Rewriting Your Own Story

SUMMARY

If you were to write a book about yourself and then read it to yourself, would it inspire you, or would it make you feel worse about yourself?

Your identity is the foundation for everything you do. Everything you believe about yourself, everything you take on as true, will either propel you forward or hold you back and, if your identity is a negative one, then that will stop you from reaching your full potential.

The great thing about our brain is a thing called neuroplasticity, which means that we're able to change the wiring in our brain. By recognising your limiting beliefs, and recognising that they're not serving you, by rejecting them, then replacing them with new, positive, empowering beliefs and behaviours, and then repeating that new behaviour and dialogue over and over again, ruminating on something positive, then you will rewire your brain.

So, what’s the next chapter of your story about? Is it going to be about ‘how you can’t' or ‘how you can'? Then, in further chapters, you'll be able to read about ‘how you did’.

You're not able to change the past, but you can set up now and the future to be a much more enjoyable journey.

Well, that's it for me for another week. Join me again next week when we move into the area of intelligence. We'll look at how you are a multiple-intelligence being and how you can tap into the most powerful intelligence of them all: your Emotional Intelligence.

I'll see you then.

TRANSCRIPT

If you were to write a book about yourself and then read it to yourself, would it inspire you, or would it make you feel worse about yourself?

Hi, this is Grant Herbert, VUCA Leadership and Sustainable Performance Coach, and today I want to round out this conversation about your identity by helping you rewrite your own story.

Over the last few weeks, we've been talking about your identity. Your identity is not what you do; it's who you are. It's who you believe you are and who you believe you're not. All the experiences you've had, all the things you've done, have either built up or eroded your identity.

Your identity is the foundation for everything you do. Everything you believe about yourself, everything you take on as true, will either propel you forward or hold you back and, if your identity is a negative one, then that will stop you from reaching your full potential.

Last week, we talked about the inner dialogue, the self-talk that you have, that constant opportunity for you to remind yourself of everything that's gone wrong, of every time that you've got it wrong, every time you've failed.

That rumination that goes on around what people have said to you and about you that you've made means a certain thing about yourself. It's that dialogue that reminds you when you are stepping into the danger zone of those 3 universal fears of not belonging, not being enough, and not being loved.

And we talked about the ability to shift that dialogue, to change it, to get that mini-me working with you rather than against you.

Well, today (as my dog barks in the background), what we're going to do is step that up. We're going to put all those things together, and we're going to rewrite our stories about ourselves.

When you have a story about yourself that is made up of all this negative, all the things that have gone wrong, the times that you've got it wrong, and all those things we've just talked about, then that's not really reading that's going to inspire you.

What you want to do is to draw a line in the sand today, knowing now what you know about being able to shift your identity and build it up to where it needs to be, and write the next chapter, version, and edition of your story.

To do that, there are certain things that you need to do and we've started that to shift that dialogue. You’ve already recognised when you’re operating out of those 3 universal fears, an approval addiction, imposter syndrome, the performance trap, all those things. So, you understand that now, and you understand that you can shift that dialogue.

The key thing to do right now is to look at all those things you actually believe about yourself, and put them under the microscope, test them, be able to discredit them, and then change them to beliefs about yourself which are true and empowering.

To do that, you need to sit down and write out a list of all the beliefs that you have about yourself. What I want you to do is start with the words "I am" because "I am" is about your identity. "I do" is about your performance, but what we are talking about here is the foundation of who you are.

So, sit down, write out a list, starting with "I am", and then write down all the things that you believe about yourself.

When I was a small child, I found out some things, and then I decided to have a pity party for the next 25-30 years. I made those things mean certain things about me, and they became my beliefs.

My beliefs are then what triggered all my thought patterns, which triggered all the behaviours. Then, starting with a foundation of a negative belief, the behaviour obviously didn't serve me either.

What I've now been able to do is challenge those beliefs, look at where they came from and shift them (I’m not perfect with this. As I've said many times, I'm never going to be perfect, and neither are you.) Now, most of the time, the story that I have about myself has elements that will help me move forward. I'm not able to change the past, but I am able to change what I made it mean, and you can, too.

So, I made it mean that I was unlovable and wasn't worthy. Therefore, everything that I did moved me towards making sure that I stayed under that ceiling of my worth. Every time I went to move forward out of that, I would do something subconsciously (and sometimes consciously) to sabotage it. And that's what you are doing as well.

As we put together this manuscript (this draft of the next edition of your story), what you need to do is look at every single one of those beliefs and challenge them. Instead of looking for evidence of why your negative beliefs are true, look for evidence as to why they're not. I have plenty of evidence that people love me, that I do belong, that I am worthy. By focusing on those (whilst still being humble, teachable, coachable and realising that I'm on a journey of imperfection and I'm continuing to grow and learn and change every single day), then I'm able to go: "Yeah, you can do this. You do deserve this," and therefore, I go after it.

Now that you've got that list of limiting beliefs, challenged them, and flipped them, what you're able to do is write the story with new dialogue.

The great thing about our brain is a thing called neuroplasticity, which means that we're able to change the wiring in our brain. By recognising your limiting beliefs, and recognising that they're not serving you, by rejecting them, then replacing them with new, positive, empowering beliefs and behaviours, and then repeating that new behaviour and dialogue over and over again, ruminating on something positive, then you will rewire your brain.

Then, with this new story that you tell yourself, when opportunities come up, you're going to be able to take them and feel like you are worthy of them. You've shifted the story and the dialogue.

Then, when you sit down and read this new story that you've written, it will encourage you and empower you to make the shifts that you need to make to do what it is that you need to do so that you can have the results that you want this year and beyond.

We've been talking about your identity this month. It's who you believe you are and who you believe you're not. By continuing to work on that identity, building yourself back up, removing and replacing things from the past that have held you back, ruminating on where you can, and looking forward rather than back, you are going to achieve far greater things than you ever thought you could.

This is a journey that will go on for the rest of your life: maintaining a healthy identity.

Things will still go wrong; however, you'll be able to make them mean different things than you would have before with that old story.

So, what’s the next chapter of your story about? Is it going to be about ‘how you can’t' or ‘how you can'? Then, in further chapters, you'll be able to read about ‘how you did’.

I see this as an absolute privilege to get to do what I do all around the world, to take my own life experience and be able to share that and to use that vulnerability and the lessons that I've learned to help people just like you. To break free of that negative self-talk and story that's holding you back and realise that when you draw a line in the sand, you can rewrite where you're going.

You're not able to change the past, but you can set up now and the future to be a much more enjoyable journey.

Well, that's it for me for another week. Join me again next week when we move into the area of intelligence. We'll look at how you are a multiple-intelligence being and how you can tap into the most powerful intelligence of them all: your Emotional Intelligence.

I'll see you then.