Do you hold impossible expectations of yourself?

Oct 20

I loved and revered my great-grandmother, Mema.

Born in 1887, she was the quintessential matriarch. Remember Maggie Smith’s character on Downton Abbey? You get the picture. She lived 104 years and had close to 100 direct descendants at her death.

She was the first to hold me after I was born.
I learned to walk underneath paintings by Pissaro and Dali that hung on the walls of her grand home.
She taught me how to dance the Virginia Reel.
She fueled my obsession with other people’s stories

She modeled what it meant to be a devoted mother. I inherited this from her.

To this day, I have a global network of relatives, that would stop and lend me a hand. And when we do meet up it’s always easy and familiar She instilled in us a fierce sense of belonging to this Pillsbury clan.

From an early age, I now realize, I also developed a deep unconscious fear of losing this connection. I internalized what I thought to be the expectations for belonging.

My worthiness became dependent on:

Intelligence
Education
Achievement
Financial success
Motherhood and family

I existed in a cage of expectation plagued by self-doubt until I hit my 40’s.

On the first day of coach training, I learned about our inner judge, the voice in my head that sounds like my truth, but isn’t. That “you’re not good enough” voice.

The judge is part of a human’s survival strategy. It wants us to stay safe from potential emotional risk, failure, disappointment, and ultimately rejection from the clan.

You can’t get rid of the voice of your judge, but you can learn how to recognize and tame her.

I learned to recognize my wise, essential self as separate from my judge and start listening to her.

I was able to unhinge myself from expectations and feel my innate worthiness.

I identified and started living from my values of authenticity, courage, and connection

When I freed myself of all the outdated ideas of what my life “should” look like it cracked open all sorts of possibilities around what I wanted it to be.

I now help guide my clients through this process and have created a video training How to Manage Self-Doubt in 4 Simple Steps. Take the next step to creating the life you want by watching it here.