Change your story....Change your life

At the heart of one of my professions (mental health therapist), is the goal of facilitating a process for a client to change something (a habit, a destructive behavior, interactions with others, their life, or to meet a desired goal). To do this, I often use a therapy technique called "narrative therapy".  The following article describes how changing your story can change your life.....

WHAT STORY AM I TELLING MYSELF?

Instead of taking responsibility for any difficulties, I brushed them off as fate, bad luck or I would convince myself I just had numerous valuable lessons to learn.

My troublesome scenarios felt almost natural as they mirrored my inner beliefs.

For years I was perpetually trapped in my own head and I paid close attention to the warning words whispered by the critical voice that lived there. I fully believed that the daunting dialogue was my inner guidance resounding to protect me. 

Whenever something bad happened certain associated words or feelings firmly attached to my mind where they soon became limiting affirmations. All of my memories were highlighted and glaringly shone to remind me not to travel along similar shadowy routes again.

However, what I failed to realise was that the more importance I placed on anything that went wrong, the more chance I had of manifesting the same problems again. 

I had rehearsed the painful and destructive scenarios that were made up of hurtful words, actions and intentions so many times that they eerily felt comfortable and as though they naturally belonged somewhere in my life.

I then chose to be around people who confirmed the horrible bedtime stories I repeated in the darkness while alone each night. I placed myself in circumstances that left me vulnerable and at risk and instead of acknowledging I was playing a part, it was easier to blame destiny as my life was unfolding exactly as I had imagined it would.

Anything that I thought might go wrong “coincidentally” went wrong. I couldn’t see that I was the one encouraging these unhealthy fantasies by indulging in fearful and irrational thoughts and beliefs.

I held on to my experiences and turned them into stories and then believed at some level that they reflected what I deserved. I played the role of a victim by thinking I was powerless and had no control over the uncomfortable and unwanted sections of my life.

Yet, the most magical aspect about these unique stories is that at any moment we can take charge of them and choose to change the script.

Whether we are consciously or sub-consciously aware of it, there is a narrative running through our mind that tells us an influential tale. We also may not realise that even though we think we are the only ones to hear or read this tale, everyone around us is aware of it too. That is why some people treat us the way we believe we deserve to be treated.

If we have low self-worth and believe that we are not valuable, others around us will pick up on these beliefs. We will attract people who will easily take advantage of our weakened state.

Whatever story we are currently telling ourselves will quickly become our reality.

Our story captures the information that is stored in our belief system. It holds all of our previous experiences including many false truths.

The little white lies we tell ourselves, dated emotions and feelings, as well as everything that we have been conditioned to believe mixes together and plays on repeat, mostly without us being aware that it is happening.

Sometimes our stories inspire and empower us. However, left to their own devices many of our stories can hinder and haunt us.

The trouble with stories that keep us stuck or spinning in the same vicious cycle is that they are disorganized and badly out of context. Because we don’t read them word by word and from front to back we often don’t realise that they don’t make sense or that they are stories that relate to our past, not to our current or future existence.

We can alter our story simply by identifying why, where and when it originated from. 

As we look at the negative information we have internalized we can address it to figure out what caused its presence in the first place. Even if we cannot discover the reason for our debilitating thoughts, we can at least diffuse them by acknowledging them, taking responsibility for them and then letting them go so that they no longer control how we perceive ourselves.

The more we release negativity and put positive thoughts in place the healthier our stories become as we nourish ourselves rather than continue a process that results in self-fulfilling prophecies and then rapidly on to self-destruct.  

It starts to become clear to see why we allow people to treat us in certain ways and also why we are triggered to respond the way we do to their treatment. We have spent our whole lifetime gathering data that has conditioned us to feel and react the way we do.

Therefore, if we feel unworthy on the inside, whenever we are treated as though we are unworthy we make excuses for it, as it matches how we feel internally and also confirms the identity of the character in the story we have attached to ourselves.  

If we feel like we have always been a victim, we will naturally fall into the role of playing a victim. We only remain a victim while we are blaming other people for our circumstances.

When we take responsibility for how we feel and refrain from accusing anyone else of being responsible for our emotional state, regardless of what anyone may have done to us, we are no longer the victim in our own unpleasant story.

When we try to blame anyone else for how we feel we not only lose our personal power, we also forsake the ability to change how we feel so we are then unable to alter what we are attracting or strong enough to turn around our current situations. 

When we have repeated thoughts over and over they can easily become ingrained in our subconscious where they become our automated belief system.

If we focus on our thoughts and believe them, very soon they become how we feel and the stories in our mind will match up with how we feel on the inside.

Therefore, we can replace any negative thoughts with positive ones so that the story we tell ourselves is one that we have consciously and carefully crafted rather than one created from all the illusions and dust from our past.

Our stories are not just the thoughts we tell ourselves. 

Our stories are the thoughts we allow ourselves to believe in the heart of our core selves.

It is not enough to just change the narrative in our minds. We have to have absolute faith that we deserve whatever is associated with each word and that we are worthy of our beliefs coming true.  

When we change our story, our life may not unrecognizably change overnight. However, we will very quickly notice amazing new opportunities that are capable of guiding us swiftly towards incredible transformation.

Although, the first and most noticeable transformation will take place immediately. The alteration of our mind.

-Via Alex Myles