This Tuesday, we finished up the Winter 2021 cycle of the Sacred Depths Transformational Practitioner Certification with a beautiful 3 hour session.
It was wonderful to celebrate how much growth and evolution had taken place for the participants over the 10 months we’ve been journeying together. So much transformation on the personal level. So many skills mastered, and happy clients that they have served.
Ending cycles always brings up so much for me:
immense joy in having had the opportunity to share myself and my work…
deep feelings of honor & privilege for being able to hold the space for such amazing people and to learn from them & grow with them…
incredible satisfaction in witnessing the breakthroughs and transformations…
sadness in saying goodbye to a particular circle & experience – while I know so many clients continue with me, it will never be this exact circle again….
And…
Because I’m me (ah, the joys & annoyances of being me!), I always walk away feeling BOTH incredibly amazing/happy/fulfilled/good (enough)….
…AND…
also feeling not good enough, focusing on what I could have done better, wondering where things weren’t epic enough.
Such a strange combo of “that was wonderful” and “that was not wonderful.”
It still amazes me how all at the same time, I can feel so confident and feel SO GOOD about the work that I do….while also being critical of it and worried that I didn’t “do enough” (even though I know better).
I’m sharing with you to NORMALIZE the experience for you, to take the shame & the frustration out of it for you, just in case you happen to be like me. 🙂
Even though my whole entire message and purpose and business is based on teaching practitioners how to be AMAZING at what you do, as well as how to have confidence in yourself…I still, after all these years, experience what I call the “Paradox of Confidence” – this feeling of knowing I’m amazing and also feeling very not amazing all at once.
If you experience this too, I want you to know that there is nothing wrong with you.
I want you to know it doesn’t mean you’re not whole and complete exactly as you are.
And I also want you to know that there are ways you can work with the Paradox of Confidence to really benefit yourself, your work, and everyone around you.
The Paradox of Confidence also very likely comes up for some of your clients: the experience of not feeling good enough even when there is another part of themselves that is confident and knows how wonderful they are.
This Paradox of Confidence can show up in so many forms. For example:
- the mother who all at once knows she is a wonderful mothers but also really doubts herself
- the teacher who all at once know they are making beautiful impact with their students but also obsesses on the students who didn’t think they were the best thing since sliced bread
- the artist who all at once feels deep satisfaction in the work she’s created yet also worries that it will not be loved & appreciated
I’ve come to learn over the years is that is it oh-so-very-human to have these different layers of experience all at once, especially for those us who are recovering perfectionists/rescuers/people pleasers/needers to be amazing in everyone’s eyes.
I’ve also come to learn that the work isn’t about making this experience of feeling not-good-enough “go away for forever”; the work is about tending to it, transforming through it when it comes up, and using it to connect more deeply to yourself and your value.
If you don’t know how to manage this very human experience in transformational ways, it can foster even deeper feelings of self-doubt, self-criticism, frustration, and inability to really feel pleasure and satisfaction in your accomplishments & self.
So there is NOTHING WRONG at all with feeling & experience The Paradox of Confidence. How you respond to it and what you do with it makes all the difference though – and of course, same goes for how you support your clients who experience this.
In Sacred Depths, we learn a variety of somatic and non-somatic practices to support with all of this.
We learn techniques to be able to work with the Myth of Perfection.
We learn techniques to be able to Befriend the parts of ourselves that are not so savory.
We learn techniques for deeper self-acceptance.
We learn techniques for working with inner child and supporting inner child towards greater self-love and confidence.
We learn techniques for re-wiring negative thought patterns.
We learn techniques for tapping into & harnessing the more confident and self-assured parts of ourselves.
When the Paradox of Confidence comes up, it’s so important to be intentional about all of it. To harness & have techniques to work with the “not good enough” feelings vs. letting them eat you alive.
Through doing the deep work around it, one thing I’ve really come to appreciate about the Paradox of Confidence is this – it IS totally related to my very healthy commitment to excellence, and when I actively do my work on the Paradox & my not-good-enoughness, it keeps me on my toes, has me always improving & deepening, helps me continue to evolve…and I am POSITIVE it is part of what makes me such a good practitioner.
As ever, I am in such deep gratitude that I’ve been given such amazing opportunity to impact so many people…and that I get to connect with so many amazing people. Making impact and being impacted, co-creating transformation…well, it’s a messy job sometimes, on a lot of levels. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.
