I would say the number one issue I have run into in my coaching career is the feeling of “not good enough”. It seems to be the monster lurking in the depths of all of us, wreaking havoc wherever it can.
I have been reflecting on this a lot and it got me thinking, can it actually be true?
Can every single one of us not be good enough?
We all have it, even if it is a little, but I would bet there is part of you that holds this belief.
It would have me ask the question “If we are all not good enough then what IS good enough?” because without an answer to that question then surely we are all just running a race with no finish line.
For us to be not good enough then there has to be a good enough to reach.
The belief we hold of not good enough implies two myths being true -
There is a destination that you feel you should already be at, you have it in mind that you should be at X but on reflection you are actually at Y. Therefore you must not be good enough. Your mind is consumed with the “end goal” and your life is in the future.
That you need to do MORE. You need to work harder, exercise more, earn more money, look sexier, be someone else, somewhere else with more!
I hear you, I really do. I write this as a bloke who has wrestled with this massively for most of his adult life. You name it, I could tell you why I am not enough in that area.
However, it is all, as always, just something we all create in our heads. It is understandable and there is a lot of evidence and theory psychologically why it happens but the great news is it can be challenged, unpicked and tamed.
If we were to examine the two most common myths above:
The problem with putting your happiness into a place in the future is that you can never live in the future. Your brain buys into the idea and state of “I will be happy when…(insert - job, weight, appearance, wage, relationship or thing in here”. I bet if you have ever done this, when you get the ‘thing’ that it never feels how you think it will. This is because you have told your brain over and over that your happiness is available in the future and you can never actually live in the future, you are always in the present and therefore happiness is never actually available to be accessed.
What if you were already at your destination and by doing more you are actually just hiding it more? What if instead of always thinking about what can I DO, try and think what can I remove from my life that is stopping me from reaching what I want and who can I BE right now? I see people like the statue of David, the statue was always in the block of stone but Michelangelo just needed to remove everything that wasn’t David, for us, we are already good enough, we are everything we need to be, we just need to remove whatever is causing us resistance.
That is the truth of it.
There isn’t a future point where you are enough, stop chasing that idea.
Doing more won’t get you there, slow down and remove.
You are and always have been enough.