A short excerpt from a YouTube podcast (by George B. Thomas) in which the speaker reflects on cycles of self-criticism and difficulty forgiving oneself for mistakes. He identifies a major life catalyst—starting a business, alongside marriage and religious conversion—that forced him out of comfort zones and required adopting a leadership identity rather than remaining a supportive second-in-command.
I've made a boatload of mistakes and I still have time to make a boatload more in this life. But you see, it's really easy to get stuck in this mindset of mistake, hate yourself, mistake, hate yourself, mistake, hates yourself. Like it becomes a freaking loop in your life. And it's hard to forgive yourself for the mistakes that you make against yourself. Many times we look at it as, it's like mistakes in the world or mistakes in my job, but. But when you internalize those and you're like, oh, I made that mistake against myself, God, don't make Joe junk. I gotta love myself, right? So now we get to like the part that you actually asked me, like, what happened over the last 12 to 16 month period that made you become more observant? The first thing that came to mind when I looked at that question was I took the biggest leap of my life ever. Other than being married and getting saved by Jesus. Starting a business is a massive freaking leap. And you're right, it made me get out of my historical comfort zones. I'm a great number two to a number one. I'm a great Robin to a Batman bs. Like, you can't run that narrative when you're the captain of the ship.
