Cathy's blog

When I was 13 or 14, I made the unconscious decision, that no matter what happened in my life, I would always make sure that I could take care of myself.

I’d seen my mom, who’s a creative person at heart, who could and should have been an artist, wither away at home. She had conformed herself to the role of housewife, and that just wasn’t her. She didn’t like cooking, she didn’t like cleaning, she didn’t like housewifing. And still, she chose to do just that - grudgingly.

I decided to never ever let that happen to me.

And it didn’t. But it has come at a (health) price at times 🤒

You see, the thing with these *absolute* decisions (I will never ever...) is that sometimes, they have more side effects than wanted results.

Because I wanted to be completely independent and self-sufficient, I’ve done a lot of stupid things: Whenever I got sick, I’d continue to go into work, because I felt I had to – until I crashed completely. I stayed in jobs that were no longer serving and nurturing me, because I I believed that I wasn’t capable of more - and so I just had to soldier on.

I wouldn’t ask for help, for anything. I kept friends at a distance. I would get so perfectionistic about unimportant details, just because I couldn’t risk failing. And then I’d fail...

Because I was just so damn tired 😩

There was nothing wrong with my 14-year-old decision. It’s just that the implementation had some flaws in it.

And I see this often with my clients as well - we tend to confuse the goal, with a specific path to that goal.

We tend to confuse needs with solutions.

I would still never want to be caught in a life that’s not mine - and yet the solutions I put in place made me do a lot of things I didn’t like.

Keep focusing on the goal. And adapt your strategy and actions along the way 😊

The question I need to ask myself regularly is: “What could I do now, that would make me feel better? More autonomous?”

Rather than sticking to: “I have to do everything myself.”

How are you sabotaging yourself with good intentions?