Coaching practices for Self Authoring Mind

Describe almost anything you are working through and IX Coach finds the practices whose real-world fit is closest. For Self Authoring Mind, these are the strongest matches in the current practice library.

Does this sound like the set of challenges you might be facing?

  • When demands pull me in different directions I just bend toward whichever voice is loudest, because I’ve never actually pinned down my own criteria
  • When a feeling grabs me I become it
  • My harsh self-critical thoughts land like verdicts on who I fundamentally am, and they devastate me because I take them as the truth about my whole self
  • When two people I respect disagree, I flip to whoever I spoke to last and lose my own footing
  • Whenever I write anything down, part of me is quietly performing for some imagined reader, so it comes out polished and dishonest

Practices that may help

  1. Self-Authorship: Moving From the Socialized to the Self-Authored Mind
    Self-authorship, from Robert Kegan’s adult-development theory, is the capacity to generate your own internal standard for decisions rather than being defined by others’ expectations. It marks the shift from the "socialized mind" (made up by your environment) to the "self-authored mind" (author of your own values). It is a developmental theory describing how grown adults keep growing, not a quick technique.
  2. Write your own internal standard
    Articulate the values and criteria you’ll use to judge your own choices, independent of approval.
    Self-Authorship: Moving From the Socialized to the Self-Authored Mind
  3. Make the subject-object move
    Turn something that has you ("I am anxious") into something you have and can examine ("I notice anxiety in me").
    Self-Authorship: Moving From the Socialized to the Self-Authored Mind
  4. Shift identity from self-concept to awareness itself
    Experiment with "I am the aware space" rather than "I am my thoughts and feelings."
    Non-Dual Awareness, Made Practical
  5. Hold conflicting perspectives without collapsing
    When two people you respect disagree, hold both views as data instead of needing one to be simply right.
    Self-Authorship: Moving From the Socialized to the Self-Authored Mind
  6. Write to yourself, not for an audience
    Keep a private record of philosophical self-argument, not a performance or a diary.
    The Stoic Daily Review
  7. Locate where you’re authored from
    Notice whether your current decision is driven by others’ expectations or by your own internal standard.
    Self-Authorship: Moving From the Socialized to the Self-Authored Mind
  8. Write about yourself using your own name
    Replace "I" with your first name when writing about difficult situations to gain analytical distance from them.
    Self-Distancing Journaling
  9. Write from the voice of an unconditionally kind friend
    Adopt the perspective of someone who loves you completely and sees your situation clearly.
    The Self-Compassion Letter, Made Practical
  10. Develop your own compass for decisions
    Build a personal value system that guides decisions independently of social approval.
    Kegan’s Subject-Object Theory, Made Practical

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