Your life is self-made
I’m Self Made. So are you. In fact, we ALL are, because our life is a reflection of the thoughts we believe and the actions we take.
As children, we begin the process of creating a “rulebook” for our life. It’s not intentional, and we create it based on what we learn from our family and the experiences we have. We also tweak the rulebook based on feedback we receive from family, teachers, coaches, peers, and ourselves.
This rulebook can serve us and can also hinder us. Some of the rules in my rulebook were:
Family is the most important thing.
Always give 110% and never make a mistake.
It’s important to be confident and feel good about yourself.
Avoid situations where you might struggle because you aren’t good at them.
Be grateful for what you have, and see the beauty in everyday life.
Always put others before yourself.
It’s ok to have big dreams and want to live a life differently than others.
Always keep moving “up” even if you don’t really want to. Move up the corporate ladder, get a bigger house, do more activities, run further, sleep less.
After I downloaded the rulebook from my brain and looked at it, I decided to keep the odd numbers and ditch the rest.
Rules 2 and 4 make following rules 3 & 7 nearly impossible. Rule 6 ensures that you’ll disappear from your own life. Rule 8 left me feeling like a robot and unable to apply rule 5.
It turns out, I’d created conflicting and impossible rules that I'd been attempting to follow for years.
What’s in your rulebook?