Monday, December 1, 2008

Where’d You Learn That?

Glenn is one of those guys who is just fun to be with. I feel special when I am with him. He’s a New Yorker with a flair for good food and a good joke. And, he’s a great skier. He’s also a developer and coach. We were talking the other day.

He says to me, “Just ‘Name the Shame’… You know… the part of you that you think is broken.” Sounds simple.

“I have this sense that I am too self-centered. “

“Oh really? Where’d you learn that?”

Well, that stopped me in my tracks. What a great question! “Where’d you learn that?”

Just try it! Think of something bothersome that you believe about yourself. And then, ponder on where you learned that belief. Because, guess what? It’s probably FALSE. Or at the very least, it’s based on some old paradigm, some old identity, some old stuff. When I look at my old tapes, one of the things I see is times that “taking care of me” landed in my universe as “you’re being self-centered” and worse yet, “you don’t love well.” As I re-frame that today, I can see that taking care of me is what empowers me to fully love others.

When I get hold of where I learned a false belief, I can put it into proper perspective and then choose a new belief. And, I learned that from Glenn.