Are we Super Human?

Welcome to Day 5 of Spiral 2 with the theme of beliefs. 

Today we are talking about the sneaky belief that I am superhuman. This belief is complex—it goes something like this. I am superhuman; I can do anything I put my mind to. I can push myself beyond what's comfortable; I can cram 10 hours of work into a 4-hour day. I am superhuman, AND at the same time, I am broken; just ask my Monger. I am too strong or too weak, too bossy or too passive. At a young age, I learned there is always room for improvement, so I keep improving. Keep pushing. Keep striving. So while we believe we are superhuman and can do anything by pushing ourselves harder, faster, and better, we also are super critical of ourselves. It is an odd catch-22.

When we have spent our whole lives believing that we could be superhuman, if only we hustle harder, how do we embrace a life of imperfection and acceptance, especially when our Mongers and BFFs can actively sabotage our efforts.

Let's start with trust. Or a lack thereof. Many of my clients are slow to trust themselves, slow to trust other people, and slow to trust our humanness. We trust our rules, rigidities, schedules, and to-do lists because those rules, rigidities, and ways of doing things keep us feeling superhuman.

I have chronic arthritis, and a few days ago, the pain was simply miserable.

I had pushed myself all day to stay productive and get things done. And I was standing in the kitchen struggling to make dinner and engaged in my default self-talk of come on; you could do this just a little bit more followed by, there are many people out there who have it so much worse than you be grateful; you just have to keep pushing. And then my biggest fan showed up and said, okay, sweet pea. Let's practice A.S.K. Talk to yourself with kindness. I took a breath and quietly said to myself, this is so freaking hard. Being in pain sucks. I am so tired of pushing and hustling through the pain.

I'm just tired. And immediately, tears came to my eyes, and my whole body softened. And I felt seen for the first time. Rather than viewing myself as something that needed to be fixed or improved, I just gave myself kindness for where I was. This is the power of showing up for ourselves, building self loyalty, and embracing our humanness.

Before I figured out the power of A.S.K. Rather than my Biggest FAn showing up my Monger would have hammered me even harder–telling me how weak I was and how I should be able to push harder. Inevitably I would push myself so hard that I would either end up sick or my body would force me to rest. 

Here's the thing with these superhuman habits: they are well-worn and comfortable.

They are our defaults like water running over a rock. It will always find the well-worn path. Change is hard, not just because of our default paths. What gets in our way more is our inability to be human and trust that there is a different way to be wrong.

Not having the right way to not know the answer to the question, being curious, and sitting in the unknown is downright terrifying for many of us.

It's also why we know a lot about how to change. We just don't make any of the changes because being superhuman is familiar and therefore comfortable—not to mention all the accolades we receive for accomplishing things; it is freaking exhilarating. We crave less hustling and less pushing. We read and learn as much as we can about accepting ourselves and embracing our imperfections.

And then our Monger steps in to say; you'll never be able to do those things. She convinces us that doing more accomplishing more and staying far away from those feelings will be best. And our BFF supports her, and she jumps in to say, you're fine. No need to change. You're doing great. We already know this stuff. The BFF is that petulant teenager attempting to protect us by telling us we can stop listening to everyone.

 As I said on our first day of Spiral 2, notice how the BFF's petulant child's voice shows up as you are listening. 

 So to summarize, we're tired of living with so much rigidity. We attempt to make a change. Our Monger belittles us for not hustling and wasting time. Despite our Monger, we make some feeble attempt at being kind to ourselves, and then our BFF steps in to tell us we're fine. And we don't need to change, rinse and repeat. 

We went to live in a space where we were open to being human, where kindness and compassion are at the top. We're drawn to that way of thinking, yet practicing it daily is hard.

We are also the first to tell our loved ones and friends all that we've learned by reading psychology. We will advise them that they should set a boundary, speak in need or be kind to themselves.

We really believe this stuff. And yet it's there's a giant hard boundary in our heads saying, Nope, that works for everyone else. But for you, you have high expectations. You need to be superhuman. You are different, but I'm here to tell you. You can't bend the time-space continuum. You can't be all things to all people.

You can't do everything on your to-do list. You can't keep plugging along. Single-mindedly towards a goal, you might not even want anymore. It will wear on you physically, mentally, and emotionally because here's the fact you are a human being. We have to honor this disconnect.

We have to notice the difference between what we know and what we live. This is why I love the idea of self-loyalty.

Self-loyalty is the ultimate act of being human. It's not turning our back on ourselves. We know how to be loyal to family and friends. We accept their flaws. In fact, we will bend ourselves like Gumby to make up for their flaws, but for ourselves, hell no.

Being human is something we strive to overcome. Maybe that's why we struggle so much; stepping into the unknown of being kind, honoring ourselves, and practicing self loyalty are messy and imperfect. And the one thing we hate is messy and imperfect. 

Ok I will see you in 2 days for week 2 of beliefs.