“If you could travel back in time, what advice would you give your younger self?” might sound like the kind of question we’d ask someone at a dinner party, but it’s something we should perhaps be asking ourselves too. Research suggests doing so can help bring us more in line with our ideal selves as opposed to our ought selves (the kind of person that other people or society expect us to be).
Researchers at Clemson University in the US recently surveyed hundreds of people to find out what their advice to their younger selves would be, what pivotal event was influential for them, if they had any regrets, and if following this advice would bring them closer to their ideal or ought self.
The results showed that people believed that following their own advice would bring them more in line with their ideal self. They also showed that those who had followed this advice to themselves were more likely to say that their high school self would have respect for the person they had grown into.
This, I believe, shows there’s a certain power in following the advice we’d give to ourselves; it can help our sense of wellbeing and bring us more in line with who we want to be.
It got me thinking that this is a good exercise to try whenever we need to realign with what we want from life as opposed to what others or society expect of us. I for one can sometimes fall in the trap of worrying about where I should be in life right now as opposed to where I want to be. I think we all do at times, so it’s good to be able to take a step back and see what we actually want from a given situation.
I decided to give it a try and see how it felt. Here’s an excerpt from the advice I’d give to my younger self.
Leave him
“I know you feel like you’re not worthy of love and that pains me. It pains me because as the 36-year-old me giving advice to 30-year-old me, I can see the blind spots clearly. Despite the fact you know in your heart it’s all wrong, you’re scared to leave him because you believe you don’t deserve any better.
Please know you are worth so much more. You’re worth the world. You deserve someone who will never be abusive. You deserve someone calm. You deserve someone who’s done the emotional/mental work they need to do on themselves – not someone who expects you to do it for them.
Leave him. Work on your self-worth. Work on figuring out what you want from life. Work on healing wounds from the past. Build yourself up. Work on your self-compassion. And only then think about looking for love. We attract what we think we deserve, and if that benchmark is low then you’ll continuously attract men who are at war with themselves.”
Don’t wait for the perfect idea
“Start writing that book. Start that business, even as a side hustle. Try to think a little less and act a little more. The perfect moment or perfect idea doesn’t exist, so if you wait around for them, you’ll never get started.
Stop worrying that you’re not good enough. You have proven time and time again that you’re more than capable of achieving your goals. So, start acting, and I’m sure in time you’ll be leading the life you envision for yourself.
I can tell that every time you procrastinate you do so because you’re worried about failing. You’re worried about not being good enough. And this fear holds you back. Give yourself the permission to create with abandon and the rest will follow.”
Ignore what others are doing
“It’s easy to get caught up in comparisons and then end up doing what others expect you to be doing as opposed to what your heart tells you to do. You have great intuition. It’s never failed you; in fact, you’ll find that every time you turn away from it, you end up taking steps in the ‘wrong’ direction.
You’ve never been content with the status quo. You’ve always wanted to build your own path in life, not follow the tried and tested avenues. So, be a trailblazer. Find and follow your own path. You’ve always wanted to lead life in your own way, so who the hell cares what everyone else is doing anyway?”
Verdict
I love this type of exercise because I feel it gives us a great opportunity to self reflect.
Regarding the advice I’d give to my past self in relation to my relationship: reading it back to myself made me realise just how far I’ve come since my breakup. It’s clear I have perspective on what happened now and I’m able to see that it was all wrong for me (something I never thought would happen – I sometimes wondered if there would be a part of me that would always pine for that man. I’m happy to see that’s not the case).
So, it was a nice little confidence booster to see how all the work I’ve done over the last four years – the therapy, the meditation, the yoga, the reading etc. – has helped me to grow my self-confidence, self-worth, and self-compassion. I see clearly now that back then I was at war with myself, so I was attracting people who were on the same ‘emotional frequency’ so to speak. It feels so good to see all the emotional growth that’s taken place.
The advice I gave regarding waiting for perfect ideas and ignoring what others are doing are actually, funnily enough, things I also needed to hear right now. It made me realise that there are certain things that are reoccurring in my life because there’s a cycle I need to break. Underlying both is fear: fear I’m not good enough and the fear of trusting myself.
I know I need to work on these areas in my life more, so I’m happy they came up. Launching this blog itself can link to “don’t wait for the perfect idea.” I started working on this almost a year ago but was too ‘scared’ to share it because I was worried it wasn’t perfect enough. That’s why I went ahead and did it anyway, as I know I had to get over the fear.
I also have some big decisions to make over the coming months, which tie into my third piece of advice: ignore what others are doing. It helped to read those sentences back to myself.
All in all, I found this to be a useful little exercise that gave me quite a few interesting insights.
So, give it a try and let me know how you get on.
