After a decade of coaching ambitious leaders, one of the greatest challenges I see show up again and again is the ability as humans to be masterful at story telling and how quickly it can take us off our game. By story telling – I mean the ability to take the simple facts of something that happens in our life and masterfully, quickly crafting a story about what happened that often creates unnecessary suffering, drama and keeps us at a distance from what we truly want.

Let me give you a simple example from my life….
I emailed a woman after a speaking event to schedule a followup meeting. I didn’t receive a response. I began telling a story began in my head that she didn’t like the workshop, had no interest in getting together, and on and on. When in reality – the facts were – I sent an email and had no response – yet.

I decided a week later to send her another email – to stand in confidence that the workshop was a success and that she was a very busy woman. I had a reply back, she loved the workshop and we scheduled a coffee date.

So, what can we DO about this?

Here are 4 Simple Steps to Rebound from Negative Thinking

Identify the root: When you find yourself in very familiar thought spirals that leave you defeated and feeling less than – it likely comes from a root story that you began telling yourself a long time ago – and have built so much evidence around that it has become your truth. This is a great area to ask for support because they can often be blind spots.

Tune in Regularly: Examine the thinking you are allowing to hang out in your mind. Is it dragging you down or propelling you forward? Clean it up to be sure your thinking environment is a place that supports the things you DO want in your life. For example, if you want to forward your role in your job, but all day perpetuate thoughts of not feeling good enough, not being able to contribute, not having the talents that others have – how is that going to make you feel? How is that going to impact your actions? Write your thoughts out. Call out any untruth in your thinking.

Check Your Story: Is there a story you have crafted around something that happened in your life? Is what you are telling yourself even tru? Ask yourself – What are the facts? What meaning have I added?

Align your focus: Let any negative thinking be contrast for what you DO want. The negative thoughts point to what you don’t want. Let the clarity of what you don’t want point you to what you DO want. Then, ask yourself what thinking and actions align with your desires. Practice matching your thinking and actions to move you towards what you want more of in your life.

When we’re willing to take responsibility for the narratives that are running in the mind, we harness inner power to really make profound change in our lives.

If this feels daunting or you have some narratives that feel deep rooted and just won’t go away – this is EXACTLY what I help people with. If you want to learn more, set up a call with me. Let’s talk.

Tune into the podcast episode #37 for more.