Does your dream feel impossible?
“What if I’m just not built for it? Maybe I just don’t have what it takes…”
My client spoke those words recently in a session. I know this sentiment closely, it’s one that comes up with many of my clients during our time working together. And it’s something I’ve experienced, too.
Most of us have experienced this phenomenon at some point in our lives – we look at someone else's life or career, wishing we could have the same, but then tell ourselves:
"I'm just not like them. I don't have what it takes"
Years back, in the months before starting my coaching business, these thoughts were very present in my life. I saw other people doing it, but somehow struggled to believe it was possible for me. I told myself stories about not having the traits, qualities, resources ‘they’ have. So I'd spend my days wishing, wanting, hoping… but then not taking action. Holding back from doing anything.
It can be extremely painful to want something so deeply and be paralysed by fear. If you've been through it, you know what I mean. It impacted my feelings about myself and took me down the spiral of self doubt and insecurities. It also dramatically impacted my feelings about my future.
One day, my coach and mentor at the time said something that shifted everything for me –
“We do not get to put others on pedestals”
In that moment, I realised that by doing so I was discounting the challenges and roadblocks that they have surely been through. I’ve made up a story that they were ‘born’ to do this, implying they didn’t need to work hard. And by saying "I'm not them", I was giving myself permission not to show up for what I wanted.
As with most of our negative self-talk, these self-deprecating statements are rooted in fear. If we believe these narratives we don't follow through, we stay in the same familiar place, safe, but deeply frustrated.
If the person we’re looking up to is so “untouchable”, we’d never be touched by their truth. We’d never be challenged by them.
This person’s role in your life is not to paralyse you, but to challenge you to stretch yourself into new perceptions, to find new depths of courage and to change a long-held thought into a new one.
And you know what’s so cool about it??
What I've learned on my journey and through working with many clients on these issues, is that when we see something we admire in someone else, it’s because it’s a reflection of our own truth. It shows us what’s inherent in us but is currently unexpressed.
It’s not that your dreams are impossible. They just don't feel possible because you don’t believe (yet) that you’re the person who can achieve them. When you allow yourself to dream beyond your current beliefs, you create the space to grow into that dream.
Go out there, do the thing, it’s all waiting for you!
Love,
Naama
