The last few weeks have been a little stressful.

(That’s why I’m sending this email late haha.)

I had to have a few hard conversations, disappointing people I care about.

Reflecting on it today, I wondered to myself…

“How did this happen? And why does this happen so often? I feel like I keep repeating the same mistakes and forget to learn each time.”

Here’s what happened…

I tend to dismiss my intuition

The last few weeks, I always had this thought in the back of my mind.

I was worried things wouldn’t go well on a project I was working on -

Asking more passive questions like “should we really do this?”

Looking back, I should’ve been more assertive:

Sharing what I wanted to happen and stating my reasons for it.

I should’ve trusted and defended my intuition more…

But instead, I dismissed my doubts.

I find myself constantly living in denial because of this 😅 

It’s not a good place to be in, to feel like something’s wrong but you just ignore it.

Because you’ve been taught your thoughts and emotions aren’t valid.

As the eldest daughter in an immigrant Asian family, I wasn’t really taught to trust my intuition.

My parents tried their best, but sometimes I felt like I shouldn’t be upset about something because I should be grateful.

Like I shouldn’t complain about doing calculus homework at 12am on the kitchen table (with my dad sitting there silently witnessing my crashouts…),

Because my cousins in Taiwan had to suffer through this confusing math at a way younger age than me.

And now I’m noticing this pattern of dismissing myself shows up everywhere:

• Work: I convince myself other people know better than I do, so I ignore warning signs (and have to deal with the fallout)

• Relationships/friendships: I downplay my needs, then feel resentful later 😭💔 I rly did that to myself…

• Business: I’m scared to charge high prices ($5k+) because deep down I don’t value my time or energy 💀

But after a year of therapy, I think I’m starting to get better.

What my therapist taught me

Lowkey this is what I taught myself bc she mainly shared reminders and asked my questions back to me.

Me: I’m upset this happened, but it’s not the other person’s fault, I could’ve done this other thing…I understand their point of view, I shouldn’t be mad

My therapist: your emotions are valid, you’re allowed to feel upset about this

Me: what should I do? I don’t know how to have these hard conversations or where to even start talking to them about this issue / setting this boundary, I’ve never practiced doing this before

My therapist: have you really never done it before? Remember to flag “all-or-nothing” thinking…is that an accurate reflection of your abilities?

Me: well…I know I’ve done it before a few times, so I do have some experience. I’m proactive and can figure things out. I guess I could search up some guidelines and write a quick outline beforehand so I feel more prepared and less scared

…

And that’s how I didn’t completely fall apart at having to let down hundreds of people today 😅

I’ll share some therapy habits I’ve incorporated that have helped me so much in another email,

But today I want to just focus on instilling this insight I had:

You should trust yourself.

Because even if you make a choice that’s “wrong” - you’ll feel so much better about it afterwards.

Instead of “I should’ve gone with my gut! I knew it, I’m so stupid…”

I’d be thinking “I made the best decision I could with the facts I had, this is a good learning opportunity.”

But building that self trust is an ongoing thing.

I’m still trying my best now even if I don’t always feel confident in myself.

Hopefully my “failures” (learnings) can help you improve too - just without the pain of making my mistakes yourself.

Til next time,

Jennifer