164 You are Following the Rules of a Child

This is Anne with your Coaching on the Go, talking about another type of rule that you may have in your rule arsenal right now, and that’s the absolute rule, the black and white, the all or nothing. 

These rules are written in a childlike format. 

It’s funny, isn’t it, that the rules sound like they were written by children? 

Because most of our rules were adapted and adopted by us before we were seven. 

So we were children, so a lot of our rules are absolutes. 

So it’s really helpful to look into those and see how you could soften them or make them broader so that they can work for you, because absolute rules often step on the toes of another rule. 

So maybe to help your family, you would have to leave work and your commitment to work.

And you have another rule about being committed to what you say you’re going to do, which is something you have at work. 

So if you leave work to help your family, you don’t feel right, and if you don’t leave work to help your family, you don’t feel right. 

How could you create a new rule that would allow you to have satisfaction in both areas?

So if you have rules like this, I want you to audit today. 

Think about rules you have that are all or nothing. 

When I think about the last couple of years with my family, I know that some of my rules were rigid. 

They were about how you always or never, and I shifted those to also include balance, that they have balance for me and my health and my business and my life, and also service to family.

There are a lot of rules we have around our behavior, like eating, sleeping, exercising, that come from a long time ago. 

That you need to exercise a certain number of days per week to be happy and healthy, or you can’t eat a certain food or you have to eat certain foods, or you have to eat dessert at a certain time or you have to eat snacks at a certain time.

So when you look at your rules, the absolute rules, how can you soften those? 

So in the last five years or so, I realized that I can have a sugar addiction. 

So for a while I had a rule that I was eliminating sugar. 

I had to eliminate sugar. 

Well, I grew up in a baker’s family, and baking and serving desserts is one of the joys of my life.

So if my new rule is around never eating sugar, that’s really difficult. 

Or if I have a rule that when someone makes a treat and it’s made with love, I need to eat it or I’ll hurt their feelings. 

That’s a rule that’s also going to be difficult for me when I’m trying to stay away from sugar. 

So how could I rewrite my rule so that I can still enjoy receiving from somebody, enjoy what they created, and not go overboard on eating sweets that I don’t want to be eating?

So I created a rule where I taste. 

I take a small taste of something. 

Or I have another part of the rule where on a certain day of the week, I have an all-out dessert that I enjoy, and that’s a day when I typically see family. 

So I’ve restructured my rule so that it can work for me, that it’s softer for me and that it can allow me to acknowledge and honor the different aspects of other rules that I have altogether, and it’s not punitive. 

So today’s rule discussion is around rules that you’ve created that are absolute, black and white. 

You’re doing it or you’re not doing, you’re succeeding or you’re failing. 

How can you shift those rules so that they can accommodate your life? 

So that you don’t feel like you’re being punished and you have the wiggle room to honor yourself, what you enjoy, what you like to contribute to, and also give yourself a structure that feels great. 

That’s your coaching for today. 

I would love to hear what you’re revamping in your rules. 

I would love to see you post a rule that you discovered that was absolute into the Facebook page, and then what you’ve chosen to do to rewrite or edit that rule so that it works better for you now.

That’s your homework, if you’re daring enough to do it. 

I’d love to see that and I will comment on it in the Facebook page.