I help people with self-doubt
be as loyal to themselves as they are to others.
Self-doubt looks very different
on the outside vs the inside:
On the outside:
It’s pushing, hustling, over-achieving, and accomplishing. You are the go-to, “I got this” person. You are the one everyone can count on to get it done.
On the inside:
It’s a feeling of restlessness and unworthiness. It’s a constant fear of being found out as the stupid, lazy, incompetent person your internal critic tells you that you are.
We appear high functioning as an attempt to keep anyone on the outside
from seeing your insides, and it is exhausting.
I know this not only from years of training but because I live with a very loud Monger (my name for inner critic)
But there is hope.
Here are some ways self-doubt shows up in your everyday life—Click on the picture to read more about the theme.
Can you relate? I got you.
The Happier Approach Podcast:
Stories and Interviews Exploring
Self Doubt
Books:
The Happier Approach +
This Stuff is Hard + Juice Squeezed
And while it might seem that the next obvious step is to heal your self-doubt, it’s not.
For years I tried to heal my self-doubt through a variety of ways:
Meditation
Journaling
Pushing Harder
Ignoring it and hoping it would go away.
Changing my thoughts
Thinking positive and being grateful
Some of these methods helped, but if they did, they felt like band-aids rather than truly quieting my Monger (my name for inner critic)
Then I realized that I was super loyal to others. I would go to the ends of the earth for other people—but myself? When life got hard or unpleasant emotions came up, I was quick to belittle, shame, push, beat up, and ridicule myself. Loyalty to myself was non-existent. I saw this in my clients too. So I went on a quest to build self-loyalty.
I realized self-loyalty was the key. When I finally stopped ridiculing and shaming myself, I could practice the activities that helped quiet my Monger. Combining my years of study, research, and countless hours working with clients, I developed the Happier Approach™, a 3 step system to help you build self loyalty AND quiet your self-doubt. I admit a 3 step system sounds easy, almost too easy. But I want to be clear; it’s not that simple. At the core of the Happier Approach™ is being as loyal to yourself as you are to others.
“What if the question is not why am I so infrequently the person I really want to be, but why do I so infrequently want to be the person I really am?”
—Oriah Mountain Dreamer, Prelude to the Dance
I remember exactly where I was standing when I read that quote at a gift shop in Minneapolis. It took my breath away because my number one goal was always to become someone “better.” But in that quest for self-improvement, the message I was sending to myself was, you are not ok.
To me, that is the heart of Self-doubt—struggling, pushing, and hustling to outrun the Monger and transform ourselves into someone who will finally be enough.
My number one goal is to help you build a strong relationship with yourself. Helping you build self-loyalty. So, while you can want to keep growing and changing (I do too), you aren’t doing it from a place of self-hatred but rather from a place of self-loyalty
