Let me tell you about limits…. They are disguised as so many different things but mostly they show their ugly little masked up faces as fears!!

We are born limitless. When we are babies we don’t think to ourselves ‘oh i’d love to talk but I don’t think i’m smart enough’. We don’t think ‘jeepers i’d love to walk around like my big brother but i’m way too fat and lazy for that’. We don’t accept no for an answer. We don’t stay quiet just in case we say the wrong thing. We shout as loud as we can until we get what we want. We fall down time and time again, often smashing our heads on coffee tables and making our knees bleed but we keep getting up again and again until we can walk!!

‘What happened to us to distinguish that immense amount determination and belief in ourselves’

Life did that’s what. Peoples expectations of us and the learnt need for external approval. We are taught from a very young age to be compliant to ‘the rules’. Here are just a few of the little words of encouragement into self- doubt and fear that our gorgeous, limitless minds get fed as children:

‘Stop asking for things you want’.

‘No means no and you are so rude to keep asking’

‘You’re not the smart one your sister is you’re the sporty one’

‘You are the devil child’

‘No one else wears clothes like that you look awful’

‘Why can’t you be more like so and so’

‘No one likes a show off , stop trying be centre of attention’

‘You’re such a pain’

‘You drive me mad’

‘Darling i’m afraid you can’t do that as we don’t have what those other families have’

‘Put your uniform on so you look the same as everyone else’

‘Gosh why do you have to be different’

‘Darling you don’t have the figure for that dress’

‘Oh gosh look you’re covered in mud, NOW WHAT WILL PEOPLE THINK??’

‘Lets make you look beautiful’ (so people can give you lots of attention for your appearance).

And the list goes on and on!! Is it our parents, teachers, siblings fault?? No of course not. It’s just what we say as parents.  Without realising it, at a very tender age, we program our little superhumans to start creating limits and beliefs about themselves that simply aren’t true.

As a small child we interpret these one line parental slaps as ok so I shouldn’t speak up. My voice isn’t valid. I’m not worthy. I need to look nice to get people to notice me, I am dumb so I wont bother trying, I am a horrible person to drive my parents mad etc etc…. 

We then live our lives on total autopilot operating from a place of fear and judgement. Our beliefs create our reality. We never question them. We accept them and live our lives according to our upper limits.

‘Don’t downgrade your dreams or your life to be in line with your fears’

I  spent my whole life thinking I wasn’t clever enough. I couldn’t achieve this and that. I lived my life making choices to keep me comfortably wrapped up in fear. 

On the occasional time I stepped out of my fear bubble wrap and took a couple of small steps in the uncomfortable zone I have succeeded and failed; but both have felt amazing. Obviously success feels better but I actually feel blooming fab when I just do ‘the thing’ even if it works or not.

‘Failing to try is the only way to truly fail. Every failed attempt has a gain.’ 

There is a lesson in every small step and in every failed attempt. It is never a failure in my opinion. Trying and not getting the desired outcome is just a lesson. It is only your ego that sees it as failure. Don’t even get me started on the ego AKA ‘the monkey mind’. He’s a protective little f*#ker that talks so much BS and fuels himself on fear. You can’t get rid of him but you can choose to zone out when he pipes up. 

What i’ve come to realise is that when I stopped dreaming many moons ago (because I was way to dumb to be successful or be in the company of successful people) I lowered my whole sense of being. I decided I was unreliable, unlovable, stupid, not worthy of anything good in my life. What followed was a series of extremely poor choices which brought me years of unhappiness. But I was in my comfort zone and it was familiar, so rather than do something about it I had to accept this sh*t life and ‘get on with it’. THANKFULLY I WOKE UP!!

‘The fear of failure is terrifying but the fear of staying stuck in a life you hate is also terrifying….. Choose your terrifying wisely my friend’

So my advice to me, my children and to you my darling friends is to know you weren’t born with limits and you can be limitless if you start to believe in yourself again like you did as a 1 year old!! The only limits you should ever know about yourself are ‘know your limits when drinking vodka’ …. 

Other than that go smash through the glass ceiling and live that one precious life you have.

Love and courage

Lindsay Nash xx