Changing Your Mind
For most of my life I haven't allowed myself to change my mind. In the past if I said something, committed to something, or decided to do something, I would seldom go back on it. This behaviour was driven by deep ‘good girl’ and perfectionist conditioning. I would stick to things even if I knew deep down to my core that they weren’t right for me.
Perfectionism drove a need to finish everything I started. This affected everything in my life - books I started that I wasn’t enjoying, movies I started that I didn’t like, courses and workshops that weren’t resonating, conversations that left me energetically drained. There was a fear of missing out too. What if I missed the most important thing by changing my mind, opting out and letting go?
This has all come up for me in the last week or so after committing to a month off social media. I’ve changed my mind. I’ve scrunched up my commitment into a ball and lobbed it into the waste paper basket. There’s a creative burst moving through me. So here I am. I am putting in limitations on my consumption, to allow for more creativity and I’m doing a slightly adjusted Zentember.
Over the last few years changing my mind and opting out has been the key to the improvement in my wellbeing. Through healing and working through trauma responses which protected me in the past, I have begun to let go and release this deep pattern of over-commitment, inflexibility and rigidity. And it is so liberating.
Life is so much more nuanced and fluid than we allow and in my experience when I allow for the flow and the grey areas, life is so much more enjoyable. Honoring myself and my needs is a fairly new and revolutionary act for me. It’s messy, complicated and sometimes a little (okay, very) uncomfortable.
What have you been holding onto that you’re afraid to let go of because you’ve committed to it but you know it isn’t right for you?
I would love to know how you feel about changing your mind after saying you’ll do something - is it easy for you or do you avoid at all costs?