My experience was very different. My father was a lawyer. Many of my friends' parents were lawyers or doctors or "business people." Until I was in high school, I didn't know that not everyone went to college. It was a given that I would go to college - I thought it was a given for everyone else too. I knew - with a certainty that I didn't realize was somewhat rare in the world - that I could become a lawyer. Or a doctor. Or go to business school and do whatever it is that "business people" do (it was never obvious to me as a kid). I went to college and was pre-Med for two years until I realized that I hate hospitals and couldn't stand the higher level science classes I needed to take. It was a big crisis for me. I couldn't be a doctor. I didn't want to be a lawyer. I didn't know what I would do with an MBA. I didn't really see a lot of other choices.
I ended up going to New York and working in the entertainment industry (television commercial production mostly). But after a couple years of struggling in entry level jobs and feeling like I wasn't getting anywhere, I went to law school. Plan B.
It was easy to see myself as a lawyer or doctor. I had so many varied pictures of lawyers and doctors that it was easy to match them to my picture of myself. It was a path for which I had a good road map. I couldn't see myself as a film producer - which is what I really wanted to do at the time. I was scared that I didn't have what it takes to be successful in that business. For me, following that dream meant going without a map and at the time I didn't have the courage to do that.
Now I find myself in a similar predicament to the one I found myself in sophomore year of college. I don't want to be a lawyer anymore. I don't want to be a doctor. I don't really want to be a film producer anymore - it's kind of a thankless job and now that I'm a mom to a pre-teen, I have enough of that. (Although I still have a fantasy about winning an Oscar for Best Picture . . .).
My new dream is to be a healer. I don't really know what a healer looks like and I sure don't have a map for that particular path. I have a picture in my mind of what a healer acts like which is based mostly on assumptions rather than observation of reality. Whenever I don't behave in ways that are congruent with that picture, it makes me question whether I am capable of becoming a healer.
For example, this morning I totally over-reacted when my older daughter got pissy and obnoxious in the way that only 12-year-old girls can. I was over tired. I was anxious and feeling guilty because we were running late - again. I'm going through nicotine and anti-depressant withdrawal. She hurt my feelings. So I blew up. And yelled at her for way too long. And then she yelled at me. And we cried. And she refused to eat breakfast. So I said "You're not going to school until you eat breakfast." She called my bluff. "Fine. Take Meredith to school. I'll stay home." And I yelled at her again.
That is definitely NOT how a healer acts, right? A true healer gets all Zen and stuff. A real healer stays calm and says "Abby, I appreciate that you are exerting your independence but if I wasn't so Zen and stuff, you would have hurt my feelings. Please be nicer next time." Or something like that. A real healer would get enough sleep and would wake up on time with a smile on her face and a spring in her step. No bags under her eyes. No going on Facebook to tend to her farm before she makes breakfast for her kids. A true healer never loses her cool. Right?
Just like doctors and lawyers, I imagine that healers come in all shapes, sizes and degrees of mental stability. I think I need to stop looking for a road map outside of myself and make my own path. I need to look in the mirror and remind myself that I'm looking at a healer. Visualization is a strong tool for achieving dreams but only if it's used in the right way. Until now, my mental pictures have limited me in ways I didn't realize.
In what ways do you let your mental pictures limit you?
