How to Stay Committed to Your Own Growth, Part 1

For my client Chloe, deciding to become the best version of herself was one thing. It was quite another thing for her to keep following through with that decision.

The more she explored her emotional history—growing up as the child of divorced parents, having a tumultuous relationship with her mom—the harder it became to cope with her inner resistance to change.

A few months into our work together, she arrived at a session in tears. “This isn’t helping at all,” she told me. “I feel way worse than when I started therapy. I’m having more self-hating thoughts than I’ve ever had!”

The Inner Resistance to Change

What Chloe was going through is something a lot of us experience when we’re on the cusp of making major shifts in our lives: The closer we come to changing our stories, the more we tend to struggle against that change. 

Why does this happen? It all goes back to our negative mind, or the ego, which is rooted in our neurologically-driven survival instinct.

Since it’s doing its best to keep us alive, the negative mind is constantly assessing danger, always searching for the idea or emotion that will put us in an anxious state.

From the negative mind’s perspective, being calm or happy doesn’t help us stay alive. If we’re relaxed and at peace, we might not notice the tiger creeping up behind us.

According to the negative mind, it’s safer to be in the known (even if we’re miserable there) than to venture into the unknown.

This is why the negative mind often interprets major transformations in our lives as a threat to survival—even if those transformations are positive. 

In other words, the negative mind is the source of the resistance we experience when we’re on the verge of big changes.

Lowering the volume on the negative mind

Given what we know about the negative mind, what can we do to lower the volume when we’re trying to change our lives?

The first step is to recognize that the voice of the negative mind is a natural part of being human (practicing meditation and/or alternatives to meditation can be a huge help here). 

This is what Chloe learned to do. Over time, as she learned to observe those moments when her negative mind was doing the talking, her vision for her life started to expand.

Why was this process of observation so important? And how did it help her turn down the volume on the negative mind?

By bringing awareness to the fact that her negative mind was rooted in her survival instinct, Chloe could see that it wasn’t always telling her the truth about herself and her future.

When she understood that her negative mind was there to protect her, but that it wasn’t always aligned with her goals, it became easier for her to identify it. Identifying that voice didn’t make it go away, but it lowered the volume and kept it from constantly overpowering her thoughts and emotions.

As she learned to lower the volume on the negative mind, she also learned to practice self-love. How? By treating herself with empathy. Instead of judging herself for having negative emotions, she behaved as though she were talking to her five-year-old self, telling herself that it was okay to feel sad, frustrated, or scared. Giving herself permission to experience her feelings as she was having them helped her release them.

On top of these emotional changes, Chloe decided to make some physical ones, too. She started to take better care of her body. She gave up alcohol. Little by little, she cut out junk food. Ultimately, she decided to go vegan. 

Gradually, as she started to feel better emotionally and physically, her head started to clear. After years of trying to figure out what she wanted to do with her life, she finally discovered what she was truly passionate about: marketing and branding. Though she didn’t have much experience, she ultimately found a great job in the marketing department at a thriving start-up. 

Still, her struggles didn’t suddenly go away.

In Part 2 of this post, we’ll look at how Chloe worked through other people’s resistance to the big changes she was making in her life.  

Do you want to learn more about how to sustain the positive changes in your life? In my new book, Life Launch, I give you additional guidance on how to identify—and stick with—your goals and create a roadmap to the life you want. Download a sample chapter here.