What do you think people are thinking about you? Have you ever thought you may not be telling yourself the truth about yourself and what your behavior is saying to other people? You will never make any progress towards behaviors you desire to change in your life if you are unable to tell yourself the truth about yourself.

I am not talking about being overly concerned with what people think about us,(people pleasing) but the ability of telling yourself the truth concerning your own behavior and how it affects your relationships. This process affects our closest relationships we have in life because that is where problems can arise due to the closeness at work or the intimacy and vulnerability we have with each other with family and friends. You might actually find yourself being unaware of something that you are doing that is less than dysfunctional, a character flaw, or an impulsive action of saying or doing something you regret and then feeling bad about what just happened at a later point and time. Being able to tell yourself the truth is something maybe everyone struggles with at different times in their life because we all have blind spots and justify things concerning our behavior. We build defense mechanism’s that form denials in order to protect ourselves from feelings such as guilt, shame, embarrassment or the pride of having to always be right. So you might ask yourself, if I don’t always tell myself the truth about what I am actually doing when I behave a certain way what can I do about being more honest with myself.

Here are 3 things that can help:

1. Go to someone who is safe and knows you very well and in confidence ask them if they are aware of anything significant in your life where you are not telling yourself the truth. Tell them to be open and honest when answering and be ready for constructive criticism. Be aware of getting defensive once the person you are sharing with tells you their observation of what they see in your actions. If you end up feeling defensive try to ignore your feelings and move forward by listening and making the connection you are searching for in yourself.  Telling yourself the truth is not always easy to accept especially when we hear it from another person.
2. Be able to self actualize with what your behavior is saying to others. Being honest and self aware with who you are, why you are that way and possibly where the behavior is driven or birthed from can help you make the connection about yourself. A lot of behaviors are genetic and passed down to us through our gene pool, taught to us through situations and experiences as we have grown up in life, or driven from your personality type. I suggest taking a personality test if you have not taken one as this will help you understand your personality type.
3. Practice the 3 D’S of cognitive processing. Discern, Decide and Do. Discern – Be aware of your thoughts- feelings and actions on a daily basis. Decide, are my thoughts feelings and actions healthy? Do. If my thoughts feelings and actions are not healthy what Do I want to change? Is it my thoughts and feelings on a matter or do I need to change how I am reacting to a situation. You can read more about the 3D’s in my other blogs.