Playing Big

Ways to Let It Be Easy

I recognized her: She was a composite of all the most important parts of me that I had left behind. I got the message. The first depressing picture showed me the waste of a life I’d end up having if I continued my worst people-pleasing behaviors and kept doing only those things that were in my small comfort zone or that were acceptable to others. T

We feel pachad when the ego perceives something it feels will wound the ego’s fragile self-concept in some way. We feel yirah when the ego perceives that something has the potential to bring us into transcendence of the ego.

ask that voice, “What are you trying to do? What are you trying to prevent or protect me from?”

Self-expression and service become the sundaes, and praise is just a lovely cherry on top.

Hiding Strategy #4: Collecting and Curating Everyone Else’s Ideas

The inner critic may take inspiration from critical people in your life.

To play big, we need to evaluate which authority figures to seek out and cultivate as allies and which to move away from or simply ignore.

It felt kind of like kicking people out of the immediate space around my writing, an intimate space I could suddenly see I had left way too open to the whims and sentiments of others.