I had to bring some tough love to one of my clients recently.
She’s brilliant, admired, deeply capable, and the kind of woman who could honestly mentor half the room.
And yet she could take a really productive day and decide that she should have done MORE.
If she walked for 60 minutes outside, she should have walked for 65 minutes instead.
If she handled 10 things, her brain would find the 11th thing she should have done!
If she had a beautiful day, her brain would still scan for where she fell short.
So I said to her…
“You will never win a day if you keep doing this.”
No matter how much she did, it was never ENOUGH. She couldn’t let herself win.
And then I said the bigger truth…
“If you don’t start to like yourself, you’re not going to get where you want to go.”
And I reminded her WHY she chose to work with me. And it wasn’t so she could spend the rest of her life criticizing herself into being better.
She hired me because she wants an amazing life.
That is why women come to me.
They want to feel good in their bodies. They want to feel free. They want to love their people, feel vibrant, strong, and enjoy life.
And you cannot build that life through self criticism.
This is the part so many smart, high functioning women miss.
They think the criticism is HELPING.
They think if they are hard enough on themselves, they will finally stay consistent.
But it does the opposite.
It drains you. It makes every day feel like a failure, even when you are doing so many things right.
And this woman saw it.
The next week, she came to our call and the supportive way she was speaking about herself gave me goosebumps, I almost cried.
She was DIFFERENT.
She could finally see that the criticism she thought was pushing her forward was actually holding her back.
That is MENTAL progress.
We talk so much about physical progress. The weight, the workouts, the steps, the strength, the body goals.
But for real transformation the mind (and brain) need to be on board too.
Sonja
