The Biggest Fan (Voice of Self Loyalty)

Welcome. Today I want to introduce the 3rd character that takes up space in our heads. We have met the Monger, the mean inner critic voice, and the BFF, the voice of self-indulgence. Today we are talking about the Biggest Fan, my favorite character. She is the voice of self-loyalty and the key to quieting the Monger and the BFF.

She is kind, generous, and wise and always has your back. She's the best of both worlds. She holds the goals of your Monger (to be safe and secure) without the shaming and belittling, and she provides the support of your BFF ("you are awesome") without the free pass to do whatever you want. 

Recently My Biggest Fan was encouraging me when my anxiety was high:

Ok, Sweet Pea (my Biggest Fan calls me Sweet Pea), You got this. You don't have to push so hard and be perfect; you are ok human and all. It isn't about being perfect; it is about being present. So let's take a breath and get into your body, and then we can keep going. 

It can also look like:

 "You are having fun. Slow down and take a breath. Do you really need another drink? You have been kicking butt on your workouts this week. You want to get up and work out Tomorrow, and you feel so much better when you work out. You can stay and have fun without drinking more, so you won't be hungover Tomorrow."

"Yikes, that is totally scary that your boss called you in Tomorrow. Take a breath and do a quick stretch. It will all be ok; no matter what happens, we will figure it out. Let's do some brainstorming. How can we best prepare for that meeting?" 

Your Biggest Fan has this wonderful combo of kind, wise, and honest (sometimes brutally so).

You might be thinking, how do I go from having a Monger to having a Biggest Fan? How do I do this?" 

The struggle I always had when someone would say to me be kind to yourself or accept yourself no matter what was always confusing. I mean, how was I going to get anything done if I was kind to myself? My belief was I needed the mean, nasty voice of the Monger to remind me how I could be a better person or how I could be more efficient. Because I had spent most of my life hammering myself into submission, I couldn't understand how I could be kind to myself AND accomplish my goals. 

Clients will say to me; my Monger has gotten me this far; if it weren't for her, I wouldn't be as successful as I am. I would be on my couch eating junk food and binge-watching TV. Ok, so let's say this is true! All hail the Monger! But let's look at the Monger and her tactics. She is mean; she is nasty; she makes us feel like crap. She doesn't encourage us to try new things; she demands that we try new things or meet her wrath. And then, when her wrath is too much, we need a break! So we bring in the BFF the character of self-indulgence (Self-compassion gone too far), and our BFF is like a pressure release valve. She encourages us to take it easy, procrastinate, and indulge. And then our Monger attacks us for being lazy and procrastinating, and round and round we go.

Being kind to yourself isn't a free pass to do whatever you want. When we are loyal to ourselves, our goals and values drive us, not shame and belittling. We can be kind to ourselves AND get stuff done. When I think about the Biggest Fan, I think of my high school Algebra teacher, Miss Henry; she was tough, she was scary, she had high expectations for us, and she demanded our best. Yes, she would get angry when we didn't meet her expectations and yell from time to time. And she was never degrading or belittling or shaming. She just had high expectations and let us know when we didn't hit them.

I can vividly remember (and still have dreams from time to time) attending her after-school help. We would all stand at the chalkboard, and she would yell out equations that we had to solve. I can still feel the chalk in my hand and the tap tap taping sound of all of us writing the next equations on the chalkboard. I can still feel the fear and insecurity. What was I so afraid of? Being wrong? Looking stupid? Being singled out? Yes, yes, and yes. We all had mixed emotions about those after-school help sessions. One, they HELPED a lot! I learned more in those sessions than in class itself. Two, they were challenging. Feeling on display and putting myself out there was challenging. And yet I also remember the laughter, the camaraderie of all being in this together. It was challenging, but it wasn't painful.

So what does this have to do with Mongers and Biggest Fans? Well, now, looking back, I can see my algebra teacher was a Biggest Fan. She was scary because she had high expectations, but she wasn't mean. She wasn't belittling or shaming; she didn't go for the jugular. She was offering help on her time. She wasn't getting paid; she purely wanted to see us succeed and was willing to work over to help us. Through my teenage eyes, she was scary because she wasn't afraid to tell us when we had it wrong or that we should have known better. But now, as an adult, I can see she was helpful. I remember feeling empowered and proud after one of those sessions. My BFF didn't come out after one of those sessions to tell me to take it easy or indulge because I felt good. I didn't need to relieve the pressure of the Monger because the Monger hadn't been chiming in. She couldn't get a word in over my Biggest Fan.

I created the Biggest Fan character because I wanted to find a way to hold myself to a higher standard and challenge myself to stretch and grow without the shame. 

The Biggest Fan is Miss Henry. She has your back, she will stay late to help you grow, and she is always challenging you to learn more. She is kind and wise and pushes us to grow. Sometimes growth is scary, but it doesn't have to be done because we were shamed into doing it. Growth can be because we have another goal; we want to stretch ourselves.

The problem is we turn our backs on ourselves. We treat ourselves as evil, lazy people who need to be whipped into shape rather than seeing that we are well-intentioned people who have anxiety about the unknown (which is perfectly understandable).

So no, you do not need the Monger to be a success. You need the Biggest Fan. That voice saying, let's stretch, let's see what's out there, let's get uncomfortable, and let's be kind to ourselves as we do it.

Tomorrow I will be talking about how to access the voice of the Biggest Fan. 

See you Tomorrow!