I used to work in Corporate America and while there were certainly times that I was excited to get up in the morning, there were a lot more times that I thought, “There has got to be something more that I was meant to do.”
I had a good job working for a good company for a relatively good salary and great benefits. I had what looked like a really great life. Great home, great husband, great dogs, great church family. It wasn’t always the case, but at this time in my life, I should have been so happy. I really had nothing to complain about.
So why did I feel so stinking miserable so much of the time?
Turns out I had every reason to be miserable. The problem was that every reason pointed back to me. Who knew I was the problem?
Well, to be a bit more precise, who knew my brain was the problem? I sure didn’t know at the time that I was creating my miserable experience. My brain was offering me problems on a nice big platter — an all you can eat buffet actually — and I was gorging myself on negative thinking, victim mentality, scarcity mindset.
The good news is that I was only doing this because I didn’t know any better.
The even better news is that I learned how to change all this and I implemented it.
In the process of learning and implementing what I learned, I realized that I am always in complete control.
Now some of you will get riled up about this. You’ll think,
- “But Jill, my situation is different.”
- “You don’t know what I have to deal with.”
- “You don’t know the conditions at my job, at home, at church ….”
- “I don’t control what other people do.”
- “I’m not in charge. I don’t have the authority to change things.”
Some or all of this may seem true, BUT I still say that you are always in complete control. And as long as you resist recognizing this, you will give your control away to the world. Which is exactly why you feel so out of control.
- What would you do if you did have control?
- What can you do?
- What do you have control of?
- What do you want most in this situation?
- What is one thing that you CAN do that would move you closer to what you want?
Our brains resist hard things. That’s the way our brains are designed.
But if you can step outside the impossible for just a minute and dream that anything is possible — in your life and in this situation — what options would appear right before your very eyes?
Here’s what I want you do.
Take a few minutes – 5 or 10 or 20 minutes — and design the ideal situation for you. Write down every minute detail. Then for every single detail, write down at least two things that you currently have control of regarding that detail and write down one thing that you currently don’t have control over, but you have a choice in.
Here’s an example: I hate where I work because the commute is terrible and I hate spending so much time on the road that I could be spending with my kids or working on my business or [fill in the blank].
What are two things that I have control of?
(1) My commute:
- I can choose to get a different job
- I can choose to move closer to my job
- I can make myself so valuable to them that they would do anything to keep me, maybe even agreeing to let me work remotely or flexible hours or some other arrangement that would make my commute more tolerable
(2) I hate spending so much time on the road:
- I can change my commute by doing one of the options above
- I can change what I think about my commute
- I can stop hating the commute
What don’t I have control over? Let’s say I don’t have control over the commute (even though we just proved that I actually do) — but I do have a choice to hate it or I do have a choice to make the best of it, even make it valuable.
There are some of you that are still resisting this. So I want to point something out to you. When you are totally powerless in a situation, there is very little hope in changing that situation. Therefore there is very little hope that you can stop being miserable. When you don’t resist these options, when you’re willing to be open to the possibilities, you risk possibly proving yourself wrong, which also doesn’t feel good. BUT … you become empowered in the situation and you have a lot of hope that you can actually change the situation to become less miserable or even become not miserable at all. Heck, there is even the possibility that you could be happy in your situation.
I know this may seem a little annoying right now, but if you are willing to be open and consider the possibilities, you may come to see that you have more control than you were willing to give yourself credit for. AND you may come to see a lot more options than you saw before.
And both of those things are very exciting.
If you’re still resistant, I welcome the opportunity to talk through your situation to help you find the parts that you have control over and identify the things you want to start trying to see if you can find relief from whatever it is you’re currently struggling with.
Just book a free coaching session where we can talk through some steps that you can take to gain more clarity and to see your options.
https://jillwrightcoaching.com/
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