Rejection
Imperfect is the New Black
Life Coach Jam held our fantastic tele-class yesterday.
We forgot to record it.
Which is only important because we said we’d send the recording out to those who signed up for the class.
Yeah.
Life is like that sometimes.
Over an hour of content.
That we’ll be re-recording next weekend.
Lesson learned.
Sometimes we have setbacks.
Let’s say we’re at a party. We indulge. The next morning we’ve gained a few pounds.
We feel disappointed, frustrated, dejected.
Then we indulge in all or nothing thinking and throw in the towel.
“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”
Sometimes we don’t get the result we wanted or expected. Or don’t behave the way we were hoping to.
We gain a few pounds. Over-drink. Buy that new purse even though we’ve resolved to get out of credit card debt.
We waste so much time and energy when we think we have to do it perfectly.
We derail our progress when we use our own imperfection as a reason to stop or throw in the towel.
“Nearly every person who develops an idea works at it up to the point where it looks impossible, and then gets discouraged. That’s not the place to become discouraged.”
Being imperfect is how we humans roll.
When we tell ourselves we have failed, we tend to think that is the end of the story.
There is no recourse.
Nothing else can be done.
It’s the end of the line.
I mean, we did FAIL, after all.
But usually what we call failure is just a matter of our results not meeting our expectations.
And when we use that as a reason to say, “Screw it” and “Why bother,” we can turn gaining a pound or two into 20 pounds, and a dismal blind date into swearing off dating for. ever.
One of the greatest expectations of all is to expect ourselves to keep going.
Failure is like a typo. Just correct it and keep toyping typing.
Oh, the pounds I never would have gained if I had treated my weight loss “failures” like “typos” and just kept going.
“Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.”
― Thomas A. Edison
To receive our fantastical re-recorded “Gift of Peace” call and learn how to keep going when you want to say “Screw it!”, shoot me an email and I’ll send you the recording.
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Of Diaphragms, Divorce & Damage
I was conceived during the confusion of the divorce between my parents.
My mother was using a diaphragm.
As a child, I will interpret this to mean that I was:
A mistake.
Unwanted.
Unplanned.
And therefore, undesired.
I will tell myself my father didn’t want anything to do with me and that my mother “had” to take care of me.
Eventually I will conclude that I am…
Damaged and broken.
I will wonder whether I was even meant to be on the planet.
In this story I have a gaping hole, and I will try to…
Fill the hole.
Fix myself.
Avoid the darkness.
Eat away the pain.
And distract myself from this very painful story and the way I feel when I think it.
I spend years (okay, decades) never quite feeling like I belong or that I am accepted. No relationship or crevice of my life is untouched by this story.
The hole is never filled.
My weight struggle is just one of many that torments my life.
Until one day I realize that there is another story here.
One that rings more true.
One that kicks the old one to the curb.
It goes like this:
Oh YEAH!
Homegirl was MEANT to be here.
I was MEANT to be conceived…
THAT. DAY.
THAT. MOMENT.
THOSE. PARENTS.
During THOSE divorce proceedings.
Diaphragm?!?
Whatevs.
What else ya got?
Time to rock it out on Planet Earth.
Today is Conception Day.
No.
Matter.
What.
Bad-Ass Embryo – Coming. Through.
CJ in the womb – Yo!
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When I’m a hater
There was a peer student in my Money Coach Training. She scared the bejeezus out of me. I didn’t want to coach her with a 10 foot pole. My thought was something like: I can’t ask her about “that” (whatever “that” was at the time) because she is slippery and avoids answering the questions, and I will look like a fool.
Rather quickly (and conveniently), I found myself not liking her. I thought she skillfully skirted the questions asked of her and strategically posed random philosophical questions designed to keep things light and off topic.
My light bulb moment came when I realized that “not liking her” was WAY easier than not liking myself, feeling like a weenie for backing off, and feeling weak for not respecting my own thoughts and input.
Once I figured out what was going on with this complete cyber stranger I had met on the forum just two weeks earlier, I saw this happening with a multitude of other people in my life.
I looked at all the people I didn’t like in my life, and then saw that “not liking them” was me avoiding something I didn’t like in myself that came up for me about me in relation to that person.
These people triggered my own self-loathing and then became a diversionary target. It was just so much easier to avoid looking at myself by focusing on them and all the evidence I had gathered for not liking them. Hating on them was easier than admitting I was hating on myself.
The people I defend against the most (the people I don’t like) are the ones who have the most to teach me. I create all that pomp, righteousness, finger-pointing, and blame and hope to God no one sees in me the perceived inadequacy I so desperately don’t want to see in myself.
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Certified!
I came out of my Money Coach Training hell bent on the goal of attending a Coach’s Retreat for which I needed to be certified. While I officially had 60 days to submit my materials for certification review, if I wanted to attend the retreat, I would need to get them in within 14 days.
I completed my Money Coach Training on a Thursday, began coaching my first clients on the following Sunday, and submitted my materials (which included recorded sessions of virtually my first six sessions EVER) within the truncated 14-day timeframe. I crossed my fingers and even bought a plane ticket for the retreat.
Shortly after I submitted my materials, Meadow Devor, my trainer/teacher informed me that her overall opinion was that I wasn’t ready. She said she would absolutely expect this from a coach who just finished training and that I was right on track and just needed more time and practice.
I knew when I submitted my materials that it was quite possible that this would be the outcome. I had submitted my very first sessions after all. I was a complete newbie and green as could be but felt I had to give it a shot. I resolved to keep coaching and submit new recordings later.
All was well. Time marched on. I coached my heart out. I stayed the course until…
I learned that one of my peers from the training had submitted her materials, gotten certified, and had just attended the Coach’s Retreat. (I ignored the fact that she was already a Martha Beck-certified coach with an existing coaching practice.)
What kind of a freakin’ loser was I that I was not yet certified?
I began to ask myself this question along with other noteworthy gems.
Upon reflection, I decided I hadn’t been told to simply practice more; I had been REJECTED.
This struck me at the core. My mindset tanked. It gnawed at me…
…and then another peer certified.
This was getting more painful by the minute…
…so I did what any self-respecting, thought workin’ gal would do. I took out my trusty self-coaching tools, sat myself down, and uncovered a boatload of painful-feeling thoughts.
Those rat bastard thoughts were the source of so much agony, self-doubt, pressure, heaviness, and loss of energy.
Get a load of the Old Thoughts that were clanging around and producing a black cloud squarely above my head.
Old Thoughts
If it takes me more than 2x to certify, it means I’m a loser, and I should be embarrassed, and I might give up.
I’m embarrassed that I was not certified the first time.
I’m not sure I’m doing sessions that are good enough to be certified.
It will take me forever to get good enough to certify.
It will definitely take me more than 1x to certify (I know this because that’s what’s happening). Therefore, I’m already a loser. That’s embarrassing. What am I? A reject?
…I’m a reject.
No matter what, I’ll always be second best.
I’m less than the other coaches who certified on the first go.
I don’t want my clients to lose faith in me or know I tried but didn’t get certified the first time around.
This will undermine my credibility, and I want to hide the fact that I didn’t certify the first time around.
No one will take me seriously.
Once I found these thoughts, I knew exactly what to do.
Turn them around into new thoughts that I 100% believed that would produce the results I wanted.
And thus…
New Thoughts
My path is perfect for me.
My path to certification is the path I am meant to have.
I will be one frigging strong coach when I certify.
When I certify, I will know that I deserve to certify.
This is making me stronger as a person and a coach.
This is perfect.
It will take what it takes, as long as it takes, for me to certify. But I will certify.
I. WILL. CERTIFY.
And it was true…by the time I got to “I will certify,” I did indeed KNOW that I would certify.
…But I certainly didn’t know it would be in a mere three days.
Within 24 hours of doing the work to come up with these New Thoughts, I received an impromptu email from Meadow saying she would be willing to assist me by listening to a recording and offering feedback in advance of my submitting a whole new set of recordings for review.
I told her “Mama didn’t raise no fool” and sent her a recording immediately.
Within 72 hours of her initial email, Meadow sent me the following jaw-dropping email:
“Thank you so much for sending me this recording. First of all – I want to give you a gold medal for dealing with one of the hardest clients I’ve ever heard.
You were amazing.
You didn’t get rocked by her hostility. You knew exactly what you were doing. You knew clearly that it was her thinking.
Your coaching was amazing.
You’ve more than passed the coaching portion of the certification.
Astounding job here, CJ.”
The amazing thing is – with my New Thoughts – I know I would have gone the distance, however far, over whatever hurdle, across whatever ocean…and certified. I’d gotten my conviction, confidence and passion back because I was tapped into some powerful New Thoughts…that. I. BELIEVED.
So how about you? Which will it be…?
Old Thoughts or New Thoughts?
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