It’s remarkable how, in recent times, many people begin a conversation by saying, “Be careful what you say.”
Not so long ago, many of us spoke more freely. We trusted that a private conversation would remain private and felt comfortable expressing an opinion, even when others disagreed.
Today, more people seem to pause before speaking, weighing their words more carefully because they are no longer as certain as they once were where those words might eventually end up. For many people, the issue is no longer simply whether something is true. It is whether saying it is wise.
There was also a time when many people believed that if they understood the rules and conducted themselves accordingly, they had a reasonable expectation of remaining free and safe.
Today, that expectation has been significantly eroded.
Whether you share that experience or not isn’t really the point. What’s worrying is that, for many people, the experience has changed. And it isn’t only happening in public life. Many organisations are having similar experiences.
New executives regularly enter organisations with every intention of creating a healthier culture. They encourage people to speak openly, invite honest feedback and respectfully challenge new ideas. Yet over time, the opposite happens and employees become increasingly cautious about sharing their thoughts.
Similarly, people start new relationships determined not to repeat the mistakes of the past, only to find themselves having the same conversations, the same frustrations and the same disappointments.
I’ve coached leaders who stepped into exciting new opportunities believing this time would be different. Yet before long, they found themselves responding to situations in ways that felt strangely familiar.
What’s striking is that although the circumstances, the people and even the settings are different, the experience often feels remarkably familiar.
It begs the question. What could possibly connect experiences as different as these?
Why do we so often recreate the very experiences we hoped to leave behind?
Our first instinct is usually to look around us. We look at the circumstances, the people, the organisation or the environment, assuming that’s where the answer must be found.
Sometimes it is. But often it is not.
What if the future isn’t being limited by the situation you’ve entered, but by the person who entered it?
Because often what we fail to notice is the real truth behind the results that we see.
The more important question becomes…
What picture of ourselves are we operating from when we make today’s decisions?
Because every decision begins long before the decision itself. It begins with the person making it.
If I still see myself as someone who must constantly prove my worth, I’ll operate differently from someone who quietly believes they already have value.
If I still see myself through yesterday’s disappointments, I’ll often make decisions designed to avoid repeating the past rather than ones creating a better future.
Without realising it, the person I have been quietly begins recreating the experience I had hoped to leave behind.
That doesn’t mean change is impossible. Far from it.
It means lasting change requires more than a new role, a new relationship, a new organisation or even a new government. It requires becoming the kind of person capable of consistently creating a different experience through the choices we make within those circumstances.
Looking back, I’ve come to realise that we rarely live only from our current vision. More often than not, we live from our current self-image.
And until that image changes… tomorrow will usually have an unsettling way of resembling yesterday.
Circumstances create the environment. The decisions we make within them reveal who we are becoming.
Reflect & Apply
1️⃣ Where have you noticed yourself recreating an experience you thought you had left behind?
2️⃣ What beliefs or assumptions might be quietly influencing the decisions you’re making today?
3️⃣ If you became the person your future requires, what might you begin doing differently starting now?
📘 Be the Person You Dream of Becoming explores how our thinking shapes our choices and how our choices shape the lives we eventually live. It is available on Amazon, in RIK Bookstores nationwide, or directly through me.
Every day I help leaders, professionals and organisations develop the awareness, discernment and perspective to make wiser decisions and create better outcomes by first becoming the person capable of creating them.
Because lasting success rarely begins with changing our circumstances.
It begins with changing the person responding to them.
Remember, your success is my business.
Perceptively,
Monica Rogers-Fletcher
Listen to Why We Keep Recreating the Past