You’ve come farther than you realize

It’s important to reflect— identify mile markers and take inventory to know where you are now, where you came from, what worked, what didn’t, what you’d like to try differently next time, what you’ve already tried and how it turned out.

This insight becomes your toolkit, a guide to help you navigate the next steps.

I find if I don’t pay attention, the things keep happening the same way over and over. The only thing that can make it different is if I break that pattern and do something differently.

Nothing changes if nothing changes. Sometimes you don’t know where the change needs to be made even, so that’s why you start with reflection.

Reflection gives you a birds eye view where you can start to see patterns that you might not see by just being in the day-to-day of it.

It’s such a powerful tool. It requires you to pay attention and start being an observer of your own life. And when you do, you’d be surprised what you start to uncover. 

There’s so many amazing things that have come out of that too. Realizing how much you actually have grown, or where you are growing where you didn’t realize and are finally giving yourself credit for.

You can see your own progress and feel good that you are moving forward where maybe you were feeling you were stuck or stagnant.

It’s an incredible eye-opener across the entire spectrum.

Some things will be a joy to notice and process and others will be surprising and may well bring you to tears. But the beauty is, you have the power to do things differently.

You may not be able to change what happened, but you can change how you think about those experiences, how you’ll handle similar situations in the future and you can use your previous experience to make more educated decisions for your now. 

And that is where all the growth and your power in your own life lies. It’s in your hands. And you already have everything you need to start taking those first steps to being the director of your own life story.

Maybe what seemed like the end of the movie, is now only the beginning and you’re better, wiser now, and now the possibilities are open ended. You’ve gone down this road before, but you’re more experienced, more prepared and this time around it’ll be smoother and since time too has changed things, maybe the terrain has changed slightly and you’ll notice new things you didn’t notice before. And this experience will become something completely new. And the old will fade away in it’s severity and be replaced by the more recent and you can look back and be grateful for the first, knowing that the second is so good because of everything the first one opened your eyes to. 

It all starts with reflection.