In November of 2021 I wrote a blog post about the power of relationships. I shared my lifelong observations that everything in the world comes down to relationships. I shared my belief that strong, powerful, loving relationships with others are built on the foundation of a strong, powerful, loving relationship with yourself.
Let’s revisit that foundational piece today. I see a lot of people blaming their lack of personal agency on their boss, workplace, spouse, partner, family, living situation, or “the system” in general. It’s easy to do when almost everyone you see on television, in the news, on social media, or anywhere else is doing the same thing. You can break the cycle. Join the growing movement of people who are reclaiming the power they’ve previously given to others and circumstances. Is your relationship with your boss, partner, parent, child, or “the system” really keeping you from being yourself, doing the thing your soul really wants to do, or discovering what your soul really wants in the first place? No. YOU are. Or rather, your conditioned beliefs and perceptions are. If you don’t think you can be happy until your partner has a personality transplant, until you have a different job, until you have more money, or until you live by the ocean, guess what: you may not be happy even if those things do happen. You’ll just take your current beliefs, perceptions, doubts, and fears into that new situation and it won’t be any better. Don't despair! The beautiful thing about you being the “problem” (which is a misnomer, because this isn’t a problem but rather a stage of growth and evolution) is that you are also the solution.
Nothing and no one outside of you needs to change for your experience of life to change.
YOU don’t even need to change. Change isn’t about becoming someone else. It’s about becoming more of who you already are.
What needs to change is how you relate to yourself. How you see yourself. What you believe and perceive about yourself.
When you regularly cultivate a strong, powerful, loving relationship with yourself, you can allow your true self to emerge and take the wheel.
You can feel secure and confident in who you are.
You can connect with your body, brain, and emotions.
You can regulate your nervous system.
You can consciously access your own inner power no matter what circumstances you face.
You can create your experience of life in each moment.
You can also allow others to be who they are without feeling the need to change them, control them, or bring them around to your way of thinking and being.
You can allow them to have their own challenging or fulfilling outcomes and relationships with others without feeling the need to fix or solve anything.
You can allow them to do or not do “the work” you used to believe they needed to do. (You will never be able to make someone else “do the work.” If you want to or think you can, you have your own work to do.)
You doing your own work DOES have a ripple effect. It DOES impact the people around you, even if it’s not obvious at first or ever. But don’t do it for that reason. However well-intentioned, that still comes from a desire to control.
Do it for YOU, first and foremost.
Trust that no matter what anyone else chooses to say or do, the world will be better off with YOU loving yourself. With YOU owning how powerful, unique, and awesome you are. With YOU focusing on YOU and staying out of everyone else’s business.
You can still build relationships and care about other people.
In fact, when you are resourced and grounded in yourself, you can care more freely and deeply about other people because you’re not distracted by trying to define yourself in relation to them.
You can also see more clearly when a relationship is unhealthy and out of alignment, and you can choose courageously how to proceed.
All this capacity stems from a deep foundation of self-love, self-worth, and self-trust, and from your willingness to take personal responsibility for your thoughts, feelings, and actions.
If you want something in your life to change, the first thing that really needs to change is your belief that there’s something “wrong” to begin with, that there’s nothing you can do, and that you have no choice.
You are exactly where you need to be for the unfolding of your most powerful path.
If you’re waiting for a relationship to change or for your circumstances to change before you take a step, write the thing, do the thing, choose to be happy, or just plain choose to be, stop waiting. Do it now.
No excuses.
The circumstances will never be “perfect” by any external measure. But they are perfect for you right now to step into the power of your personal agency.