Take Off Your Mask
SUMMARY
Your identity is the DNA that you want to project to the world.
It's not only who you believe you are; it's also who you believe you are not.
Putting all these things together: the conditioning that you have experienced up until this point, the beliefs that you have about yourself, others, and the world, means that you can (like me) get trapped in behaviours like the performance trap.
Others call it an approval addiction.
This week, I want to continue our conversation around building your identity by helping you to remove the mask and let out your authentic self.
TRANSCRIPT
Are you continually pretending to be someone that you're not, just so other people will accept you?
I know that is something I did for many years. The problem is, as you continue to do that, you chip away at your true self, and after a while, you forget who you are supposed to be.
Well, stick with me because this week I want to continue the conversation about building up who it is that you believe you are and helping you to think and behave differently.
Hi, this is Grant Herbert, VUCA Leadership and Sustainable Performance Coach, and today I want to continue our conversation around building your identity by helping you to remove the mask.
For most of my life, I wore a mask. I pretended to be who I thought others needed me to be so that I could avoid those three universal fears: The fear of not belonging, the fear of not being enough, and the fear of not being loved.
Through the things that had happened in my past and what I'd made them mean about me, I was continually trying not to be rejected.
The problem is, though, when you are focusing on what you don't want, you tend to walk towards it. Our behaviour (because it comes up out of our subconscious conditioning) takes us directly down that path anyway.
Last week, we talked about the fact that our identity is who we believe we are. It's not what you do — it’s not your job, it's not your career, your title.
It's deeper than that.
Your identity is the DNA that you want to project to the world.
It's not only who you believe you are; it's also who you believe you are not.
Putting all these things together: the conditioning that you have experienced up until this point, the beliefs that you have about yourself, others, and the world, means that you can (like me) get trapped in behaviours like the performance trap.
Others call it an approval addiction.
Then there's imposter syndrome and it goes by many names.
But when you bring it down to the lowest common denominator, it's all about behaving and being in a way that you feel you need to be so you can thrive and survive in this thing called life.
The problem is, pretending to be who you needed to be — stepping up and looking confident even though you’re not - all these things are done to get external approval.
Last week, I talked to you about approval as something you do not need to outsource to others. It's up to you to decide who you are and it is about being confident yet being teachable.
You know that you still have a lot to learn, and you are on a journey of imperfection. However, when you look in the mirror, metaphorically, you like what you see.
So how do you get to remove this mask?
Well, we're going to get to that.
I want to help you to do the things that I've learned to do (and that I've helped thousands of other people to do) to be able to get rid of that mask and be who you are.
But before we do that, I want to give you a reason why.
Most of us are doing okay.
So, unless you’ve got a reason why you would make these changes or do things differently, you’re not going to do it.
You were created for a purpose.
You have gifts and talents. Collectively, we need those authentic gifts and talents to be put together in the collective so that the world can do what it needs to do. I know that's a grandiose, high-picture view, and it's from my belief, but I want you to look at it through that lens.
When you are not ‘YOU’, two things happen:
- You are giving to the world (in whatever way you are operating) a false sense of who you are. A lot of those gifts and talents are hidden and not being used because you are pretending and you please others.
- It’s exhausting trying to be someone you are not and even remembering who you thought you needed to be with the person you're with from the last time you were with them. Being like this takes a lot out of you. That wasted energy could have been used to be who you need to be to get what you want out of life.
So, how do you do this?
The first thing you need to do is understand the performance trap. The performance trap is when you perform to get approval.
There's nothing wrong with performing. However, it becomes a problem when you perform for people to like you, make you feel that you belong and accept you.
However, you cannot always get their approval.
You can get out there and do the best performance you could possibly do, and there'll be some people that don't think it's good enough.
I know that you would have situations where you would remember that happening.
When you perform to get approval, you’ve got the risk of not getting it.
Performing to get the approval of others can only give two results.
If you get the approval; it may build up who you believe you are and make you feel more worthy and confident. However, not getting that approval can erode your identity even further.
Therefore, the foundation from which you are in everything that you do is eroded. That authenticity, your true gifts and talents, will still remain hidden.
So, what you need to do is flip this around.
You need to start with identity, and that's what we are doing this month.
We're talking about building up your own identity, taking responsibility for doing that, and not outsourcing that to anyone else.
Eleanor Roosevelt said it so well: “What other people think of you is none of your business.”
I say that not in an arrogant way, but in a confident way. I like people, and I want them to like me. But if they don't, that's okay. I'm going to be who it is that I am, authentically.
By doing that, instead of looking for external approval, what you now do is get to the position of self-approval. This is where YOU start approving of you.
The foundational relationship for every other relationship in your life is the one that you have with yourself.
So, how do you build a stronger foundation?
You look for evidence of why “you can” rather than why “you can’t". Look at times in your life when you’ve succeeded, when you have felt proud of yourself, when you’ve felt loved, and whatever it is that you want to replace by pretending to be someone else.
That evidence is there for you to be able to dispute that negative when it comes up.
You can do this by:
- Positive affirmation.
- Getting around people who actually build you up and not tear you down.
- Ruminating on beliefs about yourself that are positive rather than the negative ones.
- Getting in control of your internal dialogue.
- Behaving differently so that new neural pathways are formed through neuroplasticity, and the pleasure circuits in your brain are fired because the results you're getting are different, and the brain says: “Let’s keep doing that.”
When your new identity is formed, and you approve of yourself, what you now do is perform out of a position of self-approval.
When you do that, you're going to get the best out of yourself. You're going to get the real authentic self who takes off the mask and never puts it back on because you will be okay with being who you truly are.
When you get to that position of being able to operate from an authentic space with the imposter syndrome, people-pleasing, approval addiction in your rearview mirror — you’re able to be who it is that you need to be to get what it is that you want to get out of life.
And more importantly, you will be able to give.
The greatest gift that you can give to the people around you is your authentic self. When I'm talking to you, I'm talking to me. This is one of my greatest challenges and also one of the biggest blessings that I've been able to overcome, and I'd love to help you to do the same.
Well, that's it from me for this week. Join me again next week when we continue this conversation by going a little bit deeper on some of these things that we do to build that identity up.
I'll see you then.
