Welcome to Day 13 - How Do You See YourselfAt my church one of the classes that I facilitate is LHC 201 Discovering your Personality and Gifts. This class consists of two tests. One is the DISC personality survey and the other is a Spiritual gifts test. I love this class because of its effectiveness. It is a very accessible class and it is an open forum for discussion on how to get along with different people. It is one of my favorites.In the DISC test there are three different charts that illustrate how your personality is structured. The first is the public self chart. The public self chart is how you wish people to perceive you in public. This is the face that you put out there for others. This is the work face, the church face, the face you put on when you are uncomfortable. Some people spend so much time in this place that they begin to believe that this was their "normal". The second is the private self chart. The private self is what you do when you are comfortable. When you are alone, among close friends, somewhere that allows you to let your guard. In a lot of cases these two graphs are complete opposites. The last is the perceived self chart. This is how you see yourself. This is the most powerful chart of the three. How we see ourselves is who we really are. In the book, Beyond Positive Thinking by Dr. Robert Anthony, he devotes an entire chapter on positive image/self talk. He talks about a Self-Reinforcing Cycle that we perpetuate.My self-image controls how I perform, or my performance reality. I always act like I see myself. I cannot act otherwise. I can try to act otherwise, but I will have to work very hard to override my subconscious picture of reality. I automatically behave like the "me"who is controlled by my picture. What formed the picture in the first place is my self-talk.Each time I affirm I am a certain way, I record it in my image of reality. I act according to my image of reality automatically, without thinking about it. And after I act like I thought I talk to myself about it. I continually tell myself with self-talk, what I just did. This is known as the Self Reinforcing Cycle...I notice my performance of a task - how I act and how others evaluate my actions.I talk to myself about my performance through my self-talk or affirmative statements.My self-talk reinforces either a positive or a negative self-image or how I feel about myself.How do I feel about myself forms a self-image, which is the regulating mechanism, that controls how I perform the next time. So how do you take control of the Self Reinforcing Cycle? You are doing some of it now. You chose something to accomplish. You are doing it everyday and talking about how you feel in the process. So what are you telling yourself? Who do you say you are?GO GO GO
