A 2019 Resolution: Go Off Script

Psychology Today 6 January 2019

Emily Green Psy.D.
There Is Always Another Part
A 2019 Resolution: Go Off Script
This year, let’s challenge the rigid life narratives that keep us stuck.
If you had told me five years ago that this holiday season I would be wearing a Christmas sweater with a cat in a Santa hat on it, while proudly proclaiming myself a “cat mom,” I would have told you that you had lost it.
I was a dog person. I am a dog person. But as it turns out, as I discovered after stumbling upon and eventually taking in a meowing, underfed creature in my closed-in courtyard in Brooklyn one day in May of 2015, I am also a cat person.
I won’t lie, my insistence on my “dog person” identity probably almost stopped me from taking the plunge and welcoming a cat into my life. To do so would be to go against the narrative that I had written for myself, the collections of stories and beliefs and experiences that make up “who I am”. And had I stuck to the script- I’m a dog person, I can’t have a cat- I would have missed out on exploring an entirely different part of myself, a chance to flesh out a range of interests, emotions, and interpersonal connections that had been previously untapped. Now I buy Christmas sweaters with cats on them and have 491 photos of my own cat on my phone.
I tell this story as a suggestion to us all – and a reminder to myself- to make 2019 the year of shedding our attachment to the rigid narratives we spin for ourselves, particularly the ones that keep us from growing and expanding our lives. We all have a narrative about ourselves, who we are, who we expect to be, what we expect …read more

Original post: Family Therapy Association of Ireland