Get Galvanized

This is part three of my review of The Ray and I’m only up to page 16. Only 16 pages of reading and I’ve already written two blogs about it. I can’t help it. When I find something this good, I gotta share about it.

The article “Falling in Love With You” by Dr. Meg Haworth was a real eye-opener. Here are some of the quotes:

“Paying attention to the regular flow of the self-deprecating voices in your head is one way to begin your commitment to loving you….If you put yourself down throughout the day, others will reflect back to you exactly what you are telling yourself. What you think and feel about you is what gets produced in the world around you.”

(Side note: I call my self-depricating voice “Jeb.” Jeb is an overweight, mysogynist, conservative republican with a Southern accent. He has a beer belly and he wears blue jeans, a white T-shirt, suspenders and a John Deere baseball cap. I might unfurl Jeb to the public on the Get Gal VanIZed blog sometime in the near future).

Dr. Meg Haworth admits to denying and degrading her own talents and accomplishments in life. Even though she is highly educated and creative, (after all, she draws, sings, dances, writes poetry, songs, books, and regular articles and teaches at the Doctoral level…(phew, that’s a lot to do). Nonetheless she admits, “My commitment to hiding those talents had become a way of fufilling my beliefs around being small. I did not feel I had anything of value to offer the world.”

Boy, can I relate to that one. It seems like every client I see shares a similar sentiment. I have been around some amazing men and women in my life and I have seen a very strong tendency for people to downplay their successes, talents and accomplishments as “not good enough.” I think this is partially a side effect of a perfectionistic mindset. We are bombarded with images of perfection at every turn. Your mind believes that perfect is “normal.” Of course perfection is entirely abnormal. There literally is No Such Thing.

Dr. Meg Haworth had a worksheet titled The Path to Self-Love. She poses 6 questions for readers to reflect on. Rather than copy them from the magazine and risk copyright violation, I will share questions from worksheets in my book, From Saboatage to Success that can also help you create self-love.

1. Write your current concept of success. Where did you learn it from? Is there anything you’d like to change about it?
2. Write about the heroes or heroines you admired as a child look for clues as to what you value and admire.
3. Consider your favorite hobbies or books you read as a child. Do you find any common themes?
4. What brings you joy?
5. Through the years, what has been a consistent quality or attirbute that other people have appreciated in you?
6. Think of three people who know you well. What would each of them say is unique or special about you?

I have one more post about The Ray in a future blog.