Tell yourself a better story. It MATTERS
Hi guys! Welcome to Episode 231 of the Wildly Successful Lifestyle podcast! Have you subscribed to my podcast? If you have, thank you. If you haven’t, what are you waiting for?
Ok, our life stories. We all have them. We all have past stories. How we tell them drastically affects our current state of mind and our future.
I love a good story. I love to tell stories. To tell my story and I love to hear other people tell their story. We are just all so fascinating.
We all have such interesting stories if we just listen.
For instance…It was my first day as a freshman in high school, I’m sure you can all remember that day. I was Nervous and insecure and everything that comes with being a teenager on the first day of a new school but I also, due to the religion I was raised in, was not allowed to stand for the national anthem. Which they played every morning at my new school. I was going to have to sit while it was played. This gave me a great deal of anxiety. You can imagine that’s not really a good look because we live in the greatest country in the world and the flag represents the freedoms we hold so dear, so of course today I stand, but at the time I didn’t see that option…so I’m in my homeroom class first day new teacher new classmates and I tell my teacher right away quietly off to the side that I can’t stand for the national anthem and where would be best to sit so I don’t stand out. I’ll never forget what happened. That’s interesting so far right? I am going to tell you what happened in just a minute but like I talked about in episode 229…
This is another thing you have in common with every other person on the planet. You have a story. And how you tell that story affects pretty much everything you do. An empowering story leads us to a life of endless possibility. And no matter how you were raised, where you are in your life right now, what your ex told you about yourself, how you were treated in school..you can take that and let it damage your confidence or wear like an anchor around your neck or you can turn it into something that drives you something that empowers you
We don’t control the past but we control how we think about it. We control how we talk about it and how we think and how we talk about it matters. A lot.
Some of you might be thinking well what happened, happened. I’m just telling my story as it is. Ok. I’ll give you that. We aren’t gonna change the things that happened to us that weren’t good or the things other people said or did to us or the mistakes we made. Those things are done. But that’s the good news. They’re done. That’s history. And you get to write that book, that history book of your life. You’re writing it in your head whether you know it or not. Why not be intentional about how you tell it?
And more than likely there is a general way you portray yourself in the past.
And that affects how you are today and how your life will be in the future. If you portray yourself as a victim..always blaming someone else for the reason you aren’t where you want to be right now..it will feel impossible to change because in your mind you have no control..you’ve given your power away. It’s someone else’s fault that you are where you are. But if you tell your story in a way that empowers you and inspires you that’s when you see change. And there’s stories you tell yourself you don’t even realize you’re doing it. Like when you say “I’m just more fun when I drink” I might say that sometimes to myself but is that working for me..I can have just as much fun not drinking..I’ve done it. Many times! How about I’m just destined to be overweight, it’s hereditary. When you say things like that it just seems so impossible to change because it’s out of your control. Don’t give your power away to your mom your dad your ex your heritage. Claim it for yourself. For your future.
So back to my first day of high school as a new freshman in a new school with new classmates and a new teacher. I’ve asked my teacher where to sit so that I’m inconspicuous when the national anthem is played. And I don’t know if this was intentional on her part or not..but she said just sit in the back of the room. So I did. There was a back seat right in the middle of the room and so I sat there..not noticing the flag directly above my head. So she takes roll and it’s time for the national anthem. Where’s the flag? Above my head.
So everyone in the classroom stands up and turns around and I’m sitting facing them directly below the flag. I can still feel how that felt. Because at the time I saw no option to stand because it had been drilled in my head by the religion over and over that it would be sinful and wrong to do so. So I sat there embarrassed and ashamed. Now. Fast forward to today. I could tell that story to show why I’m a victim, how hard my experiences were and how it made me bitter and distrusting of authority. But I look back at it and I say wow. There’s not a lot of people that would have done that. Most would have just stood and turned around like everyone else but I sat there and I faced them and as I walked out of class that day…..I looked my homeroom teacher in the eye not ashamed for myself ashamed for her. And then I went to the principal’s office to explain my plight and from that day forward I worked in the office during homeroom which was AMAZING and so cool because I got to know the principal and the office workers really well and that opened up new doors and opportunities for me. I stood my ground that day and I didn’t just take it I did something about it, I never went back to that homeroom. I had my own back just as I will always have my own back.
That’s how I tell that story. I’m not a victim and you don’t have to be a victim of your past either. You get to decide how you tell that story and what you make it mean.
My challenge to you today is to think about the way you frame your past, are you clubbing yourself over the head for it, are you using it as an excuse for why you’re not where you want to be? Are you telling yourself you can’t do extraordinary things because of the way you were raised? I challenge you to reframe those stories so that they show you just how powerful you are and just how much you’ve overcome and you’re still here. Showing up and showing out because they’ve made you into the awesome person you are today, whether you believe that to be true or not, I’ll believe it for you until you believe it yourself! You hold a lot of power in that head of yours, a lot of which is unlocked when you decide to stop being a victim of your past and start being the hero that is still standing in spite of it. Life really is working for you not to you. Tell yourself that every day, it will make you look for what’s right instead of what’s wrong.
And listen, if you’re enjoying these episodes, I put them out twice a week on Monday and Friday. Subscribing allows you to see my podcast out of all the other 30 million podcasts out there. And share this episode with 2 people today. We are quick to share bad news but sometimes not so quick to share good stuff so let’s break that trend today…I love you guys and I’ll talk to you in a few days.
