You are a projection of the person that you've decided you are.
Read that again.
You have an image in your mind of who you are - your identity - and you live that identity in the real world.
"I'm always so hard on myself."
Of course you are, because you say it so frequently - either to people or to yourself - that it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
I used to tell myself that I was bad at exams, that I would make stupid mistakes; and at the time I was bad at exams, and I did make stupid mistakes.
Until one day I decided to start saying - both to other people and to myself - that I crush exams and nothing gets past me.
At first I felt like I was lying to myself, but as I embodied that person each and every day - in every past paper or exam - it started to play out in the real world.
I got f*cking good at exams.
If only I know this sooner I could have saved myself 2 sets of A-level re-takes, the heartache of dropping out of one university, and a foundation year at another.
My point is... you have a choice. The choice to decide who you are and the identity that you pin to yourself.
Change that identity, embody it, keep engraining it into yourself, push through the moments of doubt where your old-self emerges... and soon enough this identity will play out in real life.
P.s. You can either argue that I'm wrong and change nothing, or start lying to yourself until it becomes the truth. You chose.
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