Are Your Thoughts Serving You?

I read a daily devotional every morning. There is a new reading every day for the entire year. You don’t realize how fast the year has gone by until you open it up and notice the page corner folded over is closer to the end of the book than the beginning. As I read the following passage today, “And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns.” Philippians 1:6 and reflecting on the previous 10 months I thought about how much growth there has been. My personal growth as well as my family’s. It made me slightly emotional thinking about my oldest being closer to 5 and in pre-k and my youngest being potty trained and closer to 3 than the little nugget that used to nuzzle her head into my neck as an infant. Time does go by in a flash. The tricky thing about looking back is that there isn’t anything you can change—and spend too much time in your memories and you forget to notice the joy right in front of you. You can appreciate the past acknowledging that it got you to this moment, then use those moments to anchor your present and make plans for your future self.

I recently listened to a podcast and Dr. Benjamin Hardy was interviewed discussing the concept that 10x is easier than 2x, which is also the title of the book he cowrote with Dan Sullivan. There was a multitude of takeaways for me, but one that stood out was questioning if a feeling or belief serves you. For example, as a mom, I think “mom guilt” is a very real feeling. We want to meet our friends for dinner, but also want to spend time with our family. We work, but that might mean missing an activity. We want to spend time with our significant other, but there is laundry to do. That back and forth can be draining. However, as I listened to this guy talk, he said in those times as parents or adulthood in general, ask yourself one question. Does this thought or feeling serve me? And if it doesn’t, how can you change the framing of the thought so that it does? Recognize your feelings and then change your perspective to get you out of that negative place. The host of the podcast, Ed Mylett, gave an analogy. A golfer misses a putt. Instead of the golfer beating himself up about missing it, what if he trained his brain to think, “I missed a putt. That isn’t like me. I don’t miss putts like that.” Or, if you lose your patience with your kids and end up yelling at them. Instead of feeling guilt or shame about losing your cool, what if you told yourself, “These thoughts don’t serve me. I don’t yell at my kids, that isn’t like me.” Then you move on from those moments and learn from them. That way, when the next big putt or frustrating parenting moment comes, your go-to reaction and thought isn’t nerves about missing or yelling out of lost patience, but calm and collected regulated emotions because you’ve trained yourself to think in a more positive way.

To grow and have a future self we are proud of; we can’t stay stuck in these negative thought spirals about ourselves. We can’t live in the past and we can’t always be thinking about the future. With just over two months left in 2023, what can you do to get out of your own way? How can you become the best version of you there has ever been? When the ball drops on New Year's Eve, how will we wake up ready to embrace 2024? I think the best way to start building a more positive outlook on our lives is to start writing in a gratitude journal. I’ve always been a big believer in writing down what we are grateful for. But lately, I’ve changed how I do it. Instead of a whole journal entry—I know, I know, we are busy people, who's got time for that? I started doing a bulleted list before bed. I’ve been reading You Are a Badass by Jen Sincero. She suggests before bed each night that you should write down 10 things to be grateful for. This helps shift your perspective into one of gratitude. To have a positive mindset think of your blessings right before you drift off to sleep. I know it might sound like just one more thing to add to your nightly routine, and if that routine involves kids' bedtime, I hear you. But give it one week and see if it makes a difference in the way you feel. Let me know what changes, if any, it makes to your daily outlook. I’ll leave you with this quote from the book. “What you choose to focus on becomes your reality.” What are you choosing to focus on? Are the thoughts surrounding what you are focused on serving you?

Enjoy your weekend and as always, happy reading!