Change the Story

You cannot change the events of your history, but you can choose to change the story you have attached to those events.

We become the stories we tell ourselves. And if that narrative is negative, we become our own self-fulfilling prophecy – repeating patterns and habits that don’t serve us.

Perhaps you felt abandoned as a child, perhaps you felt rejected or unwanted, perhaps you have had an experience of being betrayed – has that become a part of your story – and consequently a part of your identity?

Do you make self-proclamations that go something like “I am <THIS>”. Beware that these statements don’t allow much space for anything else. The proclamation becomes you regardless if it’s true of your present day self. It is important to remember that you are not your past – unless you choose to let the past into your now. Every day we make a choice to be the person we want to be. We choose the version of our history that we want to identify with, we choose the words that make up who we are.

Do the stories and labels you’ve become attached to serve you? If it doesn’t, you may want to think about rewriting it.

Looking back at my first love relationship with a man – the one with my father, I realize that I became attached to a story that he abandoned me and was never available. The relationships I had later on in my life only reinforced this story.

And so with any new person who entered my life, my fear of abandonment caused me to implement defense mechanisms – in an attempt to brace myself or avoid what I thought was inevitable from happening.

Believing this story only created anxiety for my present and future. The story was not serving me, and limiting myself to continue repeating unhealthy patterns of behavior and attraction. If you want to change the outcome you have to change the strategy, and I have learned that I must change my perspective first and foremost.

I am rewriting the stories I have attached to my past. I am revisiting those stories and instead of recalling the bad memories, I’m rediscovering the good. I have replaced the negative narrative with a positive one and looking for the moments and examples that support that new perspective.

Whatever you are looking for, you will find. Don’t allow the dark parts of your past limit your future. When you change the story you will change the outcome.