Cobwebs and Rabbit holes

“Cobwebs”, my friend called them. We were on the bay bridge, headed off to our monthly ladies supper club. We chit chatted back and forth a bit, catching up on what each of us had been up to. Then we moved onto work (she too is a coach), which inevitably landed us on the topic of self doubt, because hello, though we’re coaches, we’re also human.

I shared that my first morning thoughts, 74% of the time, are a mixed bag self-doubt, confusion and certainty that my writing sucks, I have no creativity, and that my work is wholly unimportant and helps NO ONE.

“Yep, I’m right there with you.” she said. “I call them cobwebs, spun overnight and every morning I have to wipe away those sticky little threads to come back to myself and get to my good work.”

Over the years my cobwebs have changes. In my 20’s they were about my food and my body. I’d wake up and my first thought would be of what I’d eaten the day before to know what I was allowed to eat for the day ahead. My second thought was that I was, no matter what my actual weight, always teetering on the edge of “soft and pudgy” and had to get out of bed immediately to hit the gym.

After years of work and healing and wondering if my first morning thoughts would ever not be about my dinner the night before, those cobwebs dissolved, generously making space for new, work-related cobwebs.

And the thing about these sticky cobwebs is that if we don’t wipe them away in the morning, they blur our vision and take us down any number of self-doubting, judgmental, fearful rabbit holes throughout our day.

Cobweb clean up comes down to knowing one thing.

You have a choice.

Though they will appear every morning, you get to choose if the cobwebs stay or get wiped away like mist on a mirror. You have the power to choose if your harsh morning thoughts are REAL or just a messy web of old insecurities that no longer require your loyalty or engagement.

Do my a favor. Wipe the cobwebs away. Don’t go down the rabbit hole.

Yes, there will be more tomorrow morning. There always is.

Trusting our bodies, our work and our worth doesn’t ask that we never experience self doubt but rather learn how to maneuver with it; to see the cobwebs and know it is up to us to choose if they stay or go.

All my love,

Jamie