08 May What’s Your Story: How Do You Know Where You’re Going?
I love my GPS! Since I have ADHD and sometimes lose my focus, I count on my car’s GPS technology to get me to my destinations successfully. Not like the old days when I would drive in circles like a wanderer in a vast desert looking for an oasis. Either that or I would stop and ask others, usually as lost as me, how to get to where I’m going. Now, I just plug in my destination and a lovely voice guides me on my way!
Maybe you don’t know this but you also have a built-in internal GPS in your brain and it diligently drives you in preset directions based on its past programming. This program is based on your inner beliefs, thoughts, past experiences, and conclusions about life and people.
GPS determines your route based on your current location; where you are coming from is essential for figuring out which way to go. Similarly, your internal GPS guides you according to your present state of mind. In a recent post, I wrote about “The Two Wolves in the Heart:” the “Wolf of Love” and the “Wolf of Anger and Anxiety.” If your “Wolf of Love” is driving then you are coming from a place of stability and your GPS will take you the route of compassion, empathy, assertion, collaboration and mutual respect and safety. When your “Wolf of Anxiety” is behind the wheel, you are coming from a place of fear and it will take you the route of jealousy, selfishness, aggression, control and disrespect. The “Wolf of Love” GPS widens the circle of you and others where meaningful relationships prosper. The “Wolf of Anger” shrinks your life circle, erodes trust and isolates you into an invisible prison of loneliness and misunderstandings.
If you want a strong-reliable GPS guided by your “Wolf of Love” you have to work at it. “The Wolf of Anger and Anxiety” GPS is pre-programmed and needs no work; it is based on survival thinking and has been working for over 400,000,000 years. “GPS” is a Global Positioning System, literally: where are you in the world?? Proper navigation requires constantly monitoring where you are, who is driving, and where you are headed. We must frequently and diligently take stock of our position so we can reroute whenever we veer off course.
To reduce the “Wolf of Anxiety’s” power over you and its control over your route through life, you first need to know how to recognize it. One strategy for becoming more self-aware is the essential foundation for emotional intelligence: begin to listen to the voices of the “Wolf of Anger and Fear.” It is important to listen to your inner monologue without imposing judgment or self-criticism; the change will come once you are able to identify your inner wolves and accept their presence without resistance. Here’s what you might hear if you can fine-tune your listening to your inner wolf voices.
- The Voice of Negativity – “Don’t even try, it won’t work, others don’t really care!
- The Voice of Inadequacy – “Of course, things aren’t working out for you, you aren’t smart enough, and you’re just a loser!”
- The Voice of Mistrust – “Get the other guy before he gets you. Nobody really cares about you or your needs. It’s either you or him!”
These are three typical voices of the “Wolf of Anger and Fear”. There are many others so see what happens when a problem or conflict arises between you and another person. Just notice how quickly you can slip into an Empathic Breakdown and fall into the mouth of the angry and scared wolf.
More to come!
To learn more check out Moss Jackson’s book “Navigating for Success.” Order it online, through email: center11@verizon.net, or by calling 610.642.4873 ext. 23. If you enjoy these posts sign up for more below, and share them with others who may like to read them!