How many hidden ideals do you have in your life that keep you from feeling like a success?
They hide behind sneaky little self-judgements like I didn’t get all the laundry done, or I only exercised twice this week, not four times like I swore I would after eating popcorn and an entire package of Swedish Berries. It doesn’t seem to matter that I got 90% of the laundry done or that I worked my butt off all week and deserved a splurge of delicious red calories.
I still struggle with a sinking feeling of not measuring up.
It’s all because I have been viewing my life from the “gap”. The space that exists between where I am and where I think I should be.
I’ve been eye-balling those ideals of achievement daily and ignoring the daily progress of ME, showing up. Sometimes simply getting out of bed in the morning is one heck of an achievement when your last trip to the bathroom was at 3:30 a.m. and for some mysterious reason you’re still awake.
Fortunately the topic of the gap and the gain has started showing up on my radar. I was immediately comforted by the concept of measuring my progress by how far I’ve come instead of how far I have left to go. Think of driving cross country with your kid in the back seat asking over and over “are we there yet”. With that kind of pressure the miles keep growing and you feel like you’ll never arrive. This is exactly what we do to ourselves when we measure against our ideals.
Where do those ideals come from in the first place? Quite often it’s from looking at the success of others and measuring ourselves against that. But we all have different lives and what works for me isn’t necessarily going to fly in your world. Measure your own progress from your own starting line. Keep heading in the direction of your own finish line and believe that showing up is what’s important.
I’m on the lookout for the hidden ideals in my life. The ones that don’t make sense and the ones that make me unhappy. I’m willing to let the laundry ideal go to make space for writing. Popcorn once a week is reasonable and I don’t do penance afterwards. I have created starting lines so I can measure my progress towards the things I want to achieve. My finish lines move around but I’m the one moving them, not the experts I have never met, no matter how much I admire their achievements.
I want a t-shirt now that says “Stop Judging from the Gap”. Every time I look in the mirror it will remind me to feel the Gain, not the Gap.
The gap and the gain are a daily thought occurance for me 🙂 Always measuring from thewrong side of things… thanks Gail! Love your posts! They’re always so insightful, thought out, pertinent, and offer excellent reminders to be kind to oneself. I look forward to the next one. In fact, I could read your insights on the daily… you should be writing for magazines for all the good that your thinking could do for others… and currently does for others. Thank you!