6. Telling Stories That Limit Ourselves or Others

Humans have always been storytellers. From early ancient writings in caves to today’s social media frenzy, we use stories to share who we are and who we want to be.

But what about the stories that depict who we were, but that really don’t apply anymore? What about the ceilings we put on other people, needing to define others in a black or white way for us to have more control and understanding of who they are?

STORIES FROM OUR PAST

We too easily put boundaries on defining who we are. While hardships some of us faced as children helped to shape us, likely in both positive and negative ways, they do not have to limit who we are today.

We tell our stories to get people to understand us and what we’ve been through. But often, when we tell these stories over and over again to ourselves and others, we begin to label and identify ourselves as victims. We may have been victims then, but we choose to remain victims if we allow everything in our life to reinforce these stories.

We stay stuck in these stories and allow life to further prove that our stories remain true. For example, if we learn early in life that we can’t trust people, we might subconsciously continue to fill our life with untrustworthy people. We can then say, “See, I was right!”

If we’ve only dated jerks or manipulative women, we tell the story that all men or women are like that, and we attract more of the same because it’s what we know. While we may be sad or mad about the partners we choose, it is always our choice. We settle for what’s familiar and comfortable. Sadly, what feels familiar, comfortable and safe can also feel sad, lonely or unhappy.

We might want to change these feelings by attracting a different partner, but we have to change first and work through why these feelings became familiar and comfortable in the first place.

Without foundational work to shift our personal norms, we may miss out on relationships with people who would prove our story wrong. We know we want a kind, honest and supportive partner, but we may not know how to interact or respond emotionally to foreign behavior, so we revert back to our tainted view of our past so we can stay in our comfort zone and continue to tell our story. Because, without our story, we don’t know who we are.

Lessons repeat until we change and grow from them. Since we are the common thread in the relationships and circumstances in our lives, recurring themes in our lives won’t change unless we personally change something first.

We know our past really well, and we’ve been practicing our stories for years, but we’re not leaving room for the present to be different from our past. We think we want something different, but we don’t know how to get it.

If deep down we want to change our story, we have to take the time and do the work to change our role in the story.

Why don’t we want to change our stories? Because healing can be hard, forgiveness can be harder, and accepting truths around these experiences can be the most heartbreaking part of all. But we shouldn’t be victims of the same story forever. We owe it to our adult selves to move on and re-write our story. If we start living the story we want to be true, we’ll attract what or who we need to make it true. If we change what we believe, we will change our reality.

Don’t let your past determine your future. Your past can be a stepping-stone instead of defining your entire path. Let go of past beliefs that might once have been true that don’t have to be true anymore. Believe you can define your life and yourself as so much more than any ceiling you were born under.

STORIES ABOUT OTHER PEOPLE

It’s too easy to use another’s perceived faults or weaknesses to make ourselves feel better. I never realized how much I did this (how awful, right? No “nice” person would do this!) until I tapped into the storytelling I did about others.

For me, it seemed innocent enough. I was simply telling true accounts of behavior or situations I witnessed, whether to myself or out loud. But in actuality, I was telling stories about people that affirmed the box I put them in, the label I gave them and the ceiling I put them under. If it didn’t reinforce the label, I didn’t add it to the story to create dimension. If it didn’t fit my story about them, I threw it out like it never happened and didn’t exist.

The problem with needing to make sense of someone in such a definitive way is that it is delusional. It simply isn’t true for any of us. We feel safer when we can label someone and figure them out, but it’s hardly foolproof. “Good people” are capable of bad behavior. “Bad people” are capable of good behavior.

We can assess a partner or parent or stranger as a “good person,” therefore ignoring or justifying any “bad” behavior. We don’t hold them accountable or even acknowledge it. We might tell stories that someone is ignorant or incompetent, not giving credit for instances where this does not prove true. We throw out their behavior as a fluke or ignore it because it doesn’t fit our label or story about them. The problem is that we still process the truth on a soul level, and then subconsciously we don’t know what to do other than to bury it.

To clean this up, we have to be comfortable accepting the complexity of humans, especially those who have influence in our lives. We might be creating a more surface relationship to protect our story rather than the truth. Being able to see one another for our brightest and darkest facets is how we are truly seen and can make deep connections. It’s also how we make decisions to detach from unhealthy relationships that are putting a ceiling on our own potential for health and happiness.

We miss out on true connections when we choose to only see and reinforce the “good” or “bad” aspects to keep our story straight. It’s important to be forever curious about discovering the endless facets of who other people are, as we are generally forever discovering the endless facets of who we are as individuals. We are all changing, some moving farther away from our true selves and some moving closer. The stories we tell likely only capture a few of our many facets in a moment in time.

Most of my experience telling stories wasn’t based on labeling people “good” or “bad” specifically. My proclivity was to not honor another’s ability to have duality in general. One failed attempt doesn’t mean someone can’t succeed on an-other attempt. One emotional reaction doesn’t mean every decision is void of strategy. Even if half the information we process “about” someone tells us something, it doesn’t mean they can’t surprise us at any time with positive or negative behavior we can’t predict.

Telling stories that are based on a convenient attachment to selected moments instead of the spectrum of witnessed truths is only telling a story about who we are. We can allow others to be capable of “good” and “bad” behavior, to make “smart” decisions and decisions that don’t produce the desired outcome, and to have moments of weakness and moments of strength. We can release our need to attach labels and judgments to people in order for us to feel safer or better able to predict the behavior of others.

ACCEPTING COMPLEXITY DOESN’T MEAN ACCEPTING ALL BEHAVIOR IN OUR LIVES

The stories we tell, in this context, may be exaggerated and biased either positively or negatively, but they are equally dangerous because they are both rooted in a denial of truth. Even though accepting the complex nature of humans is an important component of stopping our story telling, it doesn’t result in having to accept all behavior in our lives.

Not telling stories doesn’t mean we can’t distance ourselves from people whose behavior generally hasn’t been kind to us. If their behavior becomes kind in the future, we can decide to reconnect in a way that feels best for us as we see circumstances change.

We don’t have to allow someone in our lives if they aren’t coming from a loving and symbiotic intention for a relationship. We know kind and loving actions when we feel them, and we know when someone is interacting with us because they truly care about us or when they are using us.

We can evaluate our involvement in a relationship with someone who is intentionally dishonest, not honoring relationship agreements, or not proving they carry integrity with their word.

We can trust our judgment as circumstances and people change (or don’t) to live in the flow of life without labels, stories or limitations. It’s okay to let others earn our love, time and respect. We are all capable of offering a kind, loving, honest, respectful and symbiotic relationship, and no one is entitled to treat us poorly and then expect unconditional love and respect in return.