Dear Christina,
This weekend I went out to eat with my mom and aunt. And it was interesting for me to see the situation my mom is in. For basically all my life, she had been pushing me to become a nurse because “I’ll always have a job”, she would say. But to this day she is looking for a new job, on unemployment, and never looking to retire.
-Anonymous
Dear Anonymous,
Thanks for writing in and sharing your experience with us. You didn’t exactly ask a question in what you wrote it, however; I think I could tell where you were headed with your submission, and I rolled with it and recorded you a short video response below.
I want to take this opportunity to discuss something really powerful: There is a pattern in our society of people projecting their fears, feelings, or beliefs onto others — telling people what they should do or judging them for what they do. The important thing for you to remember is that no matter what your mom thinks you should do for a living, do whatever lights you up and whatever fulfills you, your heart, and your soul.
It’s likely your mom told you to be a nurse your whole life because she has some wound or pain around a lack of stability with income and/or employment and so she genuinely thought she was giving you the best advice should could so that you would avoid all the pain and hardship she’s struggled through (after all, nursing is a noble and stable career choice).
Please know, though, that it’s possible that your mom’s strategy may have been a bit misguided, especially if she poo-poohed your dreams and/or if her recommendation was coming from fear; we can never trust the guidance we give or the guidance we receive when it’s coming from fear. Fear distorts everything, including reality.
But, the bigger question is not the advice your mom gave you all your life, but how you received it. You see, we have a tendency in our society to misinterpret other people’s thoughts about us. We have a tendency to assign meaning and value to other people’s thoughts, opinions, and beliefs about us. So all your life, instead of hearing your mom’s personal pain of not having stable work and stable income to rely on, you may have heard something like this: Your big dreams are ridiculous. You’ll never be able to make those dreams come true. You’re not smart enough to live out that kind of dream. You’ll never be able to accomplish that. You’ll never make it. Why bother even trying? You should just be a nurse instead. It’s safer, and I’m sure you’ll be able to handle that. I don’t believe your dreams can come true. I don’t believe in you.
You see, sometimes when we hear other people’s thoughts for us, we attach meaning to their words, beliefs, or we interpret their words to have implications about us and our own worth. We attach emotions to it, emotions that are usually colored by our pain. I always tell people that in order to keep our personal power, we must hear another person’s thoughts and feelings to us, or about us, as just that: other people’s thoughts and feelings. We can just be observers of those thoughts and feelings. We don’t have to assign value or meaning to them. We don’t have to take action on them. And we don’t have to believe them as being real, meaningful, or true for us. They are simply another person’s perspective about us based on what their life has taught them. Their beliefs about us don’t really have anything to do with us.
Truth is, it’s likely your mom was simply projecting onto you what she wished she had done for herself. Her desire for you to be a nurse, her projection, is not a statement of your capabilities, your abilities, or your worth — nor should it be a roadmap you need to follow to achieve success or happiness.
Perhaps it’s the roadmap she wished she had followed for herself, but it doesn’t have to be your path and you don’t have to take her projection on, as though it needs to become your reality.
Now, in the video I recorded for you I mention that if you’re harboring any resentment for, or toward, your mom because of how you perceived her telling you to be a nurse, I’d recommend you take a hard look at the resentments and clear that as well. Because you won’t be able to manifest your dreams if you are still holding onto resentments toward your mom for being who she is. If she hurt you, at some point, you will need to forgive her. Unforgiveness only eats at you, not her. Unforgiveness takes away your ability to create the life of your dreams. Unforgiveness keeps every person who holds it stuck in pain from the past, rather than prospering in the joy available in the present moment. Unforgiveness eats at the core of who you truly are and that is a confident, kind, loving human being. That is the root of who we all are, no matter how much bitterness and pain is covering it up. The more bitterness and pain you clear, through healing and forgiveness, the more room you have for feelings like joy, peace, love, harmony.
In another video post I created, I share some strategies for learning how to forgive and I go into more detail about why unforgiveness blocks our happiness. You can watch that here.
Below is the video I recorded for you.
If any of this is unclear, please write back to me and ask specific questions that I can respond to.
I hope what I’ve shared has been helpful to you. You can also read the unedited transcript of the video below if that is helpful to you.
With love, gratitude, grit, and grace,
UNEDITED VIDEO TRANSCRIPT
Hello, it’s Christina with Personal Growth for All™. Okay, so on this video, I have a question from somebody who wrote in. And here’s what he asks, he says, this weekend, I went out to eat with my mom and my aunt. And I’m just reading it, by the way from my phone. And it was interesting for me to see the situation my mom is in for basically all my life, she’s been pushing me to become a nurse, because I’ll always have a job, she says, But to this day, she is looking for a new job on on unemployment and never looking to retire. So, so here’s the thing, especially like, I’m gonna talk as a parent real quick. So as a parent, we always want for our children, like the very best, and we want them to have the very best life they can have. And I suspect that with your mom, like growing up, and your mom always telling you that she wanted you to be a nurse, that what she was really well and by the way, okay, you’re you identify as a healer, okay, so what she was really trying to say was, if I was you, at your age, I would have gone to school to become a nurse, because that’s a stable line of work. And I would have been able to do that for my life. And you wouldn’t have to struggle like I’ve struggled my whole life. So unfortunately, though, the way that that’s received, like when our parents like our whole life tells us like for you, for example, your your mom has told you your whole life, that you need to be a nurse, like you should be a nurse, you’d be nourishing to be a nurse. And maybe the way that you’ve received that information your whole life is that you’re not okay being you are not okay, like wanting to do what you want to do. And like, it’s never good enough for her. Like she thinks that, you know, she’s going to tell me what I supposed to do or whatever. Or like always like, and maybe every time you express your dreams to your mom, she poo pooed them or just told you like, No, you need to do something stable, you need to just be a nurse or whatever. And so when that happens for us as children, and because we don’t understand, we don’t have the perspective, to know that like, just because somebody else thinks that we should do something doesn’t mean we have to doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with us, the way that you maybe have interpreted that, as that like something is wrong with you, right or like, you’re never going to be good enough for your mom unless you do what she wants you to do. So it’s very interesting. And this is what we call like a projection in its perfect form, right where, like, your mom maybe has spent your whole life projecting on to you like what she thinks you should do. So it’s a picture that she’s created about your life, and the life she wants you to live. So we do this all the time, right? We not just parents, but just people in general, we project onto other people, our pictures for them in their life. And the thing is like energetically as human beings, especially our parents pictures, they put those pictures into our energy space, and then they become a part of us. And then we if we don’t know what’s going on, we kind of live out other people’s ideas about our life, right? We live out other people’s dreams for our life, rather than realizing that that’s just your mom’s picture. And it’s okay for her to have it and you can like kindly separate it from you and still go and follow and do the things that you feel like guided and passionate about doing. And so I guess I mean, you don’t really ask me a question in what she wrote in. So I’m just kind of going off of what I’m feeling or whatever. And I suspect that you’re looking at it from this objective perspective now, right, where you’re not a participant, and like, in what you have maybe thought of as her like judgments of you of not being good enough or something like that. But maybe you’re at a place in your life where you’re able to sit there and look at her, like make those statements of like you should be a nurse as she is on unemployment, and probably never going to be able to retire and has no plan for retirement. So the juxtaposition around what she’s always told you you should do versus what she has done is maybe really rich for you right now. And like really enhanced, that you’re able to really see it. And so here’s what I would invite you to do, when we have these moments where we’re able to really see without taking on any pain as a result of it. And what I mean by that is like you’re at dinner with your mom and your and you see your mom in exactly where she’s at, you realize how she’s tried to kind of mold you into who she thinks she needs to be. So that, you know, maybe she could be more comfortable and feel more safe. Like, as a parent, we want our kids to thrive and we want them to be successful in in life, right? And so the thought of our children not being successful creates stress in us. And so sometimes what parents do is rather than deal with their own discomfort of what if their children’s struggle like what if their children go through pain? What if their children walk with poverty? What if their children go through hardship in life, rather than sit with the discomfort within ourselves and say, like, well, then, you know, I hope that my job or they’ll get through it or they’re strong enough to handle it, what we deal with, we try and change our children. Right? So we don’t I do not, but what most parents do, is we try and change our children into being who we need them to be so that we’re not as uncomfortable with them being who they are. Right so Like your big dreams for whatever it is you want your life to be maybe scared your mom. And so instead of allowing you to have those big dreams and like rolling out the carpet to do whatever she could to make sure that they happen, maybe she downplayed the dreams. And when she told you to dream, something different, maybe she suggested you should play a little smaller, maybe she said, That’s a stupid dream, you should go for this stable, secure thing instead, right. And as children, we interpret that as I’m not good enough, or my dreams don’t matter, or my mom doesn’t believe in me, like all these big things that we that we perceive. Because as children, we don’t really have the ability to look at it and say like her, what she thinks I should do has nothing to do with me. It just has to do with like, where she finds safety, security, stability. And maybe in your mom’s case, what she wish she would have done for herself. And if she could do it all over again, what she would do, starting all over again, right. And so I guess the Long Story Short with this as, as you as the person you are now and I don’t know, I don’t necessarily know how old you are. But you being able to like see very clearly, the difference between what your mom has always told you you should do versus what she’s been capable of doing. Like rather than shame her or judge her have compassion, and perhaps look at that and say like, wow, like, I can see now how, you know, maybe my mom because of the struggles that she’s had in her life, that she was just trying to pave an easier way for me, I’ll be like, in a way that wasn’t really accurate. You know, maybe she misjudged the way that she could handle that in a way that meaning like, she might have thought she was honoring you. But it really wasn’t right, or it wasn’t perceived that way for you. And so I guess the long story short is, I’m glad that you had the moment where you were able to like, see that difference. And I hope that that means that you are still fully committed to whatever it is your vision is, if it’s not nursing, that you find the thing that lights you up, and that you pursue it, and that you follow that natural intuitive calling, and that thing that you’re just naturally good at doing. And that whatever you do, you’re happy when you’re doing it. Like if you can settle into that belief that you won’t settle and that you choose to live a happy life. And happy life is going to include everything that you believe creates a happy life, if it’s financial abundance, it says if it’s lots of love, if it’s children, family, spouse, whatever, right, you get to create your own pictures for what you want your life to be. And when I say pictures, I mean, you literally create a vision of the future that hasn’t happened yet you create the picture in your mind of the life you want to live. And then once you do that, you begin to realize like when you go down this road, like hey, like that doesn’t fit my pictures, like I don’t have to go down this road or I can change direction. So I don’t get put into a into a place or into a dead end. That isn’t going to align with like what I believe a happy life looks like it feels like for me, right? So allow yourself to create your pictures, allow yourself to go into the vision of what it is that you want to have. And while you’re doing it, allow yourself to have peace in knowing that. I suspect the only thing your mom ever, ever wanted for you was for you to be happy. She was just misjudged the route and the role she was supposed to play in helping you to get there, what would have made her happy was financial stability, and maybe a nursing career. But that is not necessarily what would make you happy. And so the important part and the reason why I say throw that compassion in there is because if there’s still any discomfort about that any discontentment any resentment, any anger towards your mom about that, it’s going to be very hard for you to have enough room within you, for your own dreams to come true. You know, resentment, anger, frustration, judgment, all of that energy gets in the way of the things that actually make us feel good and hold him fulfilled. And so as much as you can forgive your mom, for she did the best she could with what she knew how to do, forgive her and allow that energy of forgiveness to come through you so that you have enough space to let go of the trauma associated with that patterned way of being and thinking. And you have the freedom to be able to then create and manifest and dream about what you genuinely truly were born to create and do in this life. And so I hope that this was helpful to you. And I would also just say, now that you have seen that full picture of like what it’s like and thinking back like I look back on your timeline all the times you’re I’m told you what she thought you should do. And now seeing that like her inability to really ever do it herself. I invite you to think about your own family that either you have or will create one day and how you’re going to show up for your kids in that conversation. If you choose to have kids or how you show up for your friends or Your family. And if you’re going to poopoo someone’s dream or someone’s dream, or tell them what you think they should do, or whether you’re going to have enough room for their dreams, to be their dreams, and for their dreams to come true. And so I encourage you to take that latter approach, so that you don’t continue the cycle of making your vision for what you want someone else, someone else’s life to be their vision, or the vision that you hold on to that if they don’t live up to you, then they’re not good enough for you. Like, let their vision of life be theirs, live your own life and let it be the vision of your life that you choose to have. And notice the times when it’s not and realize that you can make a different decision. Right? Okay, well, this is the life I wanted to live. So what do I have to adjust in my life to bring it back into alignment with the vision that I have, but the life I want to live and how I want to feel living it, right, you have that power to always shift and to pivot and to make the changes you need to change so that you can come back into alignment with your pictures of your life. And last thing, don’t be afraid to change your pictures as you grow. Like most people are like, Oh, I have this dream, and I’m going to stick to it, or I want to do this, I’m gonna stick to it. And then they get to that place. And maybe it’s not happy or fun to do. But they don’t realize that they can shift at any time. Like, I believe that, you know, God gives us the pictures of like, what our purpose is like what we’re here to accomplish in this life. And we take the steps necessary to get to that place. And we’re, you know, when we’re awake, and we’re always doing the work or whatever to get to that special place. But sometimes we get to the place where we thought we were supposed to be only there realize that like out this isn’t this isn’t the end, this was just the steps I needed to take to get to where I am so that I could learn what I needed to learn along the way. But then your path opens and expands even more. And so you get to step into an even fuller version of yourself. So don’t be afraid to change your pictures as you take in more information about the world. More information about like what’s possible, more information about what maybe like a loving relationship looks like more information about what a career in a certain field looks like. Like don’t be afraid to change your pictures as you change and grow as well. Always letting go of the old and what no longer serves you always opening yourself up to a bigger, more beautiful, more profound version of yourself than you ever knew you could be. So allow yourself to grow into that as well. So with that, I hope I answered what it is that you wrote in about like you didn’t have a question attached to it, but I hope that it was helpful anyway. If there’s anything else that you want to know, feel free to write back into me or if anyone watching this video wants to write back into me or wants to write into me for the first time. I would love that. You can go to personalgrowthforall.com and send me a note. Hope you’re doing well. Take care. Bye
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