Some of us move through life at such speed that we never catch up to ourselves, and then others move without realizing how far they’ve actually come. It’s always easier for someone to gauge the distance we’ve traveled than we can ourselves, we don’t seem to accurately see how far we’ve come. I was sharing with someone this week how incredible it is to see someone’s light come back on, or shine brighter, and most of the time we, as observers, we see that before we do ourselves. When we live our lives day to day it can be difficult to see the growth, or we may judge ourselves for not getting to where we think we should be instead of accepting where we are and knowing that this is a lifelong journey. That’s where checking the odometer helps. Now, we as people don’t really have a reading of the mileage we’ve traveled but we can look back at our lives from a few months ago, or bigger chunks of time in terms of a year or years to see that change or growth, and, if you’re not seeing change or growth and you would like to, it’s a good indicator that some action needs to be done to reach those milestones or destinations.
Before stepping on this path I rarely checked the odometer, and if I did, it was only to beat myself up for not measuring up to my expectations. I wasn’t taking action to better myself or my life and so I didn’t want the reminder of how far I had traveled with no change, or, change for the worst. I lived my life with blinders on, only seeing what I wanted to see as my life became smaller and more isolated and I continued to feel worse about myself. It wasn’t until I found the courage to reach out for help that I started to place positive mile markers in front of me, milestones I could celebrate and be proud of. As I reached each of those it was more obvious of what I had accomplished, but even so, I didn’t see how much I had changed during that time, not as much as the others in my life, but by marking my time of making better decisions and reaching those goals was enough to keep me going, and as I heard from others about what they saw in me, or I noticed a change in how my relationships had grown or how people were responding to me, it became more obvious that more had changed in me than I was giving myself credit for.
It’s important to do a self-check and really look at how far we’ve come. It’s important to celebrate our success and to look at where we might still grow and take further action, and, learn to give ourselves credit where credit is due. When we make a commitment to better ourselves and our lives we allow ourselves to enjoy that success and acknowledge it, also learning to not push it away when someone acknowledges the growth in us. We need to be our own best cheerleaders, along with those around us, but it is us, ourselves, who need to cheer loudest as we continue down our path. We are resilient remarkable people, survivors, warriors and kick-ass SLAYERS, don’t ever forget that, and even if you find yourself in a setback celebrate the wins that have gotten you to where you are, that setback may be there so you can catch your breath as you jump forward to the next dimension. Look at how far you’ve come and be proud that you’ve made it, and made your life your own. SLAY on!
SLAY OF THE DAY: Do you tend to notice the changes in your life or do you not see them within yourself? When others point out the changes in your do you believe them? If not, why not? Do you acknowledge and encourage change in others? How does it make you feel to do so? How do you think it would make you feel to do that for yourself? List one thing that you have worked to change and write down the milestones you can think of over the course of time you’ve worked on it. Don’t get so caught up on where you think you should be without acknowledging where you are and where you’ve been, we’ve all traveled a long road, let’s celebrate the win of getting this far.
S – self L – love A – appreciate Y – you
State Of Slay™ 