The Cost of Not Giving Up the Beliefs that Hold You Back

The following is adapted from Get It.

Sue couldn’t believe her ears. Not only was her three-year-old screaming at the top of his lungs in the middle of the store aisle, but Sue’s mother was criticizing her for her lack of parenting skills. “I never let you kids behave like this,” were the final words Sue heard as she picked her son’s body off the floor. 

Hours later, Sue was sharing her day with her husband as they prepped dinner. “A part of me was so embarrassed and scared,” she told him. “I have this story in my head that I’m a terrible mother. That everyone in the store thinks I’m this terrible mother. My own mother thinks I’m a terrible mother.”

“Well, that story sucks,” he said, reaching over to kiss her on the forehead. “And it’s not even true. First, and most importantly, your mother doesn’t think you’re a terrible mother. It sounds like you were amazingly calm. And people in the store were probably recalling a time it happened to them.” 

He was right. Sue had every right to feel stressed in a difficult situation, but the stories she was telling herself were false, and they only made her feel worse. We tell ourselves stories all the time—about the things we can do, about what we’re like, about what others think of us. Most of the time, those beliefs are entirely in our heads. 

Do you want to learn how to change the internal conversations holding you back? Challenging your limiting beliefs and dropping the stories that do not serve you well will be wildly powerful in expanding your possibility and getting the life you so very much want. 

Much of Life is Make-Believe

In order to do this heavy lifting with your own internal dialogues and debates, you need to consider that much of life is make-believe. What you believe is just a story you tell yourself. Stories that self-sabotage or reinforce your own sense of worthlessness are hard to rewrite, but they can absolutely be fully edited. 

What narrative are you scripting? What false assumptions might you be making? What whoppers might you be telling yourself? The thoughts you have rumbling around in your head from prior experiences might be biased notions you hang on to with a ferocious grip to justify your stance and tactics, or they could be legitimate stories that helped you once successfully navigate the choppy seas of your life. 

If your internal stories are so stinky they cause you to struggle with honoring, accepting and fulfilling your own wants, take a moment to answer the following questions. 

• What do I believe? 
• Who or where did I get these beliefs from? Were these healthy and supportive sources at the time? Are they healthy and supportive sources now?
• Which of my beliefs is affirming and supportive of living the life I desire?
• What stories or negative thoughts might I need to drop? 
• Whom do I need to become, and what do I need to choose to believe about myself now to lead into what I really want? 

Challenge the Roots of Your Beliefs

Challenge the roots of your beliefs and who passed them on to you. You didn’t start making up stuff until someone started passing their stories (also known as their baggage) on to you. Sure, some of the stories they told you were positive and affirming and strengthened your sense of spirit and self-worth.

Cheers and thanks to the mature adults who told you stories like: Your voice matters. You’re worthy of love. You’re super creative. You’re great at solving problems. You are so thoughtful and generous. You will accomplish anything you set your brilliant mind on achieving. I believe in you. 

Other stories you heard may have been intended to tear you down or keep you in your place or were projections of someone else’s own insecurities or bass-ackward thinking.

Unfortunately, you were too young to understand or challenge their limiting, unconstructive beliefs. You’re not smart enough to do whatever you want. Who do you think you are? Money doesn’t grow on trees. You’re lazy. Hard work pays off. Your sister’s the pretty one. If you swallow your gum, it will stay in your stomach for at least seven years.

Really? Really?!

Not every story in your head developed from someone who spoke to you directly. You also picked up stories about how the world works and your role in it from the books you read, from the covers of magazines you looked at, and from watching the actions of others, to name a few sources. You still write stories and carry them around with you when you watch the news, stand in line at the store, or open your eyes and look around.

You’re hardwired for story, and if your limiting stories go unchecked, they can be destructive. 

Take Responsibility for Your Beliefs

I know firsthand just how destructive limiting beliefs can be. Years ago, I found myself lying on the floor, tears silently streaming down my cheeks, my body pulsing from real, vibrant, clean pain.

The life I had built, the decisions I had made, were crumbling to the ground, and my identity was erased in a single solitary request from a man I’d been with for twelve years. Four words tilted my axis: “I want a divorce.”

Fourteen weeks later my husband, our two dogs, our home, our shared possessions, our co-owned business, and our intertwined lives were history. I was living in a new home, sans man and dogs, sans habits and routines, sans security, but with a whole lotta pain and debt. 

I started asking, “How did I get here? Where did this series of events begin?” My inner voice responded, “When you compromised here; when you caved there; when you settled for this and that; when you people-pleased Monday and were too bitchy Friday; when you said yes instead of no; or when you let yourself be a doormat.” 

Some of those things might have been true, but many of them weren’t. That voice was my inner critic. It was the fault-finding voice that was experiencing fear and lack of self-confidence, and it was requesting unattainable perfectionism. 

The first thing I needed to do to get my life back on track was to change my internal dialogue. I needed to hush that inner critic and bolster up my inner champion. 

So that’s what I did. In one of the darkest periods of my life, I leaned into my denial, anger, bargaining, and depression instead of resisting them. I spent an extraordinary amount of time journaling and processing my thoughts and feelings.

I looked at myself in the mirror, raw and naked, and asked, “Who are you, really?” 

I didn’t rush or apologize for my feelings. I didn’t force answers when none were forthcoming. I cried when I wanted to cry, stayed up late eating chocolate when I wanted to self-soothe.

Slowly, I gave up all the limiting beliefs that were holding me back, and I realized that I was a person who deserved to love and be loved. 

You Get What You Are

A coach once told me, “You get what you are.” If you are someone who walks around having conversations in your head about not being worthy of your wants, you’ll do everything to prove yourself right. Undermining, self-sabotaging, and ruining other people’s wants as you simultaneously destroy any chances of getting your own are just a few classic behaviors of “Wanters” who feel worthless. 

Sometimes your own internal struggles prevent you from getting what you want most. But you can change the stories you tell yourself. Remember, irrespective of how a series of events starts, you choose how it transpires. You write the scenes in your life, and you choose how you walk through them. You script the narrative of your wants.

For more advice on overcoming self-limiting beliefs, you can find Get It on Amazon.

AmyK Hutchens is an international award-winning speaker, Amazon bestselling author, and has over nineteen years of experience in training and consulting with clients such as The Home Depot, Starbucks Canada, Comerica Bank, Expedia, Lockheed Martin, Securian Financial, Walmart, John Paul Mitchell Systems, and hundreds more. AmyK travels the globe sharing with executives, influencers, and go-getters how to navigate their toughest conversations. AmyK received her MS from Johns Hopkins University, and has been a featured guest on numerous TV and radio networks including Bloomberg, NBC, Fox, and ABC. She resides in San Diego, California.