You are your stories

​The thing which traps most people is their sense of who they are: their personality. When we talk about our personality, we often feel as though we are describing something objective: our inherent nature, something fixed. However, as philosophers and psychologists have been telling us for a  century, our personality is little more than a made-up story. It seems real because we keep repeating the it. Nonetheless its consequences are very real. They become our life.

The story you tell yourself becomes the story of your life. It becomes your fate, how your life turns out. Our stories can be self-invented prisons which limit, trap, or even torture us. “I’m too weak to make life work.” “If I feel afraid of something, that means I'm incapable of doing it.” “If my attempt fails, I'm a failure.” "I need to feel good before I can take action." "I'm either wonderful or terrible." "If I assert my boundaries then I'm being selfish." "If I invest in this opportunity, I will lose all my money and become homeless." "The shiny appearance of these people is real whereas I'm a talentless imposter." "If I'm self-effacing then people will be kind or at least not hassle me." "I should always play it safe and not aim higher or I will crash."
 
As a therapist I’ve spent years going deep with people into their mental life, examining their stories and changing them. Often all it takes to shatter the grip of a bad story is daylight: looking at it, seeing it. A person sees a belief they’ve held for a long time and which, now that they see it, they don't want. And so they let go of it; their reaction is so strong they stop actively repeating it. We sleep-walk through much of our life, living unconsciously, and when we actually pay attention that can create profound change. Of course if the old pattern is stubborn then we may need to practice, making a sustained effort not to repeat the story, and to tell a different story in its place. We will need to do this over and over, like somebody who goes to the gym, or somebody learning a musical instrument. This way we create a new self. The work can be slow, steady, and incremental, but it can also be exponential, a kind of positive upward spiral that feeds on its own energy. 

The fact you have invented and sustained your story, that it is something which you do, means you can start telling a different one. A better one. And you can tell it to others (who interpret you according to your cues - the ways your story shows itself). Your new story will not be arbitrary, if you tell it so often and so deeply enough that you start to act it out and become it. It will be no more arbitrary than the old one which you’ve been repeating and acting out for decades. It can become your new reality, “who you are.”
 
The consequences of our stories are real. But consequences can be good and bad. If you stop telling yourself bad stories, things will improve. Bad feelings and thoughts and behaviours will dissolve. You will stop damaging your relationships. You will stop creating negativity. But that simply brings you back to zero. What about telling the best story you can, so you create the best life you can? "Life is full of opportunities if I keep my eyes open." "The world may be cruel, but it is also kind and abundant." "I have the ability to really change." "There is something to be deeply grateful for, right here, right now." "Life is good for those who see it." "Fortune favours the brave." "I have such and such strengths." These are stories which turn you into somebody who sees opportunities, who takes leaps, who is energised with courage, who feels joy, who possesses gratitude, who feels their strength, who experiences and faces the world as an opportunity to be stepped into with all that best in them. This can be your story. If you want it.