Last month, I started a leadership coaching program. In the first day, they shared that each of us has our own story about our life. And that story we tell ourselves, informs everything in our lives. Your story is a story that has been built through a lifetime of experiences. Consider a moment you experienced with someone else, why is it that you came away with a different interpretation of the event than they did? It’s all in the way we have made sense our life experiences. When you say, “Oh that happened to me because….”, that is you making sense of your experiences for your story. So, when you start to review your story, you have to ask yourself the question “how is my story working for me?” For most of us, there are big or small parts of our stories that aren’t serving us.
To live your best life, its important that you are first aware of the language you are using internally and externally. You are manifesting a life of your own making. This becomes clearer as you can identify what your story actually is and compare that to what is happening in your life. If you find parts of your story that aren’t serving you anymore, then the question is how can you change it. Many times the change is a small tweak, which can reap huge rewards.
So for all of us, the first step is to become aware of the story you are telling yourself, and that can be difficult if the the story has been part of your ‘operating system’ for a long time. It can be difficult to remember where that came from and when it became part of your story. So be patient, as you get better acquainted with the story you’re telling yourself, you’ll become more aware of who you are and what you believe.
One helpful tool to more effectively listen to your story is to journal. It allows you to get everything down and to calm down “busy thoughts” in your head. It can also provide better clarity to your story and when you see it in print, it can help you to see areas that could be explored further or changed. With journal writing, you can gain greater awareness of your story in the present moment. I realize that I can recognize a part of my story that is not serving me and I’m able to change it in “real-time”.
You can see the name of the game is awareness. So if you change the parts of your story that are not serving you, then you can change your life. Own the authorship of your life, and make it a best-seller.
MKW
Molly K. West 