Last month, I found out something serious about someone I love, something that meant I had to take an action to protect myself. Protecting myself meant making a decision that would change the relationship, maybe permanently. They made it clear what that decision would cost us. So, there it was: do it their way and abandon myself or make the decision I knew was best for me and risk letting the cards fall where they may.
I knew something fundamentally was broken in the image that I had projected to this person. Because if who I see myself to be is really who I am, this decision wouldn’t have been on the table. So just like the work I do with my clients, I asked myself where had I let go of my own personal ownership. Where had I let old stories and rules convince me that loving someone meant tolerating anything they did? Where had I bent what I knew to be right and true for me and called it compromise? Where had I ignored my intuition and discomfort and traded it for what they needed, to keep the boat steady?
These are hard questions. And as women, we have to get honest and ask them. Even me, as a Coach.
Here is what I knew. I had taught this person the image of me they were interacting with. Not the truth of who I am. I am capable, strong, reliable, and steady. I am trustworthy and competent. I am fun and lighthearted. I don’t take advantage of people, and I don’t let people take advantage of me. I call out the truth even when it’s inconvenient, I do the internal work, and I stay in things for the long haul. And mostly, this person knows that and honors it.
But somewhere along the way, there has been a disconnect and that comes from my behavior when faced with situations where my abandonment button might ultimately be triggered. I get out of integrity with myself. I know that I am partly responsible for what had been built between us. While I didn’t cause the action of this other person, I had shaped an image of myself with them that said, you can treat this area carelessly. One interaction at a time.
Owning your image is all about perception and reception. Perception is how people see you. What they believe you’ll tolerate, how far they think they’re allowed to push, what they assume about you. Reception is different. It’s how people feel standing next to you, what they carry with them after being in your presence.
But there’s a third measure that decides both of the others, and it’s the one we skip past the fastest: how do you see you? Where’s the gap between what you’re actually living and what you tell yourself is true? What do you run from, or avoid, that makes you step into a smaller image of yourself so you don’t rock the boat, or so you do? My gap was in the perception that I projected out to others and the reception of how I felt about myself. And I knew I had to make some uncomfortable choices and close the gap. And when I did, this person said – “let me meet you where you are. You have done more than your share in this area.”
When I take ownership of self, circumstances change. I am no longer a victim that things are happening to. I am instead able to meet the situation with acceptance (doesn’t mean I like it, it means I am looking at the facts). That opens up a space for me to become aware of what my choices are and then I can get into action. When I sit in a lower version of myself with a false image of who I am, those choices aren’t choices at all. They are constraints that keep the old system going.
What would happen if you stepped into the image that let you stop running from the old system?
Here are some steps you can take to begin the work:
- Find the story underneath your own motivation. It’s usually a fear wearing a disguise. Mine is abandonment, and once I saw it clearly, I could trace it through almost every version of over giving I’ve ever done. The times I said yes when I meant no. The times I called it compromise when it was really me abandoning myself, the times I ignored my own internal compass because my wiring said, it’s better to go with it than to be abandoned.
- Notice how different you are at work than you are at home. At work I hold a boundary without blinking. I negotiate. I say no and let the silence sit. At home, in the relationships I love the most, I go soft in exactly the places I should stay steady. Where does that split show up for you? Where do you protect the version of you that shows up for a paycheck, but not the version that shows up for love?
- Ask yourself which relationships let you be your truest self. Not your best-behaved self. Your truest one.
- Name what scares you enough that you tolerate things you shouldn’t. Financial insecurity. Not being liked. Losing the identity of being the strong one. Whatever it is, it’s running more of your life than you think.
Even writing this to you, I’m aware of the image I want to create. Someone steady. Someone honest. Someone who’s done the work and still shows up in the middle of doing it more. And if I’m honest, someone that’s embarrassed that I don’t always have it all figured out.
We owe it to ourselves to be who we are in ways that are in alignment and integrity to our truest being. Not the version we built to keep the peace, or to be easy, or to be loved. Us. We’ve worn one image for so long that stepping into something new can feel like it needs permission, but it doesn’t. It’s allowed to look like a butterfly leaving a shape it’s outgrown. Other people won’t always like it. They got used to the old shape, and they built their comfort around it. But this isn’t for them. It’s for us, and the world gets the better version of us because of it.
I feel complete with who I’ve been. She got me here, and I’m grateful for her. But I’m ready for something bigger, because I know that’s where the creativity and the possibility live, and I deserve to go there. So do you.
I have done this work before, and I find myself at the crossroads with an invitation to do it again. What I know is that the version of who I have been has served me. I have created a successful and mostly happy life. But because of who I want to be, there is still a higher calling to step into, and I have to be brave enough and willing to get there, because every iteration of who I become is better than the one before. When I hold on too tight in fear of what I will lose, I don’t open up for what I will gain.
Much love,
Gretchen
