It’s been awhile since I did a “real talk” post, and I’ve been having a mini inner battle lately that I’ve been fighting to navigate, so I felt it was apropos to touch on a tough topic. Doubt and insecurities are something that almost every human out there deals with on a regular basis. It’s an unfortunate reality that this problem seems to be built into our wiring. That said when you are someone who tends to sink into a negative mindset easily, this “normal” bit of faulty wiring can corrode into a mess that leaks into all aspects of your daily thinking.
As I’ve mentioned before, I have chronic Negative Nancy Syndrome; however, since launching the blog and working hard to change my mindset, I’ve gotten much better. That said, there are still bits of the NNS sickness that are so deeply rooted in me, that it’s hard just strap on my positivity gloves and weed them out. My most cancerous roots, dug in deep, are definitely self-doubt, self-deprecation, and self-comparison.
While a little self-doubt and comparison can be healthy and can sometimes drive you to be stronger and achieve things you never thought you could, there is something very wrong with living in a constant mindset of these three “self-obsessed” type of thoughts.
I spent a large majority of my youth being seriously bullied. It started at a very young age. To be honest I don’t remember a time in my youth that didn’t have some type. Unfortunately, those moments caused self-doubt, self-deprecation, and self-comparison to be woven into the fabric of my being, and often it can be hard to unravel the faulty stitches while leaving the proper ones intact. Slowly, I’m learning to weave in positivity to help repair the miss-stitched areas, but it’s so much easier to fall back into old habits.
Most commonly I find myself falling into a loop of questions when things go wrong that stem back to the verbal abuse of my youth. “Why am I not where I thought I would be in my accomplishments by this age?” “You’re not strong enough to succeed.” “Look at “so and so”, they’re your age, look what they’ve done, what’s wrong with you?” These thoughts are often so pervasive that it leads me into a state of stagnancy where I’m so afraid to move forward because I’ve already made so many mistakes and am “so far behind” in my own mind.
The harder I find myself fighting for success in this blog and success in positivity, the more I’m realizing the major damage this type of thought can cause to any type of success. Honestly, they are the murderers of success. Why? Because, once you get caught in a loop of self-centered abuse, it will cause you to procrastinate. Why work on that task? You can’t do it right anyway. Doing it today won’t get you any closer to the level of success that so and so has. Why even do it today? Get stuck in a loop like that for three days and you’ve not only lost three days you could have achieved even something small but now, you are stuck with all the work you have for the rest of the week on top of the 3 days you skipped. Now you’re overwhelmed and so much less likely to either do a good job on all those things or you may possibly give up on doing them all together!!
For many years I’ve lived with this regularly occurring negative thought loop. I’ll have one great week of getting work done, being right on track and feeling good about where I am. Then, one thing goes wrong, and I just get lost in beating myself up over what I have not achieved yet.
Sound at all like yourself? If not, I’m so glad! If so, I’m sorry and I understand the plight you are in. Being in the social media blogosphere, it often seems impossible to not compare yourself to your competition. But, I’m here to say, WHY?! You’re not them and they are not you! And that fact will never change. God created you a singular, one-of-a-kind being, for a reason. You weren’t meant to be them, you were meant to be you!!! And that is incredible! Your path may be hard, filled with lots of stumbling blocks and may often seem so much harder than the one others walk on, but “Where God Guides, He Provides” Isaiah 58:11. You are right where you are meant to be! None of us are ever who we want to be at any given moment, if we were we would stop fighting, progressing, and growing! And who would want that life? Instead of fighting yourself and pulling yourself back down, be gentle with yourself because you are doing the best you can at being the best you! If you stop beating yourself down, you may just find a little piece of happiness and joy in a small success that you would never have found before.
