf didn’t boost me. However, by surfing in a competition, something that was completely foreign to me, I was able to not only get outside myself for a minute through the physical act of surfing, but I was also able to prove to myself that I can accomplish things that I interpret as out of my reach.

    Sure, I may not have ended up on the winners’ podium, but in non-existent surf and with every eye on the beach watching, I competed. And when I walked out the water, I was cheered.

    Want proof of how doing something terrifying changed my outlook? Take a look at the photo to the right. That’s me coming out of the water after my heat. That smile is genuine. I felt like a winner.

    For me, there is nothing more debilitating than being fear-driven. It is a barrier to progress and I, for one, feel I have come too far to let anxiety sit at my table for long.

    Don’t get me wrong. There is such a thing as healthy fear. If I would have shown up to the competition and the waves were fourteen feet high, I don’t think I would have surfed. But if I would have backed out because things had been going poorly and so, “this will probably be a disaster too,” well, I just plain refuse to adhere to that mind set, even if that’s where my brain wants to go.

    We all go through periods of time when the world just seems to be working against us. Cycles when we feel we are swimming against the current. Sometimes the best way to break the cycle is to show ourselves that worry and doubt have not taken total control.

    We can take the power away from fear and stock it back into our arsenal by taking action.

    We set ourselves free by proving that we can do the very things that scare the bejesus out of us and that life will still go on, possibly with a renewed confidence, even greater than it was before. So, go out and do something that scares you. I double dog dare ya’!

    Photo credit for Marigny’s surfing picture: Chris Goodyear

  • Why We Procrastinate and How to Finally Do What You’ve Been Putting Off

    Why We Procrastinate and How to Finally Do What You’ve Been Putting Off

    “Low key change helps the human mind circumnavigate the fear that blocks success and creativity.” ~Robert Maurer

    I’m currently working on my doctoral dissertation. It’s something I’ve been working on for many years. It’s something that I deeply believe in and want to complete, but I’m also the mom of two small kids and I run my own business.

    Making time for to work on my thesis is low down on my priorities.

    And for years I’ve been able to justify it to myself that I don’t work on it as much as I should because I don’t have the time.

    That may well have been partly true while my children were younger.

    But now as they’re getting a bit older, I realize that my procrastination is also about something else.

    It’s about all the stories in my head that make working on this project unpleasant.

    It’s about the fear, the self-doubt, the worry about not being good enough, the doubt about whether I’ll ever be able to finish, and the expectation that it’s going to be a really hard and frustrating process.

    Because I do have time.

    I have time to read and work on other projects that interest me. In fact, I make sure I create the time because I enjoy working on them.

    This is something that I’ve only recently realized. Recognizing it has been so empowering.

    Because I do want to finish it. I’ve dedicated so much time and energy to it, it would feel really good to complete.

    Since recognizing this and recommitting to the project, I’ve been experimenting with an idea that so far has been really helpful, and I’m excited about its potential.

    Sneaking Past Fear the Kaizen Way

    The idea comes from the Japanese art of Kaizen. In his great book One Small Step Can Change Your Life: The Kaizen Way, Robert Maurer describes it as a gentle and elegant strategy to maintain excellence and realize dreams.

    He explains how when we try to do big things and make big changes, it triggers our stress response and makes us avoid. So the solution is to make tiny, incremental changes, so imperceptibly small that you don’t activate your stress response.

    All kaizen asks is that you take small steps for continual improvement.

    As I was reading this I could immediately see where I was going wrong.

    Each time I sat down to work on a paper I’m writing I was thinking about how I could make this a brilliant paper that would make the biggest impact and so do justice to the participants of my research.

    Wow, the weight of the pressure. No wonder that felt like a big ask and made me avoid it.

    The two strategies I have been working with involve asking small questions and thinking small thoughts.

    1. Ask small questions to dispel fear and inspire creativity.

    Big questions, such as “How can I quit my job and find my purpose?” tend to overwhelm us. Small questions help us get around our fear and start making progress, especially when we ask them regularly.

    Maurer illustrates this point by asking you to imagine coming to work and having a colleague ask you to remember the color of the car parked next to you. You probably wouldn’t remember. If they asked you the same question the next day you probably also wouldn’t remember. But by the third day, as you arrived at work, you would probably pay attention to the car parked next to you.

    Asking yourself tiny questions consistently helps you teach your mind what to pay attention to.

    He recommends asking yourself your question a few time throughout the day for a number of days in a row.

    I’ve been using this by combining two questions: “If I was guaranteed to succeed, what would I be doing differently?” and “What small step can I take today to move me forward?”

    One idea that came to me today was to reach out to a colleague who I know was also working on her PhD while working fulltime. I shared my experience with her and her response: “Ali, I feel like you’re completely describing my experience. Let’s speak more and find out how we can support each other.”

    We’re now going to support each other as accountability partners which I can already feel will make a significant difference.

    Some other questions you could consider asking yourself daily:

    How could I make working toward my goal more fun?

    Who can I ask for help today?

    What’s the simplest thing I can do with the time I have available?

    2. Think small thoughts to develop new skills and habits.

    The second strategy involves a kind of mental rehearsal called mind sculpting, which helps you develop new social, mental, and even physical skills just by imagining yourself performing them. Here you identify the task you want to achieve from your questioning process and then begin to imagine yourself doing it.

    But instead of seeing yourself on a moving screen, as is the traditional visualization technique, you are advised to feel yourself doing the task and incorporate all your senses.

    So I see myself sitting down, feeling my fingers on my keyboard, hearing the sounds of the birds outside, and seeing the screen in front of me.

    And the important part—seeing yourself enjoying the process. Because we avoid what we imagine will be unpleasant and painful.

    What I’m doing with that is giving myself the next two weeks while my children are on school holidays to spend a few minutes a day imagining myself working on it and enjoying it.

    The idea here is that by doing this for a period of time, you start to rewire your association to the task, which makes it easier to then take small actions.

    So choose a task that you’re afraid to do or something that makes you uncomfortable and decide how long you’ll practice for each day. Make the time commitment so little that you’re going to do it consistently, as repetition is important. Maurer recommends starting with a few seconds a day!

    So what have you been putting off that you would love to accomplish? I’d love to hear in the comments below.

  • 3 Causes of Self-Doubt and How to Conquer It for Good

    3 Causes of Self-Doubt and How to Conquer It for Good

    “Each time we face our fear, we gain strength, courage, and confidence in the doing.” ~Unknown

    Self-doubt and I are old friends. We go way back, to early childhood.

    Now, if you ask me, I will honestly tell you that I had quite an idyllic childhood in a loving home.

    My parents raised us—my brother and me—to trust in our abilities and aim for the stars. They held me when I failed or fell flat on my face, which I did quite often, encouraging me to stand up and keep walking again. And yes, self-doubt still made its way into the fabric of my being and cleverly made itself boss, calling the shots at school and among my peers, seeping into my professional life as I grew up and chased my dreams.

    Sure, I chased my dreams. But you know how these things work. A thing like self-doubt has the ability to make you overcompensate. Since it tells you that you are not good enough or it gives you the nagging feeling of “wait-till-they-find-out-I’m-not-good-enough” when you succeed, your psyche is pushed to compensate for the lack in every possible way. The most common way, of course, is to over-achieve.

    I did exactly that. No matter what area of life I was focusing on, I had to be the best. The best student, the best wife, the best mother, the best doctor. And I never stopped to consider what “best” really means. For instance, whose best? How is it defined? It’s taken me years to realize that the prison of self-doubt had always been unlocked. I merely needed to walk out of it.

    In order to overcome any limitation, we have to turn around and face it, study it, and watch it like we would observe exotic animals in a zoo. From my experience, self-doubt is associated with three main processes—comparison, becoming fixated on specific outcomes, and feeling like an imposter.

    Comparing Yourself with Others

    Self-doubt is defined as the lack of confidence in one’s own abilities. When plagued with self-doubt, we believe that we can’t do something, and if we dig a bit deeper, we will invariably find that this belief arises from comparison. We believe we can’t do it the way someone else does it.

    We gauge success and failure by the norm, which is always set by others. Think about this. If you never had the ability to compare yourself with others, would you be plagued either by self-doubt or its opposite, over-confidence?

    Fixation on a Particular Outcome

    Obviously, comparison is not the only fuel source for self-doubt. One of the biggest things that holds us back from forging forward is the fear of failing. When we become fixated on a particular outcome, not only do we become paralyzed by the possibility of failure but we also close ourselves off to all other possibilities.

    For instance, if you’re a writer, you may find yourself reluctant to explore your creativity in your art if you have a particular goal of getting a certain number of readers, accolades, or other outcomes. The joy of writing becomes masked by anxiety if you are not open to failure, however you define it.

    Feeling Like an Imposter

    You’ve probably heard of Imposter Syndrome, which seems to affect women more than men. If you feel like you don’t deserve any of your accomplishments or that you got to where you are by pure fluke, you may be suffering from this condition.

    Here, obviously we are not talking about people that do end up with some successes by sheer luck but about those who underestimate their own achievements. It’s where we might feel like a fraud for being successful.

    And then there are the issues of not wanting to appear aggressive, ambitious, or assertive that make us take a step back from our full potential.

    What Doesn’t Help

    Just from my own familiarity with self-doubt, I can attest to what doesn’t help with alleviating it.

    Things like positive self-talk, affirmations, visualizations, and go-getting strategies don’t get us too far because they don’t get to the root of the issue—the belief that we are lacking. These techniques remain at the surface level of the mind, never touching the energetic power of the belief that becomes intermingled with our very identity.

    How to Face and Conquer Self-Doubt

    Whenever we are plagued by beliefs that limit our ability to live happy and fulfilled lives, it’s an indication to look into them. All of our suffering arises from believing our thoughts about ourselves or the world.

    1. Meditate

    These days we hear so much about meditation that we can often lose perspective about what it can and cannot do.

    Depending on the technique, meditation can certainly help calm our minds and lower stress and blood pressure—very favorable outcomes.

    What it will not do is solve our fundamental problems that arise from limiting beliefs. Instead, meditation creates the space in which we can do the real work of looking within. Most importantly, it helps us cultivate inner silence and the ability to step back from our minds and evaluate our internal processes in a non-judgmental way. If we cannot step back from our beliefs, we cannot work on them!

    2. Journal

    Writing is a powerful tool for cultivating self-awareness. It forces us to pin down our internal process.

    Write without censoring and consider the following questions:

    • What is stopping you from acknowledging your ability to succeed or your past successes?
    • Do you believe that you don’t deserve it? Why not?
    • Do you believe that you should not be aiming higher? Why?
    • What does success look like to you? Where did this definition come from?
    • What would happen if you plunged into your passion and the outcome was different from what you had envisioned?
    • What would happen if you fail?

    Make a list of all your limiting beliefs. Hint: beliefs are thoughts that start with a “should” or “should not,” such as, “I should not appear ambitious.”

    3. Question

    Now that you’ve identified your limiting beliefs, try this. Find fifteen to twenty minutes when you will not be disturbed. Keep your journal close. Sit comfortably and take some deep breaths, giving yourself permission to attend to tasks later. Relax any tense areas of the body.

    Now gently bring up your first belief, for example, the one about appearing ambitious. Who decides how you appear? Can you control what anyone else thinks of you? What if you never had the ability to think this thought?

    Allow each question to sink into silence without allowing the mind to answer. Take as long as you need to feel the effect of this sinking in. It will feel like a whoosh in your body when you suddenly realize that a thought is completely untrue. You don’t have to let go of anything. When you stop believing an untrue thought, it lets go of you. This is freedom.

    4. Feel

    Another powerful way of dealing with our limitations is to feel them in our bodies. Start as above, sitting comfortably and taking a few deep breaths. Relax. Bring up the first belief from your list. Where in your body do you feel it? Belly? Chest? Back? Focus entirely on feeling and not thinking. What does it feel like? Is it a heaviness? Contraction? Discomfort?

    Feel it fully, without trying to change it. Become curious about it. Does it come and go? Does it move anywhere?

    Continue to breathe deeply as the sensations subside. Notice that sensations come and go, but you are here. Our thoughts, beliefs, and sensations are temporary phenomena that become a problem when we hang on to them long after they are gone.

    Once you get comfortable with feeling sensations in your body, try the question exercise. Allow each question to sink in while observing the sensations. The energetic signature of a belief is felt in the body as a sense of contraction or tightness. When the belief dissolves through questioning, the energetic signature relaxes and this is felt deeply in the body.

    5. Act

    Once you’ve become adept at questioning your thoughts and beliefs in a meditative state, it’s time to put it into practice. Any time you feel paralyzed with self-doubt or when the old patterns start acting up, pause. Now you know that this belief is untrue.

    The only way out of this disabling pattern is to surrender to the present moment. Focus entirely on the task and not thoughts about the task, its outcome, or how you feel about it.

    If you need to give a presentation, do that. Keep bringing your attention to the tasks of researching, preparing, and rehearsing. Step into your light. What is your full capacity for each task? Do that. When “what if,” “should,” or “should not” thoughts and beliefs arise, drop into the body and feel the sensations while questioning the truth of these voices.

    The only thing that we ever have control over is our intention for acting. As long as we keep our hearts open, genuinely value ourselves and others, and act in ways that serve more than just ourselves, we are good. Learn to relinquish control over the outcome, which isn’t in your hands anyway.

    —

    As I’ve learned to work with self-doubt, I’ve come face-to-face with the fear of appearing ambitious and of feeling like a fraud for my successes. The more I inquire into this, I realize that these fears lie in my conditioning of how someone like me—a woman in a male-dominated field—is supposed to behave or expect.

    The practice here is to drop into the body and observe the sensations as they arise and subside, noticing that all phenomena including self-doubt, naturally pass. Paradoxically, it is when I allow it to arise fully that it lets go of its death-grip and my actions become spontaneous, light, and joyful.

    Self-doubt lies either in the past as memories or in the future as imaginary projections. It cannot exist in the now. Action lies in the now, where there is neither self-doubt nor self-grandiosity, both of which are thoughts of the past or future.

    In the now, there is only doing what is required. When we learn to ignore our self-doubt and put our best foot forward, it eventually lets go of us. In this newfound freedom, we become fearless, having relinquished the desire for any particular outcome and learned the value of acting for purely the joy of it.

  • How to Stop Doubting Yourself So You Can Go After Your Dreams

    How to Stop Doubting Yourself So You Can Go After Your Dreams

    Brave superkid

    “The gap between what we do and what we’re capable of doing would suffice to solve most of the world’s problems.” ~Gandhi

    I have lived most of my life with a challenging contradiction.

    I am a hopeless idealist and dreamer. And I have also dealt with high levels of anxiety, worry, and doubt, especially as an adult.

    You can probably already see how this can go horribly wrong!

    I’d have an idea of something I’d like to do.

    An idea that would excite and thrill me. I would feel energized—enthusiastic and excited about the possibility of making a dream a reality. Then I’d hit a challenge or obstacle. And the doubt would come.

    Sometimes the result would be so subtle that I wouldn’t even notice its effects—that I was avoiding doing things to make my idea happen.

    Like when I decided to relearn piano as an adult, something I’d loved as a child and would lose myself in playing for hours, especially during the challenging times growing up. I had been heartbroken when I had to give it up because we had to return the piano I’d been using to practice on.

    As a gift to myself I bought a piano.

    I was so excited. It felt so good to be giving attention to part of myself that I felt had been neglected.

    But as I practiced I struggled.

    And I started to doubt whether I’d be able to master the skills that had seemed to come so easily as a child.

    The frustration built and I started putting in less and less effort and time. I eventually gave it up amid excuses about not having the time.

    Other times the effects of the doubt were far more obvious and painful—the fear, endless procrastination, frustration, and eventual defeat. Another idea relegated to the dusty pile of unfulfilled potential.

    The older I got, the harder this cycle became. I became more and more frustrated and filled with a sense of urgency to try and follow through with my ideas.

    It felt like time was running out.

    It got to a point where, in hindsight I realize, I was depressed, although I didn’t recognize it at the time. I’d lost my confidence in myself and my ability to do the things that really mattered to me.

    I’d love to say that I was able to turn this around in the five easy steps that we’re all craving.

    The reality is that it was a long and non-linear journey of self-discovery, voracious learning, experimentation, trial and error, and small successes and failures, until one day I realized that something had profoundly changed at the core of my being.

    I trusted myself again.

    I had rediscovered something that I knew had always been there. That sense of confident learning and experimentation that small children have, when they push themselves to their limits without the fear of being judged or shamed for making mistakes.

    I could take risks again. Small at first to build confidence. It felt so good. I felt alive, filled with hope and possibility.

    Now when I have an idea I am able to act on it (well, most of the time anyway!), and sustain the energy and motivation over long time periods in order for the idea to become a reality.

    Transforming the Self-Doubt Habit

    If anything of my experience resonates with you, then you have it too. The self-doubt habit.

    And, in fact, if you’re human, you definitely have it. As Stephen Pressfield wrote in his book Do the Work, “We’re wrong to think we’re the only ones struggling with resistance. Everyone who has a body experiences resistance.” (Resistance is the word he uses to refer to fear/worry/self-doubt—anything that takes you away from doing the thing that matters).

    Now that I have recognized this profoundly destructive habit in myself, I see it everywhere and hear it in the way people talk about themselves and their ideas.

    “I would love to do this, but I don’t think I can.” “That would be my dream, but it would probably never happen.”

    “But what if I am not good enough?”

    Sound familiar?

    And the outcome? We conclude: “Why even bother trying?” We give up before investing the necessary effort that would lead to a successful outcome.

    Two ideas have been key in helping me both recognize this destructive habit and being able to mitigate the effects so that I can build my confidence in my ability to do the things that matter to me.

    1. The actions of confidence come first; the feelings of confidence come later.

    Dr Russ Harris, author of The Confidence Gap, describes the confidence gap as the place we get stuck when fear gets in the way of our dreams and ambitions. We believe that we can’t achieve or even work on our goals until we feel more confident.

    This, he says, is the wrong rule of confidence.

    The first rule of confidence is: “The actions of confidence come first, the feelings come later.”

    Lightbulb moment for me.

    I realized that I had been putting off some many things, waiting for the day when I would magically feel more confident!

    Recognizing that this day would probably never come, I started experimenting with strategies and ideas to help me start taking small steps, which, despite the fear and doubt, helped me build my confidence over time.

    2. You can always get better.

    The other body of work that profoundly shifted my thinking and helped me to take confident action was the work of Carol Dweck, Ph.D, author of Mindset.

    Through her research at Stanford University, she found that people could be generally divided into two categories depending on their beliefs about themselves—either “fixed” or “growth” mindset.

    People with fixed mindsets believe that their talents and intelligence are fixed, so they spend their lives trying to prove themselves. Their self-worth is always on the line, and failure is to be avoided at all costs. When they do experience failure, they feel intense shame and see it as proof of not being good enough.

    People with growth mindsets believe that talents and intelligence can be developed through effort and practice, so they take on challenges so they can grow and learn. Challenges are to be embraced as the path to fulfilling potential and learning.

    Another huge aha for me.

    I realized that I had been operating with a fixed mindset.

    When I started to work on an idea, whether I was working on a creative project or trying to develop a new skill, like learning to play the piano, I’d give up as soon as I struggled. Struggle for me equalled “I can’t”; I’m not good enough.”

    However, when I could recognize my thinking and see it from a growth mindset perspective, I could catch that thought and say to myself, “I am learning, I can get better with practice,” which allowed me to keep putting in the effort needed to develop my skills and become more confident in the area.

    I could reframe struggle as evidence that I was learning rather than a sign of some innate flaw that I needed to be ashamed about.

    This one mindset shift has alone had the biggest impact in helping me keep being able to take action.

    Action steps:

    1. Do whatever you can to become aware of your thoughts during the day.

    What are you saying to yourself? How are you talking about yourself to other people? Meditate, journal, do whatever it takes. It is the most important thing that you can do for yourself.

    2. Make a conscious effort to eliminate any thoughts or talk that undermines you.

    Change it to a growth mindset. Instead of self-doubt thoughts like “What if I can’t” or “What if I’m not good enough” try thoughts like “I am learning, it is challenging but I with practice and effort I will get better” and ask yourself questions like: “What is one thing I can do today to increase my chances of succeeding?”

    Practice this new mindset over and over and over again until it becomes a habit. As Tynan says in Superhuman by Habit, “New habits are things that you do, but old habits are things that you are.”

  • How To Shine Your Own Light and Let Go of Envy

    How To Shine Your Own Light and Let Go of Envy

    Woman Standing on the Moon

    “As we let our light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence actually liberates others.” ~Marianne Williamson

    “Look at her, who does she think she is?”

    “He’s so full of himself. He’s so big headed”

    Have you ever heard these types of expressions being used? Have you said them yourself?

    I have.

    Or at least I used to. I was taught to believe that people who shine their light were showing off. That they were brazen and big headed. But what does being full of yourself actually mean? Seriously, what does it mean?

    Is it being cocky or could it simply be having confidence in who you are? Is it being arrogant or might it just be saying no to playing small?

    Plainly put, being full of yourself is to be brimming over with who you are. How utterly amazing is that? To be full of who you are. Not empty. Not lacking. Full.

    Why do we believe that celebrating our greatness is something to be scorned?

    We worry that if we let all of our colors blaze brightly, we’ll be perceived as being “too much.” We end up trying to throw shade on our most vibrant parts in order to blend in.

    Are we supposed to walk some kind of middle line in life? Between shine and shame?

    When we purposely set out to dilute who we are, we are denying ourselves our birthright to live in full bloom. Full expression.

    When do we ever walk through a garden of gorgeous flowers and wish that they were less vibrant? Less alive? We don’t. We marvel at their utter beauty and proud glory. We don’t ask them to diminish their splendor. We simply ask them to be all that they are.

    If we place ourselves in the shadows then we not only prevent our true light from radiating out, but we’re also left feeling envious of those that are basking in their own fabulous glow. 

    I used to look longingly at other people who I’d see exuding sparkly confidence. I’d yearn to have their self-assuredness and be able to live out loud without apology.

    It wasn’t until I stopped wistfully wanting what I thought I lacked, and started focusing on what I was already rich with, that everything changed.

    I said no to seeking approval. I said no to coveting the lives of others. I said yes to being me.

    My life transformed when I stepped onto the stage of my own life, rather than hiding in the wings watching someone else’s performance. Every step I’ve taken since has gifted me farther toward empowerment and farther away from self-doubt.

    Do you secretly envy somebody else’s life? Do you spend hours obsessing about how amazing they appear to be? What if you took some of that energy and invested it into your most precious stock? Yourself. 

    Try this simple visualization exercise to get you back on point.

    Imagine yourself sitting in front of a mirror illuminated with light bulbs, the ones you see in the dressing rooms that film stars use. Your reflection in the mirror radiates love, happiness, and confidence. The lights are bright and beautiful. So are you. So amazingly beautiful.

    Remember this: every single time you waste energy wishing you had somebody else’s life, a light in your own life goes out. One of those bulbs dies. Your reflection loses a little bit of its sparkle. Those bulbs need your life force to keep shining. Why are you illuminating someone else’s reflection? Why are you giving your energy to their light bulbs?

    Light up your life. This is the one time you don’t need to be environmentally conscious! Burn those lights, baby! I’m talking Times Square bright. Because otherwise all those lights will lose their will to shine and you’ll be fumbling around in the dark trying to find a torch. And that’s not the look we’re going for here.

    So now you’ve got your own glow going here are a few other ways to keep the spark alive:

    1. Get creative.

    When we concentrate on our own passions it makes it much more difficult for our minds to stray and worry about what everyone else is doing.

    If you feel stuck in a rut and unsure of how to move forward, then getting immersed in a creative project can be an amazing way to shift any stagnant energy. Maybe you want to explore photography; perhaps sketching or sculpting appeal to you. Creativity is a wonderful tool for self-expression and can bring so much joy as well as clarity.

    2. Avoid too much toxicity.

    It can be hard to feel bright and beautiful when we’re in an environment that doesn’t feel supportive. Limit time with negative people and spend more time with those who champion you and believe in your abilities. We all need some encouragement from time to time.

    Take time to encourage others to shine their light, too—it inspires a domino effect which creates a global glow!

    3. Stay present, but look forward.

    In the yoga pose Warrior II, one hand reaches forward and the other hand extends back. The head (and mind) are centered.

    It’s such a wonderful symbol of past, present, and future. The back hand is the past—don’t look that way, you’re not going in that direction. Stay centered and keep your mind in the present, but focus your gaze on where you’re going: forward. Possibility lies ahead.

    —

    Shine your light like only you can. And don’t apologize for it. The world does not benefit from you living in the shadows. The world does not benefit from you wasting your energy on envy. And the world most certainly does not benefit from you living in shame and fear. It benefits from your incredible, colorful contribution.

    Your empowerment carriage awaits. It’s time to get in.

    Girl on the moon image via Shutterstock

  • What Are You Practicing—Self-Judgment or Self-Compassion?

    What Are You Practicing—Self-Judgment or Self-Compassion?

    Woman with heart hands

    “You are what you practice most.” ~Richard Carlson

    “What are you practicing?” she asked in a gentle, lilting voice.

    The entire class was in triangle pose, and at that moment I was comparing my triangle to the young woman’s right next to mine, scolding myself for wobbling out of the pose and simultaneously harassing myself for not being “further along” in my career. (Because if you’re going to hate on yourself, my motto is GO BIG.)

    “Are you practicing judgment or comparison?” she tenderly probed.

    “WTF!” I thought. “Does this woman have a direct line to my brain?”

    “Are you practicing worry or blame?” she continued. “Perhaps you’re practicing patience and love. Notice what you’re practicing and know that you become what you practice. What you practice is what you live.”

    DAMN IT!

    I was three days into a five-day yoga retreat and I was far from blissed out. In fact, I had deftly managed to tie myself into a knot of comparison, self-doubt, judgment, confusion, shame, and embarrassment.

    With my inner critic having hijacked my brain I was a total wreck, and caught myself, more than once, crying through one of the two yoga classes I took each day.

    I should also mention I was pissed to be spending days of supposed relaxation and inner communion bumping up against every old demon that laid buried within me. Not a productive use of time, and if there’s anything I hate, it’s feeling unproductive.

    I had gone on the yoga retreat (my first ever, and a huge indulgence according to my inner critic) for a good dose of soul care. I was craving reconnection badly and knew an idyllic yoga retreat in the Berkshire mountains was just what I needed to come back to myself. Little did I expect that to get to that reconnection, I first had to wade through a number of stinky layers of self-perpetuated crap.

    And so there I was, wobbling in and out of triangle pose, in full blown comparison mode and hating on myself for not having written a book yet, for not being on SuperSoul Sunday, and for most certainly not being Zen during a yoga class.

    And then her soft words plucked me out of my maelstrom of negativity.

    “What are you practicing?”

    I took a breath.

    And then another, letting the fresh oxygen pulse through me.

    I took another, solidified my stance, stretched more deeply into the pose, and faced all I was practicing.

    I let the comparison and self-doubt wash over me. Let the judgment and shame flow. Let the embarrassment of this entire emotional debacle be there without feeling bad for feeling any of it.

    In the breath I found that I wasn’t practicing the negative feelings and old stories. I was experiencing them. What I was practicing in feeling them (without kicking myself for experiencing them) was compassion.

    I let the compassion grow, filling every edge of my body, and watched it morph. First into curiosity for my feelings, then acknowledgement for my pained state, and then into deep love for myself for finding kindness where there had originally only been gripped anger and a cold heart.

    What I found in the instructor’s question was this: I can experience any number of painful thoughts and feelings, and in approaching them with compassion, it’s compassion I’m practicing, not negativity.

    I wish I could tell you with that realization my struggle ended, my demons were forever released, and I quickly became the blissed out, wise yogini I had wanted to be at the start of my retreat.

    Not so much.

    It took another few days (and will probably take the rest of my life) to continually soften, to come back to the breath, and to remember to practice compassion.

    But what her question did do was loosen the knot.

    It created space to find compassion where there had originally been none. It sparked the sloughing off of old layers, the questioning of painful stories, and the unfurling of my most sacred knowing to allow me to reconnect with myself.

    “What are you practicing” is a brave question, as it often brings us face to face with the uncomfortable emotional space we’re in. And yet, it’s in letting ourselves ask the question and getting curious about it that a crack is made for compassion to squeeze through.

    The next time you catch yourself in a maelstrom of comparison, anger, self-doubt, worry, or judgment, take a breath and ask, “What am I practicing?” Be gentle with what comes up (no judging yourself for being judgmental) and notice if in embracing your experience with tenderness, compassion has a chance to blossom.

    Know this: It’s impossible to practice love and patience all the time. That kind of every-second-of-every-day bliss was not built into us humans. We suffer, and that’s okay.

    And when we can be compassionate with ourselves when we’re practicing things other than love, our heart softens, our grip loosens, and suddenly we have a greater access to the love we were seeking all along.

    Woman with heart hands image via Shutterstock

  • How To Let Go Of Self-Doubt and Find Long-Lasting Happiness

    How To Let Go Of Self-Doubt and Find Long-Lasting Happiness

    Man and the Sunrise

    “It’s never too late, or in my case too early, to be whoever you want to be. There’s no time limit.  Start whenever you want. You can change or stay the same.”  ~F. Scott Fitzgerald

    Have you ever let your doubts get in the way of feeling happy?

    I have.

    I left my soul-sucking corporate job to live my dream, teaching yoga in Thailand.

    I was the happiest woman on earth—or was I?

    It looked that way from the outside. But each time I opened my mouth to teach a class, I was mired in self-doubt. Why wasn’t I charismatic, funny, or charming?

    I stumbled over my words. I wanted to be as chatty and charming as the retreat center owner, but I’m naturally quiet and thoughtful, more of an introvert. I secretly wished I could morph myself into a sparkling extrovert.

    Have you ever felt like you had to be more like someone else in order to be successful? As if your own natural voice wasn’t good enough? That’s how I felt.

    And I wondered if I’d made a gigantic mistake in pursuing my passion for teaching yoga.

    My wise Indian teacher noticed and asked me why I worried. He told me to stop comparing myself to others and focus instead on what gifts I had to offer.  

    It was hard. I still harbored doubts. But as I faced my doubts, the clouds cleared from my mind and allowed the sun to shine.

    I was empowered to teach from my heart, with compassion and honesty. And I strongly connected with the students.

    Ten years later, I continue to practice and teach, and I live each day energized, happier, and fulfilled.

    I’ve managed to keep my doubts at bay and achieve lasting happiness by following a collection of simple methods.

    Your Cheat Sheet To Finding Enduring Happiness

    1. Downsize your doubts.

    Many of your doubts are irrational fears that you must expose for what they are. You can do so by breathing deeply and then carefully reconsidering.

    Doubts can trigger your stress response, putting you into fight-or-flight mode. You’ll feel anxious and panicky, and your anxiety can stop you from following your deeper intuitions.

    When you stop and breathe deeply, you put yourself back into rest-and-digest mode. You allow yourself to discern what’s real from what’s imagined.

    For years I’ve thought of offering a teacher training course, but I’ve been stopped cold in my tracks by my fears. Am I a good enough teacher? Do I have the skills?

    Then I stop, I take a few breaths, and I think, “I’ve been practicing and teaching yoga for more than fifteen years, and taken multiple trips to India to study with the masters. I’m qualified.”

    I’m still scared, but if I listen to my doubts I’ll never take a step closer to this dream. So I take a few breaths, accepting and acknowledging my fears without letting them derail my initiative.

    With practice, you’ll develop a deep-breathing habit that dispels irrational doubts. Just stop. Inhale. Exhale. And repeat three times.

     2. Stop trying to make everyone else happy.

    Do you feel personally responsible for other people’s happiness? If you do, when things don’t go well, their frown will add to your self-doubt. Lighten up your load, and don’t automatically assume that you need to make them smile.

    I remember someone who looked for wrong in everything I did. She was deeply unhappy, and I was the target for her internal strife.

    I tried to make her happy and I inadvertently took responsibility for her happiness. When I finally accepted that her unhappiness wasn’t up to me, I quit wasting my energy and questioning my self-worth. And that was a relief.

    Want to feel happier and more confident? Let go of your need to be a people pleaser. Take responsibility for your own inner world, and quit trying to control everyone else’s.

    3. Kill your inner critic.

    Imagine fingernails scraping a chalkboard.

    Cringe.

    That’s what happens in your brain when you criticize yourself.

    When you criticize, your mind develops a negative thinking pattern. You should reflect on your actions, but you shouldn’t criticize yourself. Inner-harshness is a bad habit that can be changed with practice.

    Try this exercise to break your habit. Make a few lists: times you’ve shown compassion or kindness to someone, another of your positive attributes and skills, and a third of instances when you’ve coped with a difficult challenge. Keep the lists close at hand.

    Next, try to notice your self-critical thoughts. Take a deep breath in, then release the breath slowly. This breath draws your attention away from the criticism. Then think about an item from your list.

    It may seem unlikely that simply recalling positive things will change your thinking. But it will, because over time your brain will rewire itself. Self-doubt and criticism are replaced with patience and understanding.

    When I see photos of my younger self, I recall how critical I used to be about my looks. Ten years later, I see small lines developing around my eyes. Rather than criticizing these signs of aging, I embrace them. My forty-year-old self is happier and hopefully wiser than my thirty-year-old self.

    Work on breaking your habit of criticizing. Over time, you’ll cast away your doubts and cultivate a serene inner space.

    4. Meditate to replace self-doubt with self-compassion. 

    Meditation makes you happier and boosts your self-confidence.

    With practice, you begin to notice your mind’s patterns of self-limiting thoughts, and you can let them pass without believing them.

    I found that practicing loving-kindness meditation was a powerful tool for releasing self-doubt and criticism. The first line of this type of meditation elicits sentiments of compassion and kindness for ourselves. (Note: I’m tweaking the language slightly from the standard meditation)

    “I am filled with loving-kindness. I am well, peaceful and at ease, happy and free of suffering.”

    I used to have many crazy thoughts: “You’ll never find a partner,” or “You’ll never make a living as a yoga teacher, because who’d want to learn from you?” Using this meditation, over time I was able to notice and mostly let go of the doubts and fears.

    The importance is to build the sentiments, not on the specific language. Feel free to tweak this as you see fit.

    5. Celebrate success.

    Our minds are sneaky. When you envy someone’s success, your deep feeling is, “They’ve achieved this, but I can’t.” You’ve limited yourself and created more doubts. The inherent thought is that you don’t have enough.

    Envy keeps you stuck in a self-doubting cycle. Remember that the amount of success or happiness in this world is limitless. And you have what it takes too.

    Change your jealousy to genuine joy for others, and lift your self-imposed limits. You’ll feel energized and inspired—ready to channel your energy into achieving your own goals and dreams. Then take one step toward that goal. Even a tiny one.

    6. Move your body every day.

    Daily exercise keeps your mind and body healthy. The increased blood flow nourishes your body and brain. You’ll feel stronger and happier from the inside out.

    I’ve seen hundreds of people start yoga and gradually develop self-confidence. They start to do things they thought were impossible.

    I’m one of those people. A daily practice of yoga, where I progressively try new things, has helped me to see my pattern of self-doubts and gradually let go.

    Feel clear and confident with a little daily movement—yoga, walking, or dancing. Choose something that you love, and do it a little each day. Develop inner strength, and cast away your doubts.

    Start today.

    7.  Nurture your passions and strengths.

    You’ll feel alive and confident when you do what you love.

    When you’re passionate and absorbed in your task, you can easily release your doubts.

    For brief moments you’ve felt it — when you forget about censoring yourself and let yourself flow.

    8. Accept and love your shadows.

    To let go of self-doubt, you must accept all aspects of your self—including your pride and your shadows. No one is perfect.

    In order to let go of your doubts, you must learn to be grateful for your limitations and challenges. We all carry baggage; it’s a part of being human.

    Starting from a place of acceptance rather than shame will make all your efforts easier.

    Most people don’t know that I can be short tempered and critical of my loved ones. I’m not always a perfectly zen yoga teacher. But I accept these parts of myself. Instead of fighting them, I work on noticing when I’m impatient or overly critical and gently try to remind myself to be more accepting.

    Remember that we are all human. And we all have our messy sides.

    9. Embrace your own authentic voice.

    For me this was the hardest step, because being authentic means letting your guard down. You let others see your true self, and if you harbor doubts (like I did), this is terrifying.

    Looking back, I see that I was afraid to let people see the real me. It was safer to adopt a way of being that I knew was liked—a charming, chatty persona (that wasn’t me). I was petrified, but when I was able to drop my mask, my words flowed like sweet honey.

    Embrace your own voice and never try to masquerade as someone else.

    Unleash your sassy, sarcastic, or comedic inner child, if that’s the real you. But there’s nothing wrong with being thoughtful, observant, and careful with words either.

    It didn’t happen overnight, but as I practiced breathing, changing my thoughts, and being kind to myself, slowly my inner voice got stronger. I started to feel comfortable enough to be vulnerable and authentic.

    You can do it too.

    The Key To Long-Lasting Happiness

    You know what would be horrible? Looking back in twenty years and thinking, “Why did I waste so much time doubting rather than doing and connecting?”

    Don’t read this post and think, “Oh, that was good advice.” And then open Facebook and read about your friend’s lunch.

    Don’t keep yourself locked in a prison of illusionary self-doubt.

    Your actions start in your mind with your thoughts. And just because we can’t see your thoughts doesn’t mean they aren’t crucial to your health and happiness.

    Lock your doubts away and don’t let them out. You’ve got work to do.

    Connect with those around you. It’s your key to unlocking long-lasting happiness.

    You have unique gifts to share with the world, and only this lifetime to do so.

    Man and the sunrise image via Shutterstock