Help yourself

If you want to become more aware of the role of your personality in your life, you might start for instance with becoming aware of the results he created in your life. As long as those results are judged to be quite successful, it is not very likely that you will start to look for a different approach, why should you. And your personality is very creative in labeling situations as successful, so do not expect him to be the one to start the discussion on what he made from your life.

That is also why he does not like it when other people start that discussion, e.g. like therapists do, that is a place where he only wants to end when he really no longer can make his world work, or when it is somehow "granted" that his personality will be accepted as it is (maybe that is why coaching becomes so popular these days, this creates the illusion that only optimalization may be necessary, rather than errors to be corrected.

And yet, some form of contrast is needed before you can start with becoming aware. Because you simply have to somehow face the fact that the ways of your personality do not bring you anything you want, maybe just in one situation, to be prepared to let that go. It is of course an option to wait until things get so very unpleasant that it cannot be hidden anymore and then deal with it. But you can also help yourself every now and then through a little exercise. It may seem so simple, but your personality simply does not come up with questions like:

- what is it that I feel most guilty about at this moment
- who do I hate the most at this moment
- who do I blame the most at this moment
- what do I like the least about myself at this moment
- what is my greatest worry at this moment

It is very likely that even while reading the above list, your personality will tell you things like: this is nonsense, do not even start with thinking about this, you do not have time for this kind of things, I know that, etc. But still, if you set a little time apart and hold one of those questions in your mind without actively entertaining it (searching for answers, discussing) and then write down whatever comes to mind without getting attached to the outcome, you will find that not only an answer will come up, but that it probably is a thing that you have carried with you for a long time.

Your personality does want you to feel guilty about all kinds of things, in that way he can hold his grip on you because you will start looking at him for solutions. But he does not want you to become aware of the real nature of guilt. Your personality is at his best when issues are vague, feelings not too outstanding so that you will only react to the effects and forget looking for the causes.

What will it bring you when you do an exercise like this? Awareness of a situation that arouses unpleasant feelings, that is likely to manifest itself in various ways. Will you be able to deal with that or let go all the time? No, but you do not have to. Becoming aware is enough. Face the things that you have written down unconditionally. And make the conscious choice to no longer strengthen this set of thoughts. Because it does not only cost a lot of energy to uphold these interpretations, it too costs a lot of energy to keep them from your awareness most of the time.

Remember: all this does not mean anything in itself, unless you interpret and judge it yourself. Now tear the paper into little pieces and throw it away. You have moved on a little step.