Again, success. And now I have to work at not immediately minimizing my success. My "critical parent" jumps in as soon as I say it and belittles me for considering this a success--all "normal" people hang up their clothes automatically, I can't believe you have to work to make this happen, and why are you making a big deal out of this? Who cares? It's nothing to be proud of.
Ah, so nice to have company in my head.
So now I welcome in the adult voice (weirdly it just occurred to me that these voices are almost all male voices even though I myself am most certainly not a male) and the adult voice says, "First of all, there's no such thing as 'normal.' And we FOR SURE know that there are a lot of smart, successful, wonderful people who dump their clothes on the floor every night. We work with several of them.
"Second of all, this is simply a long-standing habit of mine. It is neither good nor bad, it simply is. It turns out it doesn't serve me so well, therefore I'm choosing to change it. It's taken me years to build this particular habit, so of course it's going to take some work to shift it. It's got grooves in my brain and now I have to dig new pathways for new habits to follow. That doesn't happen overnight, and good for me for being willing to put in the work!
"Third of all, this IS a big deal, to me. And that's the only person who needs to care about it. It's a big deal because I want my space to look and feel different, I want to know that I have power over my habits and not the other way around, and I want to be able to show people that it really can be different--if I can do it, anyone can.
"And taking the time, making the commitment, and making it public is something to be proud of. All we have is ourselves, our lives, our choices--how wonderful to decide to make it better in any way at all. How wonderful to have awareness and to take action. How wonderful to stand up against all the voices that are telling you , 'No!' and to simply smile and say, 'Yes.' That is something to be proud of. I am very proud indeed."
That's better.
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