“If you’re gonna make it up, make it good."
A friend used to tell me that…often! I used to have pretty low expectations. I had big dreams, don’t get me wrong. But for reasons I detail in my memoir, I didn’t really expect the dreams to come true. Until several moments big and small added up to an incredible transformation. Now my dreams are bigger and the expectations are of equal size.
What are you expecting to happen in your life? What are others telling you to expect? Research has shown time and again (search for the Pygmalion effect, or Rosenthal effect to get the start of it) that:
What others expect of us, shapes our performance and our sense of self (our esteem and efficacy)
What we expect shapes (with exception of course), what we get.
This was shown in the classroom (Rosenthal & Jacobson, 1968) and in the workplace (Bezuijen & van den Berg, 2009). It’s also been demonstrated between parents and children, and between peers/friends. And within yourself.
What you think about yourself, your self-talk, affects your sense of self. It affects what you believe you are capable of and what you believe you are worth out of life and those around you. It becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
I know that I “self-talked” my way into being overweight because I believed what others said about me. Only years later, when I could truly look clearly at pictures, did I realize that I wasn’t “fat” until I yo-yo dieted my way into being overweight.
I “self-talked” my way out of pursuing health sciences for a long time because I was told I wasn’t good at math and science and should stick to the arts. And I believed it.
I was told to not want wealth or talk about money, and so I didn’t. I dreamed of the options and stress relief it would provide, but I didn’t dare voice the desire or try to strive for it because I allowed others to make me feel like that was not a goal I was worthy of.
For a long time, I stopped expecting good things to happen because essentially, I was told to. And it was easy to believe what those in authority said. And I created a world to cocoon in based on this self-fulfilling prophecy.
And you know what happened? I was MISERABLE. I was burnt out, physically and mentally depleted. I felt completely stuck and didn’t know how to change. Thankfully some small kernel of resistance and self-belief was left inside me. And the right people nourished it enough to let it grow and take over. Like a plant that finally wins against the weeds. I guess we’re going with a gardening analogy.
What have you been told to expect and hope for? How have you been trapping yourself?
My business coach said something to the effect of, and I’m paraphrasing here, average people live the life they’ve learned. The wealthy live the life they’ve dreamed.
While he was talking about financial wealth, I believe this can apply to any type of wealth, including time.
There’s a popular hashtag: #LifeByDesignNotByDefault. And I absolutely love that. It encapsulates my life “before and after” and the before and after I help my clients achieve.
My question to you is, are you living by default? If you’re like most people. If you’ve been stuck in average mode, then the answer is yes. That’s ok. It means you’re aware and likely ready to make a change. Realizing this shows you are hungry for something better.
If so, let’s have a chat about what living by design would look like for you, and how we can get you there.
“Treat a man as he is and he will remain as he is. Treat a man as he can and should be and he will become as he can and should be.” ― Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change
References
Bezuijen, X. M., van den Berg, P. T., van Dam, K., & Thierry, H. (2009). Pygmalion and Employee Learning: The Role of Leader Behaviors. Journal of Management, 35(5), 1248–1267. https://doi.org/10.1177/0149206308329966
Rosenthal, R., & Jacobson, L. (1968). Pygmalion in the classroom. The Urban Review, 3(1), 16–20. https://doi.org/10.1007/bf02322211
