Stop “Playing Small”

Lisa Marie Bobby:

Do you have a tendency to play small, meaning that you don’t like to take up a lot of space? Maybe you tread very lightly on other people’s feelings, often at the expense of your own. If you do need something, or heaven forbid, need to set a boundary with somebody else, you probably feel guilty about it.

If you want something or need something, you might tell yourself that you’re being too selfish or too much. If any of this is feeling familiar to you, chances are that you’ve been playing small in your life and it’s time to stop. stop. We’re going to be talking about why people play small in the first place and specifically how to overcome this and move towards self empowerment.

We will also be taking a look at some really powerful inspiration to change your mindset. And then lastly, I’m going to be loading you in up with assignments and free resources to do this work. I’m your host, Dr. Lisa Marie Bobby. My background, I’m a licensed psychologist, a licensed marriage and family therapist, a board certified coach, and I’m the founder of Growing Self Counseling and Coaching.

And what I love more than anything is hanging out here with you to talk about your growth and the changes that we all need to make in order to create more love, happiness, and joy. and success in our lives. We talk about relationships. We talk about personal growth. We talk about self actualization and even professional development.

But today’s topic is so important because if you are playing small, it’s difficult to get what you want and deserve in every area of your life. And it is crucially important that we learn how to become more self empowered from the inside out. Why is this so important? Why do we need to stop playing small and figure out how to become truly self empowered?

self empowered. It’s because literally nobody can do this for you. You have got to be your own hero, your own champion, that person who tells you, yes, you can. Yes, you will. And yes, It’s okay for you to be amazing. We all have to learn how to do that ourselves. So to dive right in, first of all, let’s take a look at some of the key signs you are playing small to see which one of these are right.

are on your bingo card. First of all, minimizing yourself. If something great happens or you get recognition for something or even a compliment, are you the first one to tear yourself down and talk about the negative aspects of something less you seem like you’re too full of yourself? Or do you have this even subconscious mindset that tells you that other people are more important, that their feelings matter more than yours, and it’s better for you to be uncomfortable?

Or sad than maybe making somebody else uncomfortable or sad. If you need something, if you want something, if you ask for something, God forbid, you set a boundary. Do you immediately feel like maybe you shouldn’t have, and that was wrong of you to do and kind of bad about yourself. Ooh, welcome to the club.

This internal mental narrative that says. I’m too much, or it’s too much, and this could be you being big. If you have ambitions, if you have goals, it’s the very next thought, it’s too much. Or if you are a student, Asserting yourself or behaving in a confident way, is that followed up by this feeling of, oh, I’m being too much right now.

Something bad is gonna happen. Whew, my friend. You are not alone. I have had. So many of these same struggles my whole life too. It is safe to play small and it is our responsibility to grow past this so that we can create the love, happiness, and success that we truly do deserve. So, let’s just start by taking a look at why this happens.

People play small and diminish their self worth for a variety of reasons. Many times, this can be rooted in past experiences, but also things like suspicion. societal influences, and more than anything, our mindset and our personal beliefs. So here are some common factors and as we talk through these, I want you to be thinking about which of these is probably true for you.

First of all, you might fear being judged or people liking you less. If you assert yourself or if they see you pursuing your goals, we all know intellectually that this is probably rooted in their own issues, but it doesn’t change the fact that we also desire approval. We want to be accepted. Accepted for ourselves, right?

And so when we want to be approved by others, we crave that validation, that acceptance, right? And so we don’t want to do things that we fear would change the way other people feel about us, that they might like us less. We might alienate other people or displease them if we’re a little too much, right?

Another thing though that can be a big driver of playing small is that when we have low self esteem or low self worth and negative thoughts and feelings about our own competence, our own confidence. Maybe you had a harsh parent who criticized you, maybe you experienced failure in a way that led you to feel ashamed of it, you weren’t supported in a growth mindset, or maybe you have had legitimately very difficult or even traumatic things happen in your life that led you to feel small, weak, or powerless.

This understandably can cause all of us to doubt ourselves, doubt our abilities, doubt our worth, leads to things like imposter syndrome, and really like believing that other people are better than we are, even if it’s subconscious. Maybe that’s not a fully formed thought, but it’s still in there deep down.

And that can be difficult to manage, but it’s absolutely possible. The other thing that can oftentimes happen to many of us, particularly women, is that there can be a lot of societal conditioning around expectations, around who we should be, that can discourage things like assertiveness, Empowerment, feeling like it’s okay to go after your goals and, you know, have this mindset that what I want and how I feel is actually important.

This can turn into a tendency to place small and diminish ourselves so as not to, you know, be disliked or make it seem like. seem like we’re out for ourselves rather than caring about. And this is especially important if you come from a culture that really emphasizes humility, conformity, and discourages anything like self promotion or assertiveness, because that can really impact the way that we show up with other people, but it can also change our mindset.

But wait, there’s more. Additionally, things like having a fear of failure or risk aversion, you know, that it’s scary to put yourself out there and make mistakes. Something really bad could happen if I take chances, if I say I’m going to do something and then it turns out I can’t, that would be catastrophic.

This kind of mental narrative can prevent you from taking bold actions or setting ambitious goals because it feels safer to just shelter in place and not even try. Additionally, perfectionism can lead us to diminish ourselves and make ourselves small because we’re afraid of not being perfect. This belief that we have to be great, we have to be perfect all the time can lead to So many problems when it comes to empowerment because we stop challenging ourselves.

We avoid situations where we don’t actually know that we’re going to be perfect in them. And this limits our ability to grow and develop ourselves. Let’s not forget good old fashioned people pleasing tendencies going into this deeply rooted desire not just to be liked, but to feel the sense that you’re taking care of other people’s emotions for them.

That other people’s feelings are your responsibility and that a lot of your energy goes into managing that. Lastly, I love you. Lack of role models, who are the stars, who are the role models that exemplify confidence and assertiveness, but who are also liked and admired and appreciated for who and what they are.

If we can’t look around and see other people going after what they want in a way that is appropriate for them. admirable, desirable, and something to like inspire us, it’s difficult to feel confident in our own needs and desires and ambitions. And that’s only one of the reasons why it’s so important for all of us to be in environments and communities where we are around people who are going after it, who are assertive and confident and unapologetically Transcription by CastingWords So there are so many things that can all contribute to feeling like you need to be this little itty bitty person so that you don’t bother other people or have people hate you basically.

But there is actually one thing that in my experience as a therapist and a coach that leads people to minimize themselves and that is a deep discomfort with their own dark energy. emotions. Noticing I am not calling them negative emotions or bad emotions. I am calling them dark emotions because they are fantastic.

Especially anger. When we reject our anger and have these core beliefs around, it’s not okay for me to be mad, that gets in the way of your ability to us. Assert self and feel confident and go after hard. A lot of people socialized out of anger. We believe that it is bad to be mad and it’s not. It’s actually really protective and where this comes in for playing.

small is that when we are diminishing ourselves and our own success and our own future in order to help other people feel better about themselves, if you listen to this quiet inner angry voice that can say, wait just a minute, that’s not true. That is not okay. I do deserve more and I don’t deserve to be treated this way.

Oh, wait a minute. I’m actually treating myself this way. That is a super positive thing because anger is very protective. Anger is a positive emotion. It mobilizes these self protective impulses that allow you to say, I do actually deserve more. It is okay for me to have good things just like other people.

And it is all right for me to assert myself, have healthy boundaries and ask for what I need, but actually go after what I need and deserve rather than waiting for somebody else to give it to me, if only I can be good enough. So. Keep an eye on whether or not you may have pushed down and rejected some healthy, legitimate anger and you might find some work to be done in that area.

But now let’s take a look at some of the things that will help us you. all feel more empowered and start feeling good about going after what we want. And this involves a combination of a number of different things. Most importantly, though, mindset shifts in order to feel okay about being big and amazing.

It’s It’s essential that you first have clarity into the existing mindset that you may not be fully conscious of, but that is narrating your actions, your beliefs, and your feelings. This requires digging in first of all to what self limiting mindsets you may be holding. Once you have clarity about what those are, you can replace them with self supporting statements that affirm your value, remind yourself of your strengths, your past achievements, but also that challenge limiting beliefs.

Statements that feel more positive, more empowering, and more self supporting. And for me, for a lot of people, this involves cultivating very deliberately something called a growth mindset. A growth mindset means that we can view challenges as opportunities to learn and grow and also understand that failure is actually part of this.

Nobody jumps out of the box and is able to do things perfectly and have everything go exactly the way that they want. We have to try things. We have to experiment. Experiment. Make messes fall on our faces as we develop. We cannot develop without giving ourselves permission to do that. And so the quicker that you can just accept the fact that this is actually not a bug, it is a feature, it is literally how growth and development works, the more comfortable you will be with challenging yourself, taking risks and allowing yourself to begin taking the actions.

that don’t maybe get you exactly where you want to go in the very beginning, because they won’t, because you haven’t mastered these things yet. But you’ll allow yourself to begin growing into the kind of person who can attain this. This is also what is going to be involved as you practice growing into someone who can be self empowered and self confident and self supportive.

This requires practice and you are not going to do that perfectly in the beginning. So don’t believe that you should. In addition to getting a very clear handle on your mindset and changing that intentionally, another big part of this is defining your vision, creating a vision, and being able to start dreaming and imagining what is possible for you.

And this is This can be nebulous at the very beginning. You might truly be disconnected from what you want because you haven’t allowed yourself to imagine that more is possible for you. But this is an important piece of this work to visualize your definition of success, what it looks like and what it would mean to you order to create that ideal reality.

It could be something related to the kind of relationship you want to be in, to your career, to something connected to things that you would like to do, or who you would like to be. How about that? But getting in contact with this vision and managing the mindset allows us to stop playing small. And then the last piece is to get real committed to being your own hero.

When we stop playing small is when we get connected in a very real way with the fact that we are actually capable of great things. We are not perfect. We are not more important than other people. But we are absolutely capable of learning, of growing, of creating our desired reality, and that our feelings, the things that we want might not be more important than those of other people, but they are as important.

And it is actually okay to do what we want, build the kinds of lives that we want, grow into the kind of person that we want to be, have good things, and be successful and accomplished in whatever definition that means to you. And here’s the thing. You actually get to decide what that means to you.

Anytime we’re looking outside of ourselves to someone else to tell us if it’s okay, if we are okay, if it’s all right to want what we want or do what we do, we are giving all of our power away. So being your own hero, First means getting clear about who it is that you want to be and what it is that you want to create in your life.

And then managing that mindset because your inner voice is the voice of your hero. The part of you that’s says, yes, I can. Yes, I will. Yes, I do deserve good things. Yes, it is okay for me to be bold and be brave and try hard things and sometimes accomplish them and sometimes learn and grow, but I’m capable of this.

No, my feelings are not less important than their feelings. My desires and my needs are valid, and they are not less important. It’s important than anybody else’s, and that it is okay for me to be not just excited about my goals, but feeling really proud of myself in my pursuit of attaining them, because at the core.

of all of this for many of us. And I think that this was true for me when I was younger, is that underneath all of this, the fear about not being liked or feelings of guilt, or, you know, Oh, can I? What if I can’t? What does that mean? Am I going to be perfect? Probably not. Underneath all of that, there’s There is another thing.

There’s another layer. And I think it’s shame, this shame that we carry, shame for our anger, or this shame that we’re truly not deserving, or that if people get mad at us for being happy or being so happy, successful or for being good, right? That maybe they’re right. And that maybe it is wrong of us. Maybe it’s something shameful and bad if we want to have more.

And the truth is 100 percent that our being good. And creating the life that we want does not harm anybody else. You being amazing doesn’t take anything away from anybody else. And in fact, you can’t feel badly enough to make anybody else feel better. So, it’s time to stop being a martyr and sacrificing yourself for other people in this way that’s not even true.

And maybe even, on the deepest level of all, is fear of your own power. Because If you could actually be amazing and not just ask for what you want, but go after it and get it, then what? If all the doors are actually wide open and you just have to walk through them, where would you go? If nobody is actually stopping you, and it’s not harming anybody, to be your most amazing self, and you can actually be, do, and have whatever you want, that is a different kind of pressure, a different kind of problem, because now it’s on you to make that difference.

happen. So how do we do that work? How do we work with those thoughts, those feelings, and the behaviors in order to not just reclaim our power, but like unleash our full power on the world that needs us to be our most amazing selves. It just so happens that a very wise and powerful person said some things about this so beautifully of that.

We just, we need to visit with them. You may be familiar already with this passage from Marianne Williamson’s Course in Miracles. If you haven’t heard this before, I am so thrilled to share it with you. It’s been a source of insight for me personally for a long time, and maybe you tuned into this. podcast today because you needed to hear this message again.

Here we go. Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God and your playing small does not serve the world.

There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. And it’s not just in some of us. It’s within everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.

As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others. So, how about them apples, Marianne Williamson, reminding us that it’s not actually all about us. When we do this and become fully self actualized and empowered, not only do we create the lives that we want, we become that role model for other people to look to you and say, she’s doing it.

And she has a nice life and people still like her and she seems happy. She’s made mistakes along the way, but she keeps going and look what she’s been able to do. She is still a caring person. She’s still nice to people. She still operates with love and generosity. And maybe this old mindset telling me that it means something bad about me, if I want success.

Success and more things and to be accomplished and all this stuff, maybe that mindset isn’t true. After all this amazing person is showing me the way. So consider taking that idea on board and feeding it to that old mindset. Your hero can tell you it’s not just your right to be amazing. It is also actually your responsibility.

So. Thank you to our inspiration and muse, Marianne Williamson, for those very wise words. And if you want to learn more about her work, obviously look up A Course in Miracles. It is a classic good stuff, and I hope you check it out. Mindset, vision, being your own hero. There’s a lot here. These things sound so simple.

simple and in practice. They are complex to do. All growth is. And that’s why we need to keep in mind that a growth mindset is essential as we do the work. And that growth and change are not informational. You’re not gonna hear something and a flip is switched and you are forever. ever different. That’s not how we grow.

It is not informational. It’s part of it. You need to have new ideas. You need to move towards something and you need to have different mindsets and skills. But at the end of the day, your work is always It’s experiential, meaning that you need to do the things, take action and experience this change and movement inside of yourself in order for it to develop you and really allow you to begin growing in to this different version of yourself that is able to do the things that we’re talking about today.

And so here are some resources that I put together for you that will help you do that. First of all, I have resources for you available on my website. You can come to growingself. com. You can take my self esteem test. This quiz will ask you a variety of different questions to assess your baseline self esteem.

And then it will deliver a customized report based on your scores so that you can get visibility into where you are in the self domain currently. And you’ll also get customized recommendations that will help you do the work of improving your self esteem. team. Additionally, here are some ways that you can start doing this experiential work on your own or with the support of a really good coach who can help you crack into questions.

These are journaling prompts if you want to write these down and then write down your answers to them or if you did work with a good coach to get visibility into your skills. self and help you shine a light into your own blind spots. Questions like, why do you currently play small? What are the feelings or the false beliefs that are attached to this for you?

You’ve heard about a number of possibilities in this podcast, which of those may have resonated to you, but also be thinking about your own life experience. And so like challenging yourself on If you do play small, why, why is that? And not in a shame based self judging way, but in a, why does this make sense given my life experience kind of way.

And let yourself just go into that without judgment. Additionally, another very important question to be exploring is if you really could be, do, or have anything, what would that be? And as you imagine the things that you might own, Like to achieve or the person that you want to grow into. Does anything else come up for you around that?

Like if you think about yourself doing something amazing or growing into this admirable version of yourself, is there this voice in the back of your head that tells you that it’s bad of you to be thinking that way, or no, you can’t, or that’s selfish or I don’t know, what is that? So part of it is creating the vision, but also part of it is Experiential.

What happens inside of me when I entertain that vision? That’s where the action is. And then lastly, how do you become your own hero? Like, what would it look like? What would it sound like? Inside of your mind, even. What would you be saying to yourself if you were your own champion? Say Stepping up to say, you don’t have to feel bad about this.

It’s okay for you to take action on your own behalf, reminding you that you’re just as important as anybody else. And that it is absolutely okay to say no, to set boundaries. You’re not responsible for other people’s feelings. You can only control yourself. And if you are confident in the fact that you are operating with love and integrity and anything beyond that is in somebody else’s hands, like that’s the kind of messaging that we all need to have with us as we move through our days.

and our lives when we are striving to be self actualized and empowered. And so for you to be thinking about what does that sound like? What do I want it to sound like? And maybe, you know, setting out some new thoughts that you can be reminding yourself. Off of, or again, working with a good coach who can be supporting you in developing the ability to do this every step of the way.

Now on that note, if this is something that you would like more support from me around, I am here for you. Every Thursday I do a live stream where we are talking about that week’s podcast. So if you’re catching this episode, the week I am released. I’m going to be using it. Join me this coming Thursday on the live stream so that we can talk about what’s been going on for you.

Have you been feeling small or behaving small and really want that to be different? I would love to hear more about that. What’s going on around you or side of you and provide you with some recommendations about things that might help you as you’re on this journey of growth. If you’d like, you can ask your questions in advance.

Otherwise, you can just join me on the socials in real time Thursdays at 12 PM and just drop your question in the comments and I will address it during our time together. And if you sign up through that link, you’ll also get email reminders of when the live stream is going to happen so that you don’t miss it.

And you will also get a recording of the live stream sent. So if you can’t make it in person, you will still hear your question answered and still get to participate. Thank you so much for spending this time with me. And I hope that you got some takeaways and things to think more about and to try some actionables that will help you grow the channel.

big and powerful and feel great about it. If you’d like more from me or to see past episodes of the Love, Happiness Success podcast on this topic, I invite you to come to my website, growingself. com, go into the blog and podcast, and from there, enter the Happiness Collection, and you will find a whole constellation of articles and curated podcast playlists on the subject of personal growth and self improvement.

actualization. They are all for you. And I hope you take advantage of them. And if in listening to this, you’re thinking, you know what? I need to get into some coaching because I have some stuff to work on in this area. Come to my website, growingself. com and schedule a free consultation with myself or one of the other amazing coaches.

on my team. They’re all licensed therapists who specialize in coaching. They know what they’re doing and they can help you begin peeling this onion, getting into yourself, where this is coming from, and then practicing making those shifts that we were talking about today. so much. In your mindset, developing a vision and learning how to be your own hero.

That is what we do at Growing Self. And we’re here to do this with you too. Otherwise I’ll be back in touch with you next week with another episode of love, happiness, and success.