The biggest lie in personal growth
There is a huge lie in the personal growth and development industry.
The lie goes something like this: if you just keep working on yourself long enough, if you just keep healing and clearing and therapizing every story your parents gave you, eventually those old wounds will pack their bags, take a long vacation, and never bother you again.
Which sounds lovely. Except it is not true.
Here is the truth: I have been coaching clients for over 15 years. I have done my own work too, enough that I should have a PhD in self-help by now. And here is what I see: those old stories never really go away. They resurface. Usually at the exact worst time. The middle of a launch. When a client backs out. The moment you finally decide to get more visible.
In my RISE Business Academy class today, we talked about sales conversations.
The key to getting more of them is to get more visible.
Which sounds simple until you realize visibility is like a neon light shining directly on your deepest childhood fears. Suddenly you are not just posting on Instagram. You are back at the family dinner table, replaying what it meant to speak up, to not be perfect, to risk disappointing someone.
One client shared that as a kid, she was only allowed to be visible if she stayed in the role of the “good girl” and only said and did what was comfortable and safe for her parents.
Another told us that if she wasn’t the best, it wasn’t even worth trying. And the moment she was the best, her father would simply raise the bar to the next level. “We couldn’t ever be enough,” she said.
Both of those beliefs are still showing up in their businesses today.
And then came the million-dollar question: Why am I not done with this yet? Why can’t I just move past it?
Because the lie told us we should be. That healing is a straight line with a finish line. That one day you will arrive at the magical land of “all cleared up.”
But we do not live in a linear universe. Growth is not a one-and-done checklist. Those stories are woven into who we are. They shaped us. And they are not going to vanish.
Here is what does change. You get wiser. You develop what I call your Observer. That voice that sits right between your heart and your head and says in the moment, “Hey, you don’t have to collapse on the couch for three days. This rejection is not about you. You can choose differently right now.”
That is the real work. Not erasing the past, but learning to recognize it, honor it, and then make a different choice in the present.
You see we live in an upward moving spiral, and as we get older and wiser we move up that spiral and our Observers become stronger. So that eventually we have enough space in the present moment to let go of our old beliefs and wounds in each moment and make different choices.
Which also means this: you are not broken. You are not behind. You are not failing at healing. You are human.
And your collection of stories, beliefs, and wounds is actually a gift. Because those are the very pieces that give you wisdom, compassion, and strength to lead and to grow.
So the next time your old stories pop up when your launch doesn’t work, or your client starts to complain or you get an unexpected bill, remember, you are not meant to “clear them all.”
You are meant to walk forward anyway, with your Observer by your side, and choose a different, healthier response.
That is growth.
Questions? Email me at support@revenuebreakthrough.com or jump into our Facebook group here.
