The Stories We Tell Ourselves ~ Healing Unhelpful Narratives

  • 5 mins read

Rewrite Your Story

I’m holding an event soon that stretches me out of my comfort zone, so I’ve been avoiding promoting it or allowing myself to think about it too much. Clearly the universe has picked up on the fact that I’ve put the event “out there” though, as time and time again over the last few weeks I’ve been met with the theme of the session – the stories we tell ourselves. 

 

If you buy into manifestation or creating your own reality, then the stories you tell yourself are pretty important. If you’re constantly telling yourself that landlords are terrible, good luck finding a decent landlord. If you’re telling yourself and everyone around you that you’re always late, good luck being on time. A really good example of this is when you’re running late to get somewhere and you feel like you’re in a rush. I always used to tell myself I’d be late in these scenarios and I usually was. But for a while now I’ve been practising the opposite. These days, when I find myself running late to get somewhere and feeling rushed or rushing, I’ve been telling myself I’ll still get there on time. Don’t worry, just chill, you’ll get there on time. And guess what’s been happening? I’ve been finding that it works and I arrive with a minute or two to spare, or bang on time. 

 

Bringing awareness to our conscious and subconscious traits can help us to witness them and accept and/or move through them. If you’re constantly telling yourself that you never have any time, you can’t lose weight, can’t sleep, have no money, etc etc, then that’s the message that you’re sending out to the universe, creating, attracting, manifesting. 

 

Bringing awareness to these stories and flipping them on their heads or discarding them can transform our lives. Releasing judgement from our actions or ways of beings can liberate us. Whether you’re wrestling with deeply embedded behaviours or fine tuning the words you choose to use when you speak to yourself, tracking down and identifying our stories is the first step towards healing them and calling in something new.

How to heal your stories

Take a moment to reflect. You can do this inwardly or using pen and paper. What are the patterns that show up in your life? Illness, terrible partners, micromanagers. And what stories might you be carrying around them? How often do you hear yourself say “all men are cheaters”, “I hate my job”, “I’m ill again… I’m always ill”. There is a power in our words and thoughts. There’s a magnetism in what we declare to the world, over and over again. Whether we think it all day long, or declare it to friends, family, or anyone who’ll listen. Which stories are you looping on at present? 

 

Some have mine have been (or still are):

 

  • I’m not as resilient as other people
  • I have no “practical skills” 
  • I procrastinate or avoid 
 

Admittedly, we all have strengths and weaknesses (or is that a story too?), but in telling yourself you’re a certain something on a regular basis, are you allowing yourself any space to shift, grow or change into something else? 

 

Over the weekend I went on a lush walk with a friend, her husband and son and my boyfriend. Her son is three and she was talking about how children go through strange phases but that they often pass. It made me wonder why we don’t allow ourselves phases as adults. Why do we attach labels to ourselves and wear them for lifetimes? 

 

Confronting your stories, deciding whether they help or hinder you and choosing to change, challenge or release them can be abrasive work. This can be especially true when it comes to labels to do with our identity, health, or anything that we strongly identify with, whether consciously or unconsciously. During a breathwork recently, I got the message to release the mental health label. On paper, I have a mental health disability, which I was diagnosed with some time ago. As much as I’ve been trying to identify with this less anyway, the guidance to discard it completely feels icky and uncomfortable. It even feels irrational or dangerous – I’ve been taught to be hypervigilant about how I’m feeling, stress levels, sleep patterns. This story has rooted deep. 

 

Who knows where feeling into that and unravelling it all will take me. Perhaps if you join for the session where we’ll be leaning into our stories and sharing some beautiful cacao, you’ll begin a narrative initiation process gifted by the universe too. Because that’s what it feels like. I’m noticing the stories more and more, their weight, their power. I’m seeing when they shift, or where they shifted long ago but hadn’t noticed. They’re meeting me, I’m no longer seeking them out, they present themselves willingly. 

 

If you want to delve deeper into the stories we tell ourselves join Rewrite Your Story, 7-9pm on Wednesday 14 June 2023.  The venue is in Tynemouth, address on booking. Would love to see you there and weave some stories together. 

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