One of the most incredible parts of the human experience is the ability to pivot, to evolve, to change. It’s liberating to know that the life you’ve always lived is not the life you have to have until you die. You can decide that you want something different, that you want a better living experience, and you have the power to make it happen.
In this blog post, I’ve pulled together a few pieces I’ve written on change and evolving into your highest self.
The thing about growth is that it happens in bits and pieces. The most sustainable way to change and evolve into the person that you know is your highest self is by doing it in micro shifts. It’s almost like a practice—you wake up and make small, seemingly inconsequential changes, and these changes accumulate until one day you hit a tipping point.
When you are looking to change, patience is key. You might worry that it’s taking too long or requires too many steps, but you must remember that the kind of change that lasts, the one that comes from the inside, takes time to effect. There will be a strong pull to return to your baseline. In times like that, it’s important to know that the person you are trying to become is a doer. The reason they feel so far-fetched from you is that you are not yet a doer. Change requires that you recommit yourself to micro actions every day.
The kind of change and growth that will carry you barely happens in big leaps, regardless of what social media content shows you. What you see as big leaps are made up of very small steps that have compounded over time.
Changing your life happens in waves. You don’t just wake up with a life that is radically different. It happens one day at a time, one small decision at a time, one little change at a time. You will take baby steps forward and sometimes you will fall or stumble. If you continue to keep your eye on the goal and keep taking the small steps, making the small changes, one day you will wake up and see that your life is completely different. Not because you woke up one day and upended your entire life and flipped it over, but because you were consistent in the small steps.
You cannot hate yourself into change, nor can you rip your self-esteem apart in an effort to scare yourself into change. The reason it will never work is that it was born out of fear, and fear cannot sustain you for months or years. Changing the way you live has to come from a place of radical self-acceptance and love for yourself. It doesn’t mean you will be overly soft with yourself and not hold yourself to the standards that you have set. It means that on the days that you stumble or take a step backward, you will realize that it is part of the process and you will give yourself love and grace throughout the entire journey.
Allow yourself to move on. Allow yourself to step into the person you are becoming. Allow yourself to close one chapter and walk into the next. You no longer have to hold on to stories of the past; that’s not who you are now. You are different. You have evolved. Allow yourself to evolve into the person you can see on the horizon.
Changing your life is not easy. It starts internally, with confronting who you are right now and truthfully acknowledging that something needs to change. It’s about letting the things you have suppressed spill out and staring at them, looking for the lessons to extract from them. It is uncomfortable because you are in new territory. It’s okay if you feel a bit out of place. Sit with the discomfort until you begin to internally adjust and align with the new reality in front of you.
I hope you let yourself change. I hope you do the work required. I hope you let yourself be uncomfortable for a while. I hope you allow yourself to step into the person you know that you were always meant to be. I hope you welcome the change. I hope you embrace it. I hope you learn to love yourself through it all, through the missteps and the mistakes. I hope that you allow your life to unfold beautifully. I hope you give yourself permission to become the person that is capable of your wildest dreams. And I hope you know that growth and change are worth it. I hope you allow yourself to become the person you’re proud of, even if it is just you on your side, even if nobody understands, even if everyone says the person you used to be was fine. I hope you know that the way your life feels to you is more important than the way it looks to other people. I hope you build a life that you are excited about, a life that inspires you to wake up every single day and live it fully. I hope you build a life that the 90-year-old you will be so proud of. I hope you make every single moment you are alive count, and that includes becoming the version of yourself that does the work. I hope you give yourself permission to take the leap even if you are scared. I hope you don’t let fear stop you—fear of the unknown, fear of what people will say, fear of failing. I hope you let the joy of achieving your dreams be so much bigger than the doubt in your mind. I hope that you’re brave enough to evolve.
