Have you heard of this one? Researchers did a study in which they had children solve increasingly harder puzzles. Some of the children were told in between puzzles “you’re so smart”, while others were praised for effort, not intelligence, and then all of the children were given the choice of a next puzzle to solve: easy or hard.
Guess which group of children didn’t pick the hard puzzle?
Yep – the group that was praised with “smart”.
Weird?
Here’s the thing – if you’re told that you’re smart, and then you’re given something slightly hard to do, then what happens if you can’t actually finish it?
You’d no longer be smart.
What happens if no one loves us?
And who wants to lose that approval? Especially if it came from our parents?
Whether consciously or not, explicitly or not, our parents poured all of their hopes, dreams, and aspirations for us into our little, sponge-like minds, and they tried to encourage us by saying things like:
“you’re so smart. Very good! What a good boy you are!”
They were doing what was right – praising us! What could be wrong with that?
But what happens when we aren’t so “good”? What happens when we aren’t “smart”(aka can’t finish a hard task)?
What happens then to the love we so desperately needed from our parents?
We are so wired for social approval, and especially for that approval from parents and authority figures – that we would rather do nothing than risk losing that approval.
Erin, why are you talking about childhood in a blog for women who want to go after their dreams?
Because it has huge implications for us as adults.
Think you’re past that need for approval? I’m not. I have to regularly counteract the messages I was given in childhood in order to propel myself forward. (P.S. Mom and Dad I love you!!!!!)
And I’m betting you have a few of those tucked away in there, too….
What will they think?
For instance, how many decisions do we make in life based on “What will other people think if I don”t…” or “What will other people think if I do this?” (Even if it’s not entirely conscious.)
We hold ourselves back from claiming our truth, speaking our heart’s message, and going forward because of all of those messages left over from childhood.
We would rather take absolutely no action on behalf of our big dreams than lose that approval.
We are so scared of losing that love and approval that we’ll stay in jobs we don’t love, in houses that we can’t afford, and keep friends who no longer give us what we need.
What does that mean?
But let me be the one (of hopefully many!) to give you that permission, to really sink deep into no longer needing anyone else’s approval in order to follow your calling.
Because really, we don’t need anyone else’s permission to put our hearts out there, to claim what we really love to do.
And I know how hard it is to get into that headspace. But there are ways to do it. One of which is by journaling around one of my favorite questions: where am I out of integrity with myself?
No more “should”:
However you do it, it’s time, my friends – time to break free of what everyone else has told you you “should” be doing.
If the apocalypse is coming, I know I want to be able to say that I lived life to the absolute fullest, that I walked out and found the confidence to do what I love.
I know you can, too. And I’ll be right here with you.
In two weeks, I’m rolling out an amazing, awesome system that’s going to build that confidence with you, using the same techniques that I used to create my own dream career as a successful life coach and author. If you want to know more, just send me a message.
(And if you’re interested,here’s an article on better ways to praise kids.)
