Want to know how to get what you want in life? The secret is surprisingly simple, but also surprisingly difficult. The answer is… commit to taking action until you get it! There we go. End of blog.

The messaging that if we just want something hard enough and deeply enough then it will happen seems to be quite prevalent. This is certainly the first step towards getting what you want. You have to want it first (duh). But that’s not enough on its own. I very much want to lose 10 pounds. I deeply, deeply want that. Sometimes I feel miserable that I’m not 10 pounds lighter. When I try on a cute top and it doesn’t look so cute on me, I feel quite despairing that I’m not 10 pounds lighter. So with all this wanting and desire, why hasn’t it happened??

Wouldn’t life be so much easier if people would just think, feel, and behave in the way we want them to? Deep down, we know that we can’t make other people act in certain ways, but that doesn’t stop us from trying. We think that if we just try harder or find the right way to explain why our way is better, then they will change. But how often does this really work?

The word “authenticity” is used and overused today, but it is profoundly meaningful. Living authentically means staying true to yourself and making choices that align with your values, desires, and interests. This sounds like it would be easy, but it’s surprisingly difficult to do. It requires courage to deviate from the path expected of you by others and sometimes by society as a whole.

So far in this journey, we have focused on discovering ourselves and accepting ourselves. The next step is to develop ourselves. Carl Rogers, among others, said that it is only when we accept ourselves that we can change ourselves. Accepting ourselves isn’t about giving ourselves permission to be the worst version of ourselves. It’s about creating awareness, learning from experiences, and using those learnings to change and grow.

Hello friends. Last time I talked about discovering ourselves for ourselves and not relying on the opinions of others to shape our self-perception. The process of discovery means that we become more aware of both our positive and negative traits. This can be difficult at times – as we become more aware of our faults and flaws we might feel the need negate it, resist it, or to beat ourselves up and shame ourselves into changing. We do this to try to protect our self-image but it’s not helpful and not productive. Once we’ve created awareness, the next step is to accept ourselves for who we are, good and bad, light and shadow.

“Tell me about yourself.” You’d think that would be easy for someone to do. How could you not know yourself and who you are? But for so many years, I had no idea. I had plenty of messages from others about who I was, some good and some bad. The ones I internalized were mostly along the lines of not being good enough, not fitting in, not being wanted. So it’s not surprising that I didn’t know who I was.