A movie that got me thinking…

I had the pleasure of watching a great chick flick, Ghosts of Girlfriends Past, with my mother this afternoon. The movie stars Mathew McConaughey playing the role of Conner Mead, a womanizer, who is visited by ghosts of girlfriends from the past, present, and future to save him from a life filled with emptiness and casual sex. In the beginning of the movie, we are introduced to a character that has no compassion for others, doesn’t believe in love and uses women for his own benefit, with little regard to their feelings. The beauty of the film is that Collin gets to revisit the past and watch the events that got him where he is today unfold. The first scene depicts a young innocent boy with a crush on a girl, Jenny. We see the true essence of who he is: full of love, full of wonder and with no emotional baggage. The next scene, a few years later, finds Collin at a dance with Jenny. The DJ starts to play a slow song and he watches himself as a young boy, wanting so badly to ask Jenny to dance, but his nerves getting the best of him. Jenny is then asked to dance by another boy. As she accepts and starts to dance, he watches as Jenny gets kissed for the first time, not by him. This is the moment where it all begins: the pain, the hurt and the baggage. The movie continues as Collin gets to revisit various events in his life, but this time he gets to be the observer and see himself through the eyes of a grown man. He also gets to witness the aftermath of his actions, the pain, the tears and the heart ache that he caused so many women. He catches a glimpse of his life in the far future, at his own funeral, where there is only his brother present to bury him. This scene is the turning point, where he understands that his loveless path leads to a loveless life. It is this new set of eyes that allow him to see clearly, follow his heart and go for the girl (Jenny), despite his fears.
What if each of us could go back and revisit various events in our lives in order to gain a deeper understanding of where most of our baggage and self-limiting beliefs where shaped. A belief that most of us struggle with is one of self-worth, or lack thereof. Imagine going in back in time and witnessing where the building of our self-limiting beliefs began. Did it begin with parents whose love was conditional on our grades, our actions, and our ability to follow orders? Did it build in school when we didn’t get the grade, catch the ball, or get asked to dance by the boy or girl of our dreams? Did it continue in high school when we weren’t in the “in” crowd, didn’t drive the right ride, and got made fun of for being to this or not enough of that.
Although what we experienced as a child was real, there is a gift that comes with getting older and wiser. That gift is a greater level of awareness. Going back with a new level of awareness or vantage point allows us to see clearly that what we chose to believe about ourselves had no merit. Our grades, whether good or bad, did not dictate our success. Our parents, who we felt knew everything, were quite wrong in some regards. Those kids that made fun of us really were quite empty, as they were struggling with their own lack of self-worth.
Imagine how different your experience could have been if you never bought into those self-limiting beliefs which hold no truth. How much more joy, passion, and success could you have experienced if you just believed that you where worthy of all those things? Imagine if you believed that you where worthy of greatness. Take a ride down memory lane, back to those events that still bring you to your knees or are painful to think about and choose to see them differently. Reframe those events until you see them as events that empowered you as part of the divine plan. Oh and by the way, that guy of my dreams that never asked me to dance…I can’t even remember his name.