Life begins on the edge of your comfort zone

Do you trust yourself? Do you really believe that anything is possible? This is what I mean when I say that you are your own best friend and that you are your greatest resource. You are going to take another minute now to assess the way you think and speak about yourself. I know, you feel like I keep asking you to do that. And you are right. I do. Repetition is the mother of skill. Practice, practice, practice–remember that? Go on then.

Have you started journaling yet? I’m asking you to do that now. If you have ever read The Artist’s Way or heard of an author called Julia Cameron (who was married to the very well-known film director, Martin Scorcese) you will be familiar with the process called Morning Pages. I’m not saying write three pages of your full-size journal (unless you want to). It’s up to you how much you write in your journal. I am saying cultivate a new habit, daily, of writing in your journal. Journaling is a mysterious phenomenon. It seems like a really easy thing to do, and yet when you sit down to write, it can seem incredibly daunting. I have known many days of journaling where all I have written for three pages is “I don’t know what to write. And yet there are some days where three pages are just not enough, and I have to stop myself over-indulging my writing habit. The point is this, I write. Daily. It gives me access to how I think and feel about myself and what is going on in the world and in my life.

When you journal, you start to notice, very acutely, how you talk about yourself, and others, and what you think about yourself and others. You may very well start to notice that the worst gas-lighter you have in your life is not outside of you. It is, in fact, you. When you see that, transformation is possible. It is only through awareness and observation that you can start to see your own patterns–that’s why you have to do some detective work and investigation.

This is an adapted extract from Discipline: A Secret Code for Women in the Bedroom, Boardroom and Beyond (12.99, Panoma Press)