Late 2019 and early 2020, I was in a pretty big slump.
And this was all before Covid…
2019 was a tough year for me. I made a lot of mistakes.
I made mistakes that impacted me and others around me.
So I began beating myself up about it…..a lot.
Why did I do that?
How could I not have seen that?
I’m too experienced to be making those kinds of mistakes.
What was I thinking??
Am I even good at any of this?
The list of self-deprecating statements was endless and brutal,
So much so that I came up with a punishment for myself.
That should have been my first clue that what I was doing was unhealthy.
Then, I had a call with one of my mentors and he gave me some advice that had nothing to do with my mistakes.
He simply said “You have to be nice to yourself.”
He went on to talk about how I was beginning to let my mistakes define me.
And he ended it very abruptly.
“You have to let that stuff go…”
I had violated my own rule about having a short term memory.
The world is harsh enough, we don’t need to be our own executioners.
If you haven’t watch Ted Lasso on Apple + it’s a gem.
He asks one of his players:
“You know what the happiest animal in the world is? A goldfish! 10-second memory.”
“Be a Goldfish.”
There are people all over just waiting to knock us down.
Let them have that job.
We have better things to do.
Be nice to yourself.
