I think we all know how we need to be in order to create the type of results we want. Ask any guy who he wants to be movie character wise, and it‟s always the usual James Bond or some other main cool character. It‟s instinctive.
So the difficulty is not knowledge. We know how we need to be.
The difficulty lies in making it be who we naturally are. That requires a big shift from how you‟ve been for years.
And when we observe somebody exhibiting the same traits and personality which we would like, we automatically distance ourselves from believing we can become that identity.
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We separate our capability by saying things like:
- Oh they are a natural, I could never be that way.
- It’s just not me. I can’t imagine ever being like that.
- It’s easy for them. They are good looking and charming.
- I bet they had a good upbringing. No wonder they are that way.
Our objections are ways to protect our identity. Even though you WANT to change who you are, it seems almost impossible to be able to break away from the small little box you‟ve got yourself in.
After all, you have been the way you are for so long. Whether you are 18 years old, 25 years old, 38….42- we always say “it‟s too late. I‟m too set in my ways.” We stick to our same methods and strategies out of the belief that, “This is how I‟ve always been”.
If that‟s the case then we need to shatter the belief that keeps us caged and locked in our own identity.
The only way to shatter a belief – is by giving enough strong contradictions to make you doubt
and question the initial belief
SELF-PERCEPTION
Let‟s say I give you an extreme example and say to you, “Do you think you can get up on stage tomorrow?”
18 | S O C I A L A T T I T U D E A N D M I N D S E T Public Speaking is a major social fear. Dying on your ass in front of one person is hard enough. But 100+?
From that question there are three generalised responses:
- No way. I could never do that in a million years. I‟d be too could never accomplish such a feat. He‟s never done it before in his life. Or when he has done it, it has gone tits up with negative consequences like being laughed at, stuttering, too nervous to even focus.
He has no references to success.
The second person comes from a place where he has an overall confidence of, “I‟ll give it a shot”. Even though they have no point of reference to being on stage, their confidence from other areas of life lead them to believe, “I can do it”.
The third person has been on stage since he was a little kid. His parents threw him up on stage and cheered him on. Getting knickers thrown at him when he was in a band at 18 etc. From there he believes going on stage is easy.
The scenario will be different, but the act of going on stage is the same. He has multiple references to support he can do it.
They are all simple men with nothing special about them. They all have the same biology and general appearance.
The only difference between all of them is their past experiences. From being born up until this day, they will have travelled different paths- each being raised by different people, different schools, and a different upbringing.
So now, at the point where you are at- you have a generalised definition of who you are and what you are capable of, based
19 | S O C I A L A T T I T U D E A N D M I N D S E T purely on your past- how you were raised, the people who hung around with, your upbringing and role models etc.
It is not about living with the perfect past.
We can all say, “My parents never encouraged me…if only I went to a better school when I wasn‟t bullied…if I had just pushed myself then I would be OK now”.
This is where you are at NOW. Who you are today is a result of your past. You went through experiences that traumatised you and made you realise, “I‟m not going through that again”.
Or maybe you have not been through a traumatic experience.
Perhaps you have just been bombarded with criticism and negativity. You showed your teacher your work, and they disregarded it without the praise that you had hoped for. People were dismissive of you. You always saw somebody else getting the prize instead of you…
I do not know your personal history. Your past experiences will differ from everybody else.
So now, the only thing we can do is CHANGE HOW YOU SEE YOURSELF as it is right now, regardless of your previous history.
STEP ONE- DEFYING YOUR PAST AND PEERS If you are a nervous and shy person, then I‟m assuming that you have been around people who have pigeon-holed you into that type. They didn‟t mean to do it. They were just never the type to encourage you or give you support when you got knocked back.
20 | S O C I A L A T T I T U D E A N D M I N D S E T So you have a whim one day that you want to perform as a DJ in a club. You‟ve been secretly practicing in your bedroom. You have got a phone call for the perfect opportunity.
One of your automatic thoughts at that point will be:
“Oh My God, what will people think of me?”
Personally, I don‟t think it is about what PEOPLE think that really hinders us, but simply what will our SOCIAL CIRCLE think- our parents, our family, our friends etc.
We could rationalize a situation and say, “It is okay. I‟ll never see these people again- I can do what the hell I want and get out of here”.
Within your own environment and own social circle- you do not have that luxury. You will always be reminded and remembered for it. There are social consequences.
Our peers seem to concrete us to make sure we are set in our ways. Whenever we want to make a shift, they will say things like,
“You‟ve changed…that‟s not like you….ugh, I don‟t like you anymore. You‟re too different”.
Going against our friends and family is a difficult challenge.
They remind us of how we have always been.
So if you want to change your past- the first step is building up the courage to defy the perceptions of your peers.
OUR SOCIAL CIRCLE FEAR EXPLAINED It‟s scary being judged by your social circle.
Even if we are not around the same people from when we were growing up, we use their perceptions and opinions of us as validation of our identity. We get set into a level of status.
If we ever took the chance and risked becoming something better, or messing up and decreasing our value in their eyes- we have to face their opinions.
21 | S O C I A L A T T I T U D E A N D M I N D S E T Maybe it will be their disappointment in you, or their upset, or their anger/challenge, or their ridicule.
Fearing your social circle judgements is nothing new. It‟s an evolutionary fear.
We have not always been the 6.5 billion number species. We were in our hundreds of thousands spanning across the world. That meant we had to walk around in small groups.
Those groups were our survival. We learnt that by staying together we could seek out shelter and provide better.
So imagine if we did anything wrong or we went against our group. We would be cast out or put at a lower status- resulting in us getting the least amount of opportunity for food and shelter.
Our safety mechanism made us conscious about our actions within our peer group. We could not risk messing up. Hence why there is such an emphasis for us to question what people think of us.
But we cannot be somebody different and change if we remain fearful of social perceptions. We have to dare to strike out and find new ground- otherwise their views and comments about us will drag us back to how we have always been.
“I better not change. My friends are different with me now…”
And defying your peers does not mean go out of your way to purposefully piss them off. I am suggesting that you should accept the grilling and different perceptions that you may get.
Because some may even surprise you and say, “It‟s about time. I knew you had it in you.” Others may throw negativity and keep that pigeon-hole on you.
It‟s a risk you have to take in order to improve yourself.
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Accept that what ever you do different from the norm- you will receive different feedback from each
person in your social circle.
If you are deciding to become that social, then your social circle will notice it. “I can‟t believe you just did that…That is so unlike you, Oh my god….What are you doing that for?....Really? Are you sure you can do it?”…
Don‟t try and find the perfect way to avoid the possible negativity and different attitudes towards you. Accept them as a prerequisite to becoming a better person.
STEP TWO- BELIEVING AND DECIDING TO CHANGE
Step one was all about realising two facts:
1) Your past is created by beliefs and references from people observing you, especially by your social circle and those models around you- teachers, parents etc
2) We still fit into that mould by living up to those beliefs;
otherwise we will interrupt our comfortable social circle.
It‟s our evolutionary design to prevent social consequences.
Doing new things and accepting what your social circle thinks of you is a hard concept to grasp. It will take some pondering and thinking over, and hopefully you will reach the conclusion that breaking away from that mould gives you strength.
Unfortunately, no amount of reading can convince you of that.
It is an internal acceptance.
But when you do, you have to understand BELIEFS.
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Beliefs are all context related. If I asked you are you a murderer- you will hopefully say no, otherwise this book has leaked out into all the wrong hands.
However, if I asked you could you kill somebody if they killed your parents- most could actually say yes.
A label like murderer is just that- a label. And we can only gain labels in comparison to other people.
I mean, how could I possibly be a confident person if I have nobody to compare it with? How can I be shy unless somebody has identified me with that characteristic compared to somebody else? I would just simply BE.
But because we are in a social world, we are constantly in comparison with other people- and so we have to identify labels and assign traits to each other.
“Oh him? Oh he‟s a quiet person. He wouldn‟t say boo to a goose.”
“That guy over there? I don‟t know, but he looks psychotic.”
“She is really sweet and innocent. Butter wouldn‟t melt.”
“That one? Yeah he‟s really chatty. Trust me, you‟ll love him.”
Beliefs are thrown indirectly at us all the time, and throughout our past we have picked them up. If your parents were constantly telling you, “Don‟t touch that you‟ll break it!”, or if your dad never let you touch his tools and help him fix something- you will identify that with yourself and think, “I‟m no good. I‟ll just end up breaking things”.
That initial thought will spring on you every time you are thrown into a situation where you are required to apply your fixing skills.
Indirectly, if you have un-social parents, you can pick up their bad habits as well. They may have been the type to always shy away from social events- like meeting the family or going out for a drink.
You didn‟t question why they did it, you just thought “it‟s not that important to be social”.
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What beliefs can hinder your social success?
“Don’t ask somebody questions like that. You’ll be imposing.”
“Always be polite. Only speak when spoken to.”
“People don’t like to be approached.”
Or maybe your teacher was the eccentric chatty type. And you thought to yourself, “God. I can‟t wait till we get rid of this guy. He is so chatty! It‟s annoying!”
So now you believe being chatty and talkative = annoying, so you stay away from it. You become the opposite quiet type instead.
A belief simply identifies what you feel you can and can not do, or what you should and should not
do.
The mistake people make, however, is that they never challenge them. In our time of youth and moulding, we were shaped with those ideals and beliefs.
As an evolutionary and conscious step, we hit our rebellion teenage years to make sense of the world on our own terms. Teens get confused a lot nowadays. There is so much pulling at them right and left that it‟s hard to know what to believe.
And when it comes to defining beliefs about ourselves- it seems we generally revert back to our old ways anyway after our rebellion.
BELIEVING IN CHANGE
Now comes the part where you start making small changes to become that charismatic guy you‟ve always wanted to be. Or, whoever it is you want to be- it‟s your choice.
25 | S O C I A L A T T I T U D E A N D M I N D S E T The problem you faced in seeing that charismatic guy or James Bond is that you felt “It is not who I am.”
Clearly we need to change that limiting belief. So remember the rule about contradictions…
Change is a very emotionally charged word. We are so set in our ways that even the idea of interrupting them will cause our own internal Armageddon.
I like to think of change a little bit lighter than that.
I define change as NOT DOING WHAT YOU ONCE DID.
For example, you probably stay away from approaching somebody out of fear. To say you have changed only requires that instead of staying away- you approach and start a conversation.
Ah, but then the infamous, “I did it, but I‟m still scared of doing it again” dilemma comes into play.
I don‟t know why changes have to be seen as so dramatic. We want to be able to wash away all our fears in one big swoop.
Changes can be a small progression, or they can happen in one big life-changing drama.
So let me point out how change works just to clarify the process to you.