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Self-coaching for a Smoother Path towards Self-improvement
I have found in striving for goals that some form of self-coaching helps inspire and direct my efforts.
My self-communions in a journal consist of admonishments and advice-giving and many “you should” that have a motivating impact on getting me to follow the acts necessary to fulfill personal goals. Whether they work or not is always problematic, except for times of recent relapse. Then the engine of determination gets re-ignited.
The impact is attenuated by resistance because of unconscious vindictiveness, low self-confidence, or various fears, none of which can be validated.
Self-Directed Dialogues
By returning to these self-directed dialogues every day, compliance brings a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction. Noncompliance inevitably brings guilt, frustration, and new resolves to “do better.”
Carl Elliot, in his book Better than Well, argues that to ‘to thine own self be true’ articulates the notion of authenticity as a moral ideal. We each have a way of living that is uniquely our own and we are each called to live in our way rather than that of someone else.
Self-Coaching for Progress
Elliot argues that the original idea was that you needed to be in touch with your feelings to know how to do the right thing. It was an…