Sometime this week while listening to my morning podcasts I came across an interesting post. It went something like this: when a baby elephant starts being domesticated he is bound with a metal chain on his ankle. This chain is secured to the floor by a wooden peg. At first the baby elephant will pull and pull and fight to free himself. As he learns that the chain cannot be broken, he stops resisting. Fast forward to when the elephant is a fully grown adult and the chain is reintroduced. Despite the fact that the mighty elephant could easily break the chain with a pull, he won't even try. Because he has learned that the chain cannot be broken. He is one of the most powerful animals to walk the Earth, and he keeps himself strapped to a puny chain because he can't see his circumstances have changed dramatically.
The post went on to talk about self-limiting beliefs and how most of our own limitations are in our head. They've been put there by our past experiences, by what we've been told, by what we've come to believe. And it all rang so true to me.
I am a couch potato at heart (I love spending time knitting and watching films, could do it for days on end), but that doesn't define me and it most certainly doesn't keep me from doing new things, from going out and exploring. I am scared of heights, but that fear doesn't own me. It isn't something carved in stone and set for life. These are things (like most things that) I can fight back.
In the last couple of years I may not have changed much of how I speak about myself, and yet sometimes just a single word can make a world of difference. In past couple of years I've changed from saying "I am afraid of heights" to "I am currently afraid of heights". I went from saying "I can't run 5k" to "I can't run 5k yet".
And so today I completed my first 5k run. With inflatable obstacles. One of them a climbing wall. After listening to that particular podcast again, I made sure I jumped into every obstacle before my mind had a chance to evoke my fears. I could fall down. I could slip. I could hurt myself. I could make myself a fool in front of everyone. And so I ran and I jumped and I had the most fun my body's had in ages. Today I was playful and I was fearless, not because I didn't have any fears, but simply because I literally ran away from them.
And now I know I can. Now my chain is broken. And I vow to carry on breaking many more chains. Challenging myself. Becoming better that who I was yesterday. I've learned that all my chains are temporary, and in time I'll break 'em all and I'll run free.
PS: Want to read the full post I mentioned? Visit:
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