Why we play small

When I look back now, I can recall almost every time I’ve felt small in the past. In jobs, relationships, and within my family, I can name exact moments. Of course, I didn’t know at the time. Or maybe I did; I just didn’t have a name for it. 

The thing about smallness is that it can creep up without us even knowing. 

It can lead to us shrinking ourselves, suppressing our needs, or downplaying our gifts and skills. When it’s happening, we can feel like we are being accommodating, easygoing, the reliable one in a friendship, or negotiating our needs in areas where our partner lacks. We might even convince ourselves that this is the sacrifice we must make for our relationships or work.

The problem is that sooner or later we start feeling overwhelmed, tired, or resentful. 

The why we choose to play small—whether in a job or relationships is complex. 

For the most part, fear is what drives us to choose smallness. Whether it's the fear of change or the fear of being judged, criticized, or abandoned. Or maybe we simple dont want others to feel uncomfortable. 

And we often learn these messages early on. Maybe staying small kept us safe as kiddos. And this might have actually worked for our survival needs. 

But the truth is, as adults, it can ultimately cost us our sense of safety, identity, and sanity. 

So how do we get out of smallness and move toward greatness? We determine our needs, where we want to go, and what it will cost. And we move towards our inner knowing. We start to develop more compassion with ourselves. 

We take low-stakes risks that our nervous system can tolerate.

And slowly, we build tolerance toward our needs, desires, goals, and dreams.

What Change Actually Means

Being a therapist is the most compelling, heartbreaking, and meaningful job in the world. It’s also all-consuming and requires endless sacrifice, self-reflection, and self-care. 

After exploring the dark side of the soul all day, it can make socializing in the world a bit tricky. Even the idea of small talk can feel difficult most days. 

But I’m always humbled when I go out, and glad that I did. 

This past weekend, I was reminded why I love what I do. I was in conversation with a couple at a party, and the minute I mentioned what I do for work, there was silence. 

Soon enough, we were engaged in a discussion about the process of therapy and the meaning of human suffering. Then the question came out...the most common question I get asked: How do you know when people change? 

The truth is, it depends. 

It’s a complex question because internal change is not always visible to the external world. What people see on the outside and a felt sense of change are two different experiences.

If an identity shift has happened, there could be aspects of the client’s worldview that have changed. Maybe they start a new creative project, adopt a pet, or end a relationship that was unfulfilling. They could become softer, more attuned to their needs, more compassionate in their relationships. 

In subtler ways, it could show up physically in session at first—a sudden shift in posture, a red lipstick that feels out of character. Or, their language changes– how they describe their experiences, how they speak about themselves. 

It could also be cathartic and involve a big life change–grieving parts of themselves that they had been carrying from the past that needed to be tended to. A release that leads to an openness to possibility, realized hope, a new way of being.

The reality is, real change requires an identity shift. And that means we have to challenge old belief systems that have kept us stuck. 

Because the version of us that worked before won’t work if we want to step into a new way of being, a new life. 

Something must be surrendered to step into the new—whether it's leaving friendships that no longer serve us, making big career transitions, or finding honest, deep love in ourselves or others for the first time. 

We must figure out a new way of being and release old patterns.

And when a client asks me the question...How will I know that I’ve changed? 

I respond, when peace becomes attainable, presence becomes your norm, and truth becomes your way of being. 

The Unknown Is Where The Magic Happens

The cost of pursuing any new endeavor can feel terrifying at first. 

Whether it's changing jobs or ending a relationship–even thinking about the process can feel destabilizing. 

Mostly, because what if it doesn’t work out? What if we don’t find better, or worse–what if a wrong decision becomes one of our biggest regrets?

So, we don’t act; instead, we distract or numb. Maybe we become paralyzed, convince ourselves the issue will disappear, and wait until we have time to consider our options. 

The problem with this approach is that we can end up sleepwalking through life and increasing the odds of rationalizing unhealthy relationships and jobs in the future. 

One reason we avoid our issues is that betting on something without knowing the outcome feels risky. And we humans are generally risk-averse and avoid uncertainty at all costs.

But the truth is, life is full of uncertainty, and we must constantly navigate decisions where we don’t know the outcome.

So maybe an alternative is to ask ourselves more interesting questions. What will it cost me if I stay somewhere I don't belong? And what are the possibilities if I do get the outcome I hope for? When we do this, we can better understand our relationship to uncertainty and get curious about the unknown. 

It’s in this process that we learn more about ourselves.

And this is where magic and expansion can happen.

What Lies Beneath

Whenever I start working with a new client, our sessions begin with the problem that initially brought them to see me—a suffocating job or relationship problems that perpetually get worse. 

Sometimes it’s a catastrophe, but most often I’m presented with one or both of these problems. And a lot of the time our sessions in the beginning will hover over the surface of these issues. 

This is when emotional safety is slowly established between us.

Fast forward weeks or even months into our work, and the client feels safe enough to start exploring their internal world. Then, all of a sudden the safety expands, and the client brings in new material…

Oh yeah, my wife and I haven’t had sex for a couple of years. I haven’t slept well most of my adult life. Or, I don’t really have any friends that know the real me. 

This is when the work begins.

The suffocating job is where we start. It might be your boss that you find intolerable and a place where you feel you have no agency. Or a career path that doesn’t align with the internal knowing that you need to be doing something else. 

Or a total existential dread.

We start to pull the thread for you to better understand how you got to where you are at that very moment, so you can move forward in a more intentional way.

The problem is that by the time someone comes to me they have often been unknowingly suffering for many years. 

Somewhere along the way, we held on to the belief that our internal struggles are not that important. And that these internal conflicts we carry are something to be fixed rather than understood. Or pushed away for a later time. 

So we keep our pain in a box and set it aside.

Or we attempt a short-term fix. We get a new job at a different company, with a significant pay increase. Find a new partner. Move cites. Get another tattoo. 

Yet, sooner or later, the nameless dread creeps to the surface again. The discomfort or dis-ease presents itself and maybe we start to panic. 

But it doesn’t have to be this way. If we take notice and prioritize our mental health as much as our careers and physical health, we could save ourselves years of suffering or even a lifetime of pain.

So whether you hate your dead-end job that is sucking your soul, or you feel disconnected from yourself and/or your relationships, know that you are not alone. 

You can get support and start exploring your suffering at any time, and redirect your life in a more meaningful way.  

Asking The Deeper Questions

There is no greater waste in the world than the difference between who we are and who we could be. Ironically, this was my senior quote in my high school yearbook. 

And this idea has always stuck with me-on my own journey, and especially now as someone who is helping people grapple with and move toward their best selves.

My transition from the corporate world to becoming a therapist brought up so much for me around human potential and our need to expand toward our greatest selves in a world that often tries to keep us small and asleep. 

What complicates this even more is that we are wired for comfort and safety. 

As soon as we wake up in the morning, we have our inner critic to remind us that we have the option to hit snooze, sleep in, and stay comfortable. 

Hopefully, we also have another inner voice that whispers get up, show up, and make the choice that our greatest self would make. The wise voice that tells us that the universe needs us to show up-that we need to move our body in a way that connects us to ourselves, do meaningful work, develop skills, tend to our family, and protect our time.

This is the voice that expands us toward the greatest version of ourselves.

But what happens when we have obstacles in our way that require us to work within a system that benefits from keeping us small? Or we deal with people who require us to perform a version of ourselves that feels small, fake, or performative. 

This is when we have to quiet the external noise and start asking ourselves the deeper question of whether or not the system or person is moving us toward expansion or contraction. 

Some questions we might ask ourselves…Do we like the person we are within this system? Do we feel connected to and seen by the people that surround us? 

Once we start asking these deeper questions, we can move toward a life that feels more meaningful and aligned with our values-those we inherit that resonate with us, and those we develop on our own.