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You are not your past
Get ready to step into a fresh future
It is easy to imagine that what's ahead for you is more of the same.
Modern psychology has been telling us how much we are shaped by our past, how the way we grew up determines how we will roll for the rest of our lives.
Here is an invitation to move beyond this limiting concept of who you are:
Here is an invitation to move beyond this limiting concept of who you are:
You can liberate your past by re-imagining it.
You can liberate your future by re-envisaging it.
You can liberate your future by re-envisaging it.
The story of your past holding you in thrall is only a part-truth.
It can hold you enthralled only so long as your gaze is fixed behind you, only while your expectations for what's to come are based on what has gone before.
As you stride ahead, your past is where your 'back foot' is, metaphorically speaking. It's where you've been. It's also the platform from which you will take your next step.
Where you are, and where you've been, do not determine where you are headed.
Where you place your next step is up to you.
It can hold you enthralled only so long as your gaze is fixed behind you, only while your expectations for what's to come are based on what has gone before.
As you stride ahead, your past is where your 'back foot' is, metaphorically speaking. It's where you've been. It's also the platform from which you will take your next step.
Where you are, and where you've been, do not determine where you are headed.
Where you place your next step is up to you.
LIBERATE YOUR PAST BY RE-FRAMING IT
If you re-tell the story of what's behind you as the flow that has brought you to this very moment, there is a lot to appreciate and celebrate.
After all, you are alive, here on the planet!
(Monty Python have already put this point into song; if you feel that way inclined, check it out on YouTube).
If you re-tell the story of what's behind you as the flow that has brought you to this very moment, there is a lot to appreciate and celebrate.
After all, you are alive, here on the planet!
(Monty Python have already put this point into song; if you feel that way inclined, check it out on YouTube).
LIBERATE YOUR FUTURE BY RE-ENVISAGING IT
To go beyond re-hashing your past experiences, you have to engage a different engine: your imagination.
This can be helped by sourcing some new experiences - and these can be 'borrowed', to get you started.
To go beyond re-hashing your past experiences, you have to engage a different engine: your imagination.
This can be helped by sourcing some new experiences - and these can be 'borrowed', to get you started.
Source some new 'bricks'
Photo by Valeriy Kryukov on Unsplash
We tend to construct the pictures about our future re-using elements from our past, bits from our past experiences (I'm calling them 'bricks' here).
These bricks are already 'branded', they carry the stamp of those past experiences, so they may not be suitable for the new future you want to build.
These bricks are already 'branded', they carry the stamp of those past experiences, so they may not be suitable for the new future you want to build.
Let me explain what I mean by new 'bricks' through a real-life example:
Lexi (name changed) had felt that her exciting working life, which took her to lots of interesting places abroad, was not compatible with maintaining a steady intimate relationship. This was particularly concerning for her, since she was keen to start a family at some point in the future.
As Lexi was preparing to exit one unsatisfying relationship, eager to avoid landing with more of the same, I invited her to check how incompatible her working life really was with a relationship of the kind she'd find satisfying.
To take this query beyond imagingings, I set Lexi this task:
Find nine women who are managing to combine family life with a vigorous and mobile working life, in a way that nourishes and honours these women. Then borrow anything from the solutions these women have found, to become new building blocks for what is possible in your own life.
Lexi now envisages a future for herself drawing on experiences of couples and families who work in her chosen industry (global charities).
How could you, too, have both?
Lexi (name changed) had felt that her exciting working life, which took her to lots of interesting places abroad, was not compatible with maintaining a steady intimate relationship. This was particularly concerning for her, since she was keen to start a family at some point in the future.
As Lexi was preparing to exit one unsatisfying relationship, eager to avoid landing with more of the same, I invited her to check how incompatible her working life really was with a relationship of the kind she'd find satisfying.
To take this query beyond imagingings, I set Lexi this task:
Find nine women who are managing to combine family life with a vigorous and mobile working life, in a way that nourishes and honours these women. Then borrow anything from the solutions these women have found, to become new building blocks for what is possible in your own life.
Lexi now envisages a future for herself drawing on experiences of couples and families who work in her chosen industry (global charities).
How could you, too, have both?
You are not your past.
May this liberate you to live your life boldly.
May this liberate you to live your life boldly.
My experience of speaking with people demonstrates that there is often something quite specific that people feel is out of reach, based on what they haven't YET been able to bring together.
What has been just out of reach for you?
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Margarita Steinberg
I am a Leadership Coach with a specialism in Psychosynthesis psychology. I am the founder of ByHeart Coaching, and this blog grows out of my coaching work. I am also a qualified and experienced teacher, and draw on training in counselling skills.
I work with individuals and couples, as private clients; I also work with organisations through running leadership coaching programmes and group workshops.
PUBLICATIONS
A chapter on my innovative learning format using embodied learning appears in the book 'Disrupting traditional pedagogy: Active Learning in Practice' published by University of Sussex Press in June 2019.
In preparation: my first book 'One step at a time: how to thrive in a dynamic world'
I am a Leadership Coach with a specialism in Psychosynthesis psychology. I am the founder of ByHeart Coaching, and this blog grows out of my coaching work. I am also a qualified and experienced teacher, and draw on training in counselling skills.
I work with individuals and couples, as private clients; I also work with organisations through running leadership coaching programmes and group workshops.
PUBLICATIONS
A chapter on my innovative learning format using embodied learning appears in the book 'Disrupting traditional pedagogy: Active Learning in Practice' published by University of Sussex Press in June 2019.
In preparation: my first book 'One step at a time: how to thrive in a dynamic world'
Find out more about my work
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ByHeart Blog
I write about my clients' stories, about coaching and psychology, current events and the human condition
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