You work hard to feel good about yourself and pursue your dreams and yet, there is a little voice in your head telling you that you aren’t good enough to get it done. Sound familiar?
Sometimes that voice can be so loud that it drowns out everything else and leaves us stuck.
And we all know feeling stuck really sucks.
So what to do?
Acknowledge that inner voice. Name it if you like. I have a client who calls his Bob!
Recognise that the voice exists in an attempt to keep you safe – to keep you where you are – because our minds like the comfort of what they know (even if that place is not really where you want to be).
Accept that there was a point in your life where something happened to give power to that voice, to make you feel you have to be a certain way in order to survive in this world. (Bullies at school, trauma, abuse, absent parents, being around anxious people who passed their fears onto you are all examples.) Acknowledge that you no longer need some of those thoughts and give yourself permission to do the work to stop feeding them.
When the little voice rears it’s head, try not to judge what is being said or feel a certain way about the fact that the voice is there. Just notice what is going on, recognise it’s an attempt by your brain to keep you safe and say no thank you to what comes up. When we just notice without getting worked up that we feel a certain way, we stop feeding the thoughts and they go away much quicker.
Identify a replacement thought that will help you right now and look for evidence which supports it. For example, if your current thought is that you are no good at your job and sooner or later you will get found out, practice telling yourself how capable you are and look for the evidence that shows how you are good at it.
Each day, spend 5 minutes focusing on your replacement thought and looking for the evidence which supports it. Over time, notice how this helps to change your thought patterns.
Go easy on yourself, this is like training for a marathon. It takes time, but it can be done.
A great book which looks at the topic in an easy to digest way is “how to tame your gremlin” by Rick Carson.