Owning Your Power
Have you ever felt like you were finally making progress in your life and getting closer to where you want to be and then something happens and stops you in your tracks and you feel like you’ve taken two steps back.
What I wondered is, is this the universes way of saying, hey you’ve missed something, there’s something you haven’t learnt yet, and if you truly want to move forward you must go back and see what you’ve missed.
And it’s good to wonder. Reflection is a wonderful thing, when you’re able to look back and self-coach yourself and ask what did I miss, what am I not seeing. Upon reflection you want to make sure you don’t head down the Judger Mindset path and get stuck in the pit.
I read a book called ‘Change your questions, Change your Life’ by Marilee Adams and she talks about the power of asking questions and how to direct your thinking in a way that makes a positive change in your life.
She says “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them. To solve our problems, we first need to change our questions; otherwise we’ll probably just keep getting the same old answers, over and over again”.
New questions can totally shift our perspectives, moving us into fresh ways of looking at problems.
Marilee Adams created the ‘Choice Map’ a map that helps us to become better observers of the two basic paths we take in life—the Learner Mindset path and the Judger Mindset path. As the name implies, the map is all about our ability to make choices.
It helps us observe ourselves in a more conscious way. Every single one of us has Judger moments, including me. It’s a natural part of being human.
She says “At nearly every moment of our lives, we’re faced with choosing between taking the Learner or Judger path, Whether we recognise it or not, we’re making choices moment by moment by moment. Those choices take us along the Learner path or the Judger Path. These are our mindsets. By choosing Learner mindset we can discover new possibilities. By jumping into Judger mindset we can eventually end up stuck in the pit”
“Most of the time, we’re shifting back and forth between Learner and Judger mindsets, barely aware we have any control or choice. Choice begins when we are mindful enough to observe our own thoughts and feelings and the language we use to express them. This is the key to success— building the muscles of the observer self.”
“Self-coaching is impossible without a strong observer! It’s as simple as asking ourselves, What’s going on? Where am I right now? Am I in Judger or Learner?
“Choice begins with observing our own thinking, and our own mindsets. It’s simpler than you think.”
I love coaching myself out of my problems. I always ask myself lots of questions and when I’m following the Learner Mindset path I get so many possibilities. But if you’re one who is not self aware, who hasn’t developed the skills of the learner mindset or self coaching you may find yourself heading down the judger mindset path and this is where people blame other people or themselves, events or situations. They ask poor quality questions like, “Who is at fault?” “What’s wrong with me or What’s wrong with them” and if you keep asking these types of questions you end up in the pit of blame, self pity and negativity and not seeing any way out of it.
Recently I found myself in a situation where I could have easily have gone down the judger path. I was standing at the fork in the path with one foot one the judger path, asking myself, ‘What’s her problem’ and then before I took that next step I stopped myself with another question ‘What can I learn from this’ and in that moment my mindset had changed. I took a step back and kept asking myself better questions on how I could resolve this situation.
Remember the question I asked at the beginning of this blog, Have you ever felt like you were finally making progress in your life and getting closer to where you want to be and then something happens and stops you in your tracks and you feel like you’ve taken two steps back.
Yep well this was me. I finally felt like I had gained my power, I’ve lost some weight, I was feeling really happy within myself and about where I was physically, mentally and emotionally.
I could feel my confidence growing daily, opportunities were being presented to me and the growth of my business has increased. I was in a really, really good space, somewhere where I haven’t been in a very long time.
I felt like I had put those old beliefs of not being good enough, worthy enough or deserving of being loved to bed, and just like that, in a blink of an eye, I felt like it had all been taken away from me and I was right back where I started, lost, powerless, hurt, angry, unworthy and so many more emotions came flooding back to me.
I was married for nearly 23 years. I met my ex-husband when I was 17, married at 21 and had 3 kids by the time I was 25.
I was so involved in being a mum (a decision I will never regret) that I lost sight of who I was as a person and as a woman. I neglected myself and gained a lot of weight, my self esteem and confidence was low and I was happy within myself.
For years I sacrificed my own needs and happiness for my children and my ex-husband. I blamed him for a lot of the problems in our marriage. But the truth is, it wasn’t just him. I was also part of the problem and later, I discovered I was also the solution.
At the time, I dimmed my light so low that I felt worthless, powerless and undeserving of having true love and happiness. No one else did that to me, it was me. I am not blaming myself in any way, sometimes we do this to ourselves without realising we are doing it and before we know it, we’re so stuck in our beliefs, causing our own suffering.
In light of this recent situation, it felt like someone had taken it all away and I was right back where I started.
The truth is, no one can take away your power. No one can make you feel or do anything. It’s all on you.
Elenore Roosevelt said: “No one can hurt you without your consent”
For a moment I gave away my power and the funny thing was, I could feel myself doing it at the time and I let myself feel those old way emotions and beliefs again.
I had to let myself go back there to know how far I’ve really come, to learn a little more about myself, to see the strength and courage that I have developed to allow myself to put me first, to respect myself and love my self to stand up for me and to remind myself that no one can take my power away I am the only one who can do that.
So sometimes when we take two steps back it’s meant to happen for a reason, to uncover what we’ve missed and not being hard on ourselves for going back there. Allowing yourself to step onto the learner mindset path and self-coach yourself to ask better quality questions. Changing your questions really does change your life.
Light & Love Tracy