Changing By Doing
“The things you do often create the things you believe.”
– David McRaney
One helpful way to change how you think is to work backwards: begin by changing your actions and let your thoughts follow. Once, while feeling really bad about myself, I decided to walk, talk and act confident. Somehow, almost as if by magic- I felt more confident. Similarly, self-esteem can be enhanced by doing things that one holds in high esteem, perhaps such as volunteering or acting honorably. This is also sometimes referred to as acting as if. If you want to be a good person, act as if you are a good person until you start to believe it.
When I was 23 I directed my first feature-film. I felt like an impostor and every day I waited for someone to yell, “Hey, he shouldn’t be here! He doesn’t know what he’s doing!” So, I decided to fake it. I felt like a pawn on a chessboard making moves like the queen. All the while I was waiting for someone to say, “Hey, you’re a pawn. You can’t do that!” Only no one ever did. And after awhile, I was a queen on that particular chessboard. I believed it, and everyone else did too.
An impostor complex can be a powerful thing, but the feeling of whether or not we belong is just that: a feeling. That means it's all in your head. After all, when you believe in yourself and feel comfortable in your skin but someone else sees you as an imposter, that’s their problem to work on.
The fact of the matter is, we view our problems from the inside looking out, which is a pretty poor perspective. If you are in a terrible relationship, your perspective is limited. Whereas if your friend is in a terrible relationship, you are an outsider looking in and will find it much easier to see the reality of situation. Thus, we often have to mentally get out of something before we can understand it. The same is true for changing yourself. To break old patterns of behaviors and beliefs, you have to get outside of yourself. We have to become an observer of our own thoughts.
If you’re struggling to know what to do in a situation, ask yourself, “How would it look if I were an outsider looking in?” Another good technique is to ask yourself, “What advice would I give a good friend (not yourself) in a very similar position?” The answers to those questions are often quite eye-opening. Then the question becomes, “Am I ready to take my own advice?” Even if taking our own advice proves challenging, the perspective we’ve gained is priceless. Sometimes, because you can only see your life from the limited view of an insider, the person you know best is the person you know least, yourself. However, by observing our thoughts as if we were an outsider, we can have tremendous perspective and thus, introspection. And the best way to change is often by doing. You can act as if you are who you want to be, and watch yourself become that person.
Ask Yourself:
If I was going to fake it, what kind of person would I want to act like?
If I believe in myself, can I accept that what other people believe is their problem, not mine?
How would I like to act today? Can I begin to make it my reality one step a time?
Next Letter: Getting Uncomfortable