Challenge The Stories You Tell Yourself

Bob is a big car guy. He loves horsepower. The rumble of a classic glasspack muffler is like a symphony to his ears. He has a buddy who owns a mint condition 1968 Corvette Roadster, cherry red.

Bob has salivated over that car for years. Suddenly the car is for sale and Bob had better move fast because his friend is already getting feelers from other car enthusiasts. Bob quickly goes to his broker and pulls thousands of dollars from his already eroded retirement fund. He buys the car of his dreams and is sure this is the happiest day of his life.

He takes the Corvette out for its first road test. It’s a beautiful day. Wind blows in his face as he races down a country highway.

Bob isn’t sure what he’s enjoying most, the noise and vibration of all that horsepower he’s riding or the surge of testosterone through his body.

Then, out of nowhere, a young boy appears and throws a rock smack into the side of Bob’s dream car. Wham!

Bob’s immediate thought goes something like “Hmm, let’s see. In this jurisdiction would what I’m about to do constitute cold-blooded murder or would it simply be justifiable homicide?” Well, something like that. Let’s just say that Bob instantly shifts gears from being a gratified automobile enthusiast to being a raving maniac in the grasp of a serious case of road rage. He slams on the brakes, throws the Corvette into reverse, and burns rubber all fifty yards back to where the rock-thrower is standing. But instead of finding a boy with a look of terror on his face, he discovers a boy with a look of pleading, even supplication. “Mister, I’m so sorry about hitting your car with a rock. But I’ve tried to flag down other people and nobody will stop. My little brother is over there in the tall grass. He’s had a seizure and we’ve lost his medicine. Can you please help us?”

How does Bob feel now? How do you feel now?

In an instant, Bob is transformed from a raging hothead ready to do damage to a child a fraction of his age … to a compassionate and empathic grownup willing to provide grownup help to someone in need.

Why the quick turnaround? With a fresh set of data (a boy taking a risk to help his little brother versus a punk kid doing vandalism), Bob changed his “story.” With a fresh story came a new set of feelings. And with a new set of feelings came a very different kind of action: help rather than harm.

That’s the power of the stories we tell ourselves.

On a drive along California’s central coast, I noticed an interesting bumper sticker on the vehicle in front of me: “Don’t believe everything you think.”

Unlike most bumper stickers, this one caused me to ponder the layers of meaning and even to challenge—well, to challenge my own thinking.

Everything we do is a product of our thinking. Every single act is rooted in a thought. Our thoughts may be subtle or even unconscious, but they nevertheless are at the root of our behavior.

Here’s how it works. Let’s say you’re with a group of people and they laugh at you. Based on that observation, you instantly tell yourself a story. It goes something like “They’re mocking me. They’re ridiculing me. They’re belittling my ideas.” That story then spawns a feeling, which could range from hurt to anger. You then act on that feeling. Maybe you defend yourself, or go silent, or even get up and leave.

Here’s another scenario. You’re with a group of people and they laugh at you. Based on that observation, you instantly tell yourself a story. It goes something like “It’s really fun to be with my friends. That’s why we decided to hold this Super Bowl party. They’re not laughing at me out of ridicule, but out of friendship and camaraderie.” That story then spawns feelings that could range from amusement to outright joy. You then act on that feeling. Maybe you join in the laughter, maybe you poke fun at the other guy. You enjoy the moment.

Do you see the difference? In both instances, people laughed at you. But your path to action produced vastly different behaviors, and the critical variable was the story you told yourself. The difference was your thinking.

At one time or another, most of us have claimed that our emotions—our feelings—are imposed on us, that we have no control. Have you ever said something like “He makes me so mad!”? The reality, tough though it may be to swallow, is that nobody can make us be mad, or glad, or sad, or anything else. We choose our feelings based on the stories we tell ourselves. Then our feelings lead to actions that produce results. If we don’t like our results we can challenge our own thinking, be- cause what we think is what launches us on our path to action that produces our results.

At first blush, this idea may come across as a touchy-feely mind game. It’s not. The ability to improve our results by challenging our own thinking is one of the most powerful skills we can develop. It can unlock our true potential by freeing us from the constraints of the stories we often tell ourselves.