Welcome to Personal Growth Lifestyle. Real talk. Real results. I’m your host battle-tested empath, author, and motivational speaker, Lisa Latimer. 

So, I’m really sorry to have to start off the first episode with some bad news. But you and I, we have been sold a bag of bull-ish by many, many gurus out there. We’ve been sold this idea for far too long, that we’re supposed to wake up in the morning, and just go and operate without looking at the years decades worth of valuable files in our minds,

Literally to put our hands and our hot frying pan, rather than using a spatula to get our food out. Because if we used some of that information, we would know that we’ve learned our lesson and that we’re going to get burned. But these gurus are telling us that we’re supposed to just wake up in the morning and go without reference. So if you are tired of tripping over your own two feet, whenever you feel like you’re making progress, you’re dealing with that three steps forward two steps backward type of deal, you’re gonna want to stick around for this episode.

Today, I’m going to call bullshit on the idea that we don’t need our past, that our past is something that we can just safely abandon, not look back at, don’t need it, that it holds us down puts us in a bad headspace and all the other nonsense that we’re told by so many gurus that all the damage that our past does to us.

I’m going to talk to you today during this episode about why we need our pasts why we need to roll up our sleeves and dig into our past. If we really truly want to create a healthy, fulfilled life where we’re attracting everything and everyone that we want, need, and deserve. We’re going to see what happens when we neglect all of that valuable information all of those hard-learned lessons, like burning our hands on a hot stove or on a frying pan. And last I’m going to share my go-to mental shift tip for getting into your past without fear, embarrassment, or shame.

And don’t forget to stick around until the end. Because as promised, I’m going to drop one to three thought-provoking questions at the end of every episode. That can also serve as journal prompts because I’m a huge believer in reflection and journaling. And if you put that together, you have what I refer to as reflective journaling. So let’s jump right into why do we need our past.

So I’m going to ask you this one question. What do you stumble onto an ancient archeological site? And instead of getting dirty, and sweaty and making life and history-changing discoveries? Would you instead decide to just kick those artifacts out of your way and continue just walking right past them? I think we both know the answer to that. You would be crazy. You’d be batshit out of your mind crazy to just walk past something so interesting. So valuable. So revealing, and not even stop and investigate it.

So just like artifacts tell us how ancient cultures lived, give us clues as to what the world was like. Our past gives us all sorts of insight into the who’s what’s whens whereas hows and whys of our selves, where the hell else would we go? To understand why For example, we attract men who don’t fully let us in, or why we attract friends who flake out on us left and right or why we spend outrageous money on shipping. We don’t need wood, we look to our future to tell us why we do things that we’ve done in our past knew, it’s pretty obvious.

And yet we have been falling for this advice, and really running in circles like a dog chasing its tail for far too long. So our past is where we uncover the origins of the false truths and self-limiting beliefs that hold us back. And keep us operating from a place of fear and doubt, rather than empowerment. And just a quick to backtrack.

So a false truth is something that you hear repeated to you. So frequently, it could be by your close group of friends or family. It could be something that’s repeated so often in the media or popular culture. And even though it’s not a fact, it’s just something that has such a large consensus of people believing it and repeating it, but it feels like a fact we treat it like an absolute. Now, a self-limiting belief is similar to false truth. But it’s something that like it says, something that you believe about yourself, that keeps you operating in a very narrow box and limiting your opportunities.

So let’s just say for example, you believe that relationships and in cheating, and perhaps you’re living the self-limiting belief, or behavior, that you need to close yourself off to the idea of finding love, you’re just not going to put yourself out there. Perhaps if you’re buying into the false truth that all relationships end in cheating, perhaps you’re enacting the self-limiting belief that you know what I’m gonna cheat on my partner, because I’m assuming it’s gonna happen anyway. And I don’t want to be the one that gets played. And I don’t want to feel like the fool. Right? So you beat them to the punch. If you hope to get to a point where you can be part of a healthy relationship, your only choice. And the only choice we ever have with false truths and self-limiting beliefs, is to kick them right in the ass.

You do that? You do that ass-kicking, by reflecting on the experiences that brought you to that conclusion that brought you to that false truth and that self-limiting belief. Now, perhaps, you witnessed going with this example of cheating, perhaps you witnessed a parent being cheated on when you were growing up, either by your other parent or partners that that parent had. Perhaps you’ve been the one that’s been cheated on in the past, or your friends have had bad experiences with cheaters, which really just affirms that false truth, right, or that self-limiting belief.

When we have other people around us that are close to us, that are experiencing and sharing and partaking in that same experience. It makes that experience seem all the more truthful and factual. Now I know myself, I always had really close guy friends at different stages in my life. And I would feel both cringy and fascinated, I hate to say, but I did feel a little fascinated at the absolute balls, of what degree of fuckery they’d pull on partners and people that they were dealing with, it was insane. And that led to my own false truths about relationships coupled with my actual experience experiencing narcissists abuse relationships that involve cheating. Of course, I don’t think there’s a narcissist abuse relationship that doesn’t involve cheating.

 So that for a long time became my idea of normalcy and relationships. Oh, that’s just something that happens from time to time. You know, cheating is just something that couples have to deal with from time to time. And they either get over it or they break up, but that’s between them. What do you think happened with that attitude about cheating? Well, I attracted cheaters. Yes, I attracted more cheaters. So these false truths and self-limiting beliefs really wind up kicking us in the ass and setting us up for failure. It’s like creating a self-fulfilling prophecy every time it will get you every time.

So here’s a fun fact, in order to identify your self-sabotaging patterns, false truths, limiting beliefs, to break them and to begin to replace them with healthy patterns. You have to stop and take a look behind you at your past. But what happens when we ignore our past like we’re so frequently told to do? I call it the Michael Myers effect. Now if you’re not familiar with the horror film, franchise Halloween, it goes something like this. You have Laurie strode who’s played by Jamie Lee Curtis. And she is just relentlessly stalked by her brother Michael Myers, who wears this white mask that is completely expressionless.

 And just is a complete psycho killer and every time poor Laurie kills him, and I swear to you, she kills him a different way. Every time. She goes back to living her life, and here comes Halloween part 25 not even joking with you. I don’t even know what number that franchise is on by now. He’s back, and she is back to trying to finally kill Michael for good.

Well, our past behaves a lot like Michael Myers or any other horror movie creeper. That just keeps miraculously rising from the grave. No matter how gruesomely, you slaughtered it. No matter how deep and well-buried you thought you had it. Quick question. How many times have you been out here in the world, feeling like you finally hit your stride. You know that feeling where you’re just like, I’m living my best life and out of nowhere, something from your past sends you stumbling or just completely flying into a brick wall.

Perhaps a self-sabotaging pattern, like cheating, maybe binge eating or drinking until you blackout. Perhaps a false truth. Like the all men cheat. Money is the root of all evil, or a self-limiting belief. Like, oh, I’m not smart enough to do X, Y, and Z. Or nobody will want me at this size. No matter what it is pick your poison. Because God knows we all have our kryptonite. Not dealing with your past, bites you in the ass in so many different ways. It’s time that we open our eyes and get conscious of it and get ahead of this fear that we have about delving into our pasts.

So why are we just absolutely delighted to listen to the Guru’s and toss a burning match to our past? Well, as we kind of touched on before, let’s be honest, it’s just easier to do that. Right? It allows us to become our own enablers in a sense. It’ll allows us to really avoid times that we’ve been hurt, perhaps even devastated or made someone else feel that way. It comforts us into believing that we can indulge in a degree of laziness, and somehow still get the results in life, in love and business, in our health, still get the results that we desire. The main reason though, and I think you’ll agree with me on this. The main reason that we’re happy to part with our past is because we fear that our past somehow defines us, it’s somehow going to haunt us, and, you know, the spirit of who we were, or who we weren’t even is gonna come back and possess us in our future. So here’s my quick mental shift tip to help you step away from that fear of reflecting on your past.

Don’t look at your past, as a definition, this kind of strict rigid definition of who you are and who you’re going to be forever. As humans, we are meant to evolve. In fact, one of the things I hate so much when people get into an I hate politics or together. But when people get into these political discussions, I hate when people say, or use the term flip-flopping. Because I think a lot of times, we say someone is flip-flopping. And that robs them of the ability to do what we’re all here to do, which is evolve. 

Our self-awareness evolves, our opinions evolve, our interactions evolve, our entire human experience is made to evolve, you’re not a fixed object, you’re closer to water. And being able to move with fluidity. We get this screwed up time and time again, of course, by allowing the perceptions of other people to make us feel like we have to be boxed into certain labels and identifications. Again, one of the biggest reasons that I hate politics and politicians, no one works harder to put those labels on us and to place us in those boxes.

So look at your past, as that ancient archaeological site, just as it gives valuable clues, but it doesn’t define mankind in totality, your past does the same thing. It gives you valuable clues. But it doesn’t define you in totality. It doesn’t say, Okay, you got to this point, and this is where it stops. Think about it. Think about some of the ancient discoveries that have been found, versus how we live today. Pretty safe to say that we have done a hell of a lot of evolving. And let me tell you something, you are evolving and will continue to evolve for the rest of your natural God-given life. Evolution is ongoing.

So take those past experiences and use them. Use them to your future selves advantage. Instead of being fearful of your past, take your power back from it, and use it to your advantage. So now that we’ve discussed why we shouldn’t ditch our past, what happens when we do and why we’re tempted to do so?

Here are two questions for you to reflect on.
The first question I’d love for you to reflect on is this.. name the top three self-sabotaging patterns that you experience at least every other month. So it could be something like not finishing what you start, it could be going back to a toxic ex or just a toxic friendship, family relationship, toxic relationship in general. And then the second thing that I want you to answer or reflect on is, what’s the false truth or a self-limiting belief that those self-sabotaging patterns belong to? In other words, what are the roots? What are the origins?

So if the self-sabotaging pattern is not finishing what you start, maybe you trace it back to having a bad habit of saying or believing that you never have motivation, you can’t find the motivation. As if motivation is hiding under a rock or something that you have to look up into the sky and try and capture. And if the self-sabotaging pattern is is going back to a toxic ex. Perhaps, perhaps you have a self limiting belief that you can’t or don’t deserve? Anyone better than that person. If you reflect on those questions, and I’m just going to give you two because you’re going to have a bit of reflecting to do with these questions. When you reflect on these questions and you start coming up with answers I want you to just brainstorm. Connect those dots. Have some time set aside for what I like to call organized chaos.

Where you kind of like the 80s pinball machines, you pull that handle back and let it go. And just watch that bowl, ping, and Pong. bouncing from one thing to the next. And pay attention to the memories that light up. And the things that make sense write them down. The things that don’t let them go. But when you do this on a regular basis, you’ll be able to uncover not only your patterns, but you’ll also be able to uncover experiences. Whether it was your own experience, something that you witnessed other people go through that that was the birthplace of that self-sabotaging type of behavior. And when you start coming up with some answers, I want you to email me. Email me right on my website, hit the email and shoot me an email and tell me all about what you’re finding because I want to celebrate with you. I love it.

I love getting emails, when someone has that aha moment. There’s, there are a few things in life, I’ll be honest with you, that excites me more than not only having my own aha moments, which I continue to have. But for hearing from you about your aha moments. Not only am I going to leave you today with the two questions, but I also want to leave you I’m huge on affirmations as well. I do my own personal affirmations for different aspects of my life, my kids do affirmations, it really leads to improved positive self-talk and mindset.
So if you’re still having a little bit of fear about going into your past, keep this affirmation in mind, repeat with me or after me.

My past is behind me, and does not define me. I use my past to my advantage. My past does not use me. I am safe in the presence. When I look back at my past. My past does not trap me. It liberates me. If you repeat that affirmation to yourself. On a daily basis, it will become intuitive for you to start thinking about the past, whether it was a week ago, six months ago or six years ago, we’re back to childhood memories, you get more comfortable. And in fact, that’s a great starting point. If going back 10 years feels a little too scary. Go back a week ago and start like that. I’m so big on self-awareness. 

So, if dipping your toe into your past is easier for you start with that. If jumping headfirst into your past is something that you’re totally comfortable with. And you want to really start getting these aha moments out. Go for it. But I will never tell you how to go about it in terms of what’s comfortable for you. You do you start where you can. It doesn’t matter as long as you start. So I’m leaving you with that in the first episode of personal growth lifestyle. We talked today about the idea that we don’t need our past, that we can light a match to it and burn it. I hope that I have done a good job because I feel so passionately about this point of showing you and helping you understand that your past is not something that you need to discard your past is not something that you need to be afraid of your past is something that you can step up to like a boss, show it that it’s your life and show your past that you own it. It doesn’t own you.

And please the next time you see a meme because the memes are all over social media. Whether it’s a meme or a guru actually saying it please chime in and let them know listen, I am not a delicate flower that’s just too fragile, to dig into her own past. Right. We are battle-tested empaths out here. Empath it’s a power. It’s not a weakness. So use your power. Make it work for you make your password work for you. I’m Lisa Latimer and this is episode one Personal Growth Lifestyle.

Are you ready to become your most valuable asset? Book a free chat with me at Lisa latimer.com. From there you can grab my Amazon bestseller “Who The Fuck Are You?! Increase self-awareness to gain clarity, silence fear, and create fulfillment in life in business”. You can also check out my courses, Self-Aware Goal-Setting and Speak it Into Existence with more courses to come. I’m Lisa Latimer and I’m helping you make personal growth part of your lifestyle.