It's good to be optimistic. It's good to practise positive thinking - it feels much better than negative thinking, however, it seems that it isn't enough on it's own...
Imagine that you wanted to lose weight so you started doing more exercise, however your pockets were full of cake!
Imagine you wanted to spring clean your house, but instead of putting things away and cleaning properly, you dusted around the clutter and vacuumed around the dog!
Do you see what I'm getting at? The benefits will only go so far.
I have worked with the same coach on and off for nearly 20 years now. She is an amazing women. I trust what she tells me as she has witnessed a lot of my life, both my easier and harder times. So, when she helps me to see that I have a trait or habit that is holding me back in some way, I listen. It's almost like having a good friend who's known you for years, but when she pushes you a little harder to grow beyond your problems and get past your own 'bs', you really need to take notice!
By the time you get to 50, most of us have faced some big challenges, maybe financial, relationships, careers or health. Up till now, through using a combination of personal development and a lot of positive thinking and optimism I have got to a place that I was quite comfortable with - however I was not going any further, which in itself was a problem and becoming pretty uncomfortable.
What Cissi, my coach, said to me was that I always see the positive in situations, so much so that I don't get to the root of the problem to clear it out or allow it to heal. I still had a good few skeletons in the cupboard you could say! I knew there was some truth to it because otherwise I'd of achieved what I wanted by now. In all honesty, who wants to dig around in the dark shadows of memories and emotions if you can put a brave face on and gloss over your problems?
After feeling stagnant for longer than I am comfortable with, the little voice inside me started shouting quite loudly that my lovely, comfortable, yet rather stagnant life was not a long term solution! The idea of creating more of the same mistakes felt a little miserable actually. I had to resist the urge to be busy for busy's sake. It's easy to gloss over things by focussing on something new and shiny, but once the new and shiny doesn't have any meaning, then what's the point in doing it?
Do you know what I mean?
Being optimistic only becomes a problem when we keep facing or even creating the same problems over and over again and also in my case, when I'm working with other people to help them move forward in life, it also means that I don't push them as far as I need to for them to get the deep transformation that I know is possible. Now that's a big problem!
In 2020 I started a new program with Cissi. It lasted for over a year. I was in a group of 16 remarkable women from around the world, all supporting each other as the year progressed. Obviously we all brought our skills, talents and limitations to the training. This made for an incredibly powerful experience. It also helped and taught me to feel safe going deeper in the healing that I needed to do. It forced me to face some of the skeletons in the cupboards of childhood memories or experiences that that affected me as a child. I didn't even have a traumatic childhood through adult eyes, but as a kid, the world looks pretty different.
The work we did together allowed me to heal and release some of the emotional baggage that I was trapped by. It was that baggage that stopped me from creating anything new. I could only keep creating the same things and was kind of stuck in a spiral.
I'm sharing this today, as I used to feel that 'healing' was all a bit self indulgent and delving into the past! I didn't think it was necessary so long as you could always see the positive. Well, now I can safely say that it's a limited way of living!
If you're feeling stagnant, stuck or you keep facing the same situations and problems, it's time to delve deeper and heal what's really causing the issues. Trust me when I say that optimism and positive thinking will only take you so far.
Please leave a comment and share this blog with anyone who you think will enjoy it! You can also tune into my podcast, Magical Midlife to hear about other women like you who are making brave moves and creating new futures!
