Be a Smart Mum Not a Good Mum By Nicky Tegg (Book Excerpt)
Process #15
Making Friends with Your Future You
Imagine your life six months from now. What would you love your life to look like? How are you dressed? How is your demeanour? Who are you with? How do you feel about yourself? Imagine you have your mojo back and you are feeling amazing.
Now imagine your life twelve months from now. What are your surroundings? How do you feel about yourself? What are you doing? How is your self-esteem?
Our brain automatically goes to the past, then the present, and finally to the future. It does this all day, every day. A good way to fog up our mojo is to live in the past and reminisce about all the hurt we have suffered. The problem with that is we can’t change what people have done to us. An irrational part of us seems to think that if we keep remembering the hurt, talking about it, we will be able to talk and think our way out of it.
Thinking and talking about past hurt only drains our energy, as well as the energy of the people we are complaining to. Resentment of the past only creates experiences that create more resentment in the future. The only thing that can change the past is a change of perception about whatever hurt us.
A new perception gives us a sense of relief from past hurt, which frees us to experience inner peace. Instead of trying to figure why someone did what they did, a process that I use on my past hurt works for me. Give it a go—it might work for you. All I do is I detach the behaviour from the person, so it’s no longer about the person and all about the behaviour.
Then I evaluate the behaviour, whether it was words that were said or a physical act. Instead of saying, “She hurt me,” it has now become, “Those words that were said to me hurt my feelings.” Next, I detach the feelings of hurt from the words. So now I can evaluate just the words that were spoken to me. Now they might look like, “What a daft thing to say to someone.”
By this point, the feeling of hurt starts to shift. I can now see that it was nothing personal, just a daft thing to say. People have a choice to speak kind words or words that are not so kind. If someone said unkind things, remember it was their choice to be an unkind person. It is none of our business how others choose to show up in the world.
So at this point after breaking it down, I take the lesson and the gift. The lesson is not to take things personally, especially from people who choose to be daft, either by being insulting, critical, or belittling. I can simply accept them as they are. My gift is that I have just become a better person because I have learnt to be mindful of my communication with others.
Feeling joyful about our future creates an even more joyful future. Worrying about the future creates additional worry. We have more control over our lives than we give ourselves credit for. We cannot create a future for others, but we can imagine a joyful future for them. We cannot control another’s mindset, although we can exert a positive influence on them.
Our children are watching and learning from us. Their brains take it all in. How we respond to life and respond to each other greatly influences their behaviour. They see how we deal with life, the choices we make, and how we go about making those choices. They tend to mimic our mindset until they realise, they have control over their own mind and can think for themselves.
When we imagine a future we would love, it provides us with a vision to focus on. The more often we imagine our future, whether it be six months or six years from now, we make friends with it. In my six-week Magnetise your Dream Lifestyle Program, I teach a process to connect with the future you. As we imagine the future, the process of doing this eventually, not always immediately, ignites inspiration within us to take some sort of action to move toward this future.
As we focus on the future self, we start to become this unconsciously. This is intense and is my favourite thing to do every single day. My soul and my future self are the two companions I have with me my entire life’s journey, from birth to death, so I connect with them both daily. I am never alone—and neither are you, my sweet friend.
If this is the first time you are imagining your future self, go easy with yourself. It takes a few goes to get a clear picture of who you will become. The more you go to the future in your mind, you may add or remove from the vision anything you want. The more you do this, the clearer you become of what you really need to feel happy. When you go to the future, be generous with yourself. Don’t hold back because of current circumstances. Open your mind and dream like a child without limitations.
One thing will prevent this process from igniting inspiration, and this is lack of belief. If there is a lack of belief, then the mind-gremlins have woken up. They will tell you this will not work, this is impossible, you cannot have this, get real, this is bullshit, don’t be so silly, you’ll be disappointed—and anything else that stops you from believing you can be anything you deep down want to be.
Remember to be loving and friendly with the mind-gremlins. Let them gently know that you’re just having some fun, and all will be well. Tell them anything that keeps them from sabotaging your future.
You can even communicate with your future you and ask her what your next step should be toward your future. You will either receive the step straight away, or you may receive the inspired action step in a few days. Your only job is to say ‘yes,’ even if the mind-gremlins are freaking out. If the inspired action feels exhilarating and you have a feeling of knowing it is the right thing to do, say ‘yes’ and do it.
Eventually, you will realise that you have become your future you, and you might look back and think, ‘Wow, I didn’t even feel the change.’ It is a beautiful thing to make friends with your future you. I believe this process could help so many children to stay focused on a path that brings them joy and empowerment.
EXERCISE
Spend a day trying this process out for yourself. It is one thing reading this book, but physically doing the processes makes the difference.
1) Spend a day, dreaming about a future you would love to experience.
2) See yourself in six to twelve months’ time.
3) Use all your senses while you imagine your future you. Think about what you can see, smell, taste, hear, and touch.
4) Make the image so big that you feel like you are standing inside the image.
5) When you feel like your image is starting to fade away, it is time to take a deep breath in and out. Gradually bring your awareness back to your physical body, while you slowly open your eyes.
6) Check in with yourself. How did it feel to imagine your future self this way?
7) Do this as often as you can during the day, and especially tonight while you rest in bed and relax your body, mind, and soul.
About the Author
As an expert in the field of personal development, professional life coach Nicky Tegg has enabled hundreds of clients to transform their lives all around the globe through coaching, workshops, online programs, and speaking engagements.
The link between people’s mindset and their behaviour became of interest to Nicky when she started studying self-development as a young teenager thirty years ago. It was after she married her husband Nick and became a mum to her daughter Ashani that she realised most women she knew were not happy. That was when she decided to go fulltime into the world of personal development, becoming a qualified life coach so she could support people from all walks of life
‘Be a Smart Mum Not a Good Mum: 5 Profound Principles to Reclaim Your Mojo for a Satisfying and Fulfilling Family Life’ is available now: https://amzn.to/3nF6DXc.
