Our past behaviour can hold us back, but if we acknowledge it, we can move forward
We always fight our past self, and what we did in the past. This is the baggage we carry with us into every venture. We remember what we did, and what happened ‘last time’.
This is not to say the same thing won’t happen again. It depends upon the context.
If everything is the same, and we change our behaviour, then something different might happen in that situation. That is where we need to fight the resistance of our past behaviour. That is where we can learn something new.
This is part of the learning process, and can be hard in some situations. Everyone can learn new things, but sometimes we have to get over past learning experiences that were hard on us.
The first step is to pause and recognise past behaviour, or emotions that arise. Maybe an old memory is triggered. These are clues that resistance is there, and needs to be overcome. In these situations we can start by naming the emotion we feel, and acknowledging its presence. By naming it we take away its power.
You can do this. Just being aware that the feelings and emotions are there means you can take steps to fight the resistance. You can look for opportunities to do something different and make a change.
The first time will be hard, but it can get easier after that.
Go look at Zen Pencils for some inspiring stories to show you what others have done to overcome the resistance.
You can also read Julien Smith’ The Flinch, or Steven Pressfield’s the War of Art. They all talk about doing the work and putting in the effort to fight the resistance of your inner critic.
All of them proscribe ways to fight your inner critic. As noted, name it for a start. Then go from there. Yes, this inner critic is also known as imposter syndrome. It is you holding yourself back. Go on, give it a name.
Talk to your people about this. Discover each others’s stories about their resistance.
This post is part of a project pulling together my materials and ideas about Teaching Team Collaboration: the Human-Side of Software Development for software development to students.
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The ideas above are from my book 101+ Ideas to Improve Team Collaboration, which covers all of these little things that students can do to improve their collaboration. Also available via Kindle.