We are incredibly fortunate to have trails that have been cleared for us when when it comes to self-discovery.
One of the leading pioneers is Dr. Paul Conti, board certified psychiatrist and mental health thought leader. His latest book, What’s Going Right, is a fantastic trail guide for getting to know ourselves through the lens of what is actually working for us already. It’s one of the best starting points because it overrides our natural default negativity bias.
Dr. Conti is a firm believer in the benefits of positive psychology. For far too long, whenever we felt the urge to “find ourselves”, we began by thinking we were lost in the first place. All those hero’s journey stories set us up to face adversity and overcome it in order to come out on the other side, with clarity about who we truly are. Or we may have believed we needed to “hit rock bottom” and then work with all the broken parts of ourselves to get our act together.
Dr. Conti suggests that we’ve made this whole self-discovery and self development process much harder than it actually has to be. We aren’t broken or lost. But we may be exerting ourselves more than is healthy or necessary. His approach is to have a deep appreciation for how far we’ve already come and what is actually going right in our life.
Imagine standing at a trailhead or mountain range map and seeing that little circle on the map that declares “You are Here”. Somehow, you have come this far. What got you here in the first place?
When we start with this positive reframe, a big psychological shift naturally occurs. We are not starting from scratch and we have a lot to work with — we do, in fact, have some pretty solid ideas about who we are and where we’d like to go in life.
As you take some self-inventory, you’ll be cultivating greater self-awareness. You’ll be priming yourself to become more consciously aware of thoughts, behaviors, habits and emotions that you rely on. Then you can begin to pay closer attention to what’s already working well FOR you and what really is going right so far.
One of the most astounding aspects of cultivating a working knowledge of yourself by taking stock of what is good in your life is that it dislodges the brain’s default negativity bias. You’ll naturally start to scan for and take note of the plethora of positive things already happening for you. Without a lot of effort on your part, you will be putting out the signals that you’d like more of this, please. You will be organically aligning your actions, thoughts and emotions to create more positive outcomes.
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