During this season of the year, people like to revisit scary narratives in movies, TV shows and books. When I think of the stories that have frightened me most in life, they were the ones where I was missing a crucial element to make a troubling myth comforting and true.
I’ve mentioned before that I think there are several myths that keep many high achievers from having satisfied lives. These are the limiting beliefs we accept that keep us from taking action to improve our circumstances.
If you’ve read my Five Essential Strengths for Success with Satisfaction, you know everything for me starts with assessing the reality of a situation. One of the most challenging beliefs for me to flip from scary myth to empowering truth was the idea that doing everything right on paper automatically leads to satisfaction and well-being.
This fallacy is based on the following premise – I’m good at school. School prepares you for life. I will automatically be good at life.
What this myth fails to account for is the fact that success in school is based on being good at sticking to guidelines set for us by others. Formal education isn’t geared to help us to identify what we think is important for ourselves. As a result, we don’t always build trust in our own decision-making.
Some of us are fortunate enough to encounter personal or academic challenges during our education that force us to make some consequential choices on our own. This gives us a foundation for faith in ourselves.
Ironically, if school goes smoothly, we never really have to do the self-discovery that drives self-direction. This can leave us feeling a bit rudderless when we have to guide ourselves.
School prepares our minds and bodies to do the work necessary for our jobs. It’s on us to cultivate skills that allow us to know and trust ourselves in the world – mind, body and spirit. No one is giving us a syllabus for life that guarantees fulfillment for certain benchmarks achieved.
It is fully possible be unhappy following everyone else’s idea of the proper path when it is not aligned with your spirit. The most satisfying lives are based on the right mix of respect for external parameters and trust in internal guidance. That means what we know to be right for us is as valid as any curriculum someone else has set.
This realization was the key to flipping the scary myth that brought me a sense of disillusionment to an empowering mantra that spurs me to purposeful action. It turns out, when I do what is right for me, I get what is meant for me – including satisfaction and well-being.
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Dr Jattu Senesie is a board-certified obstetrician-gynecologist, certified success coach, physician satisfaction specialist and speaker. She blogs about issues of self care and well-being in an effort to help her fellow altruistic high achievers find satisfaction in their success as early in their careers as possible.
