Becoming Your Big Self — Transformation

Todd Gifford – Success Coach

I was recently reading about personal self-improvement, which I do a lot of, and I came across a really great phrase from a gentleman named Craig Ballantyne that describes a state of mind that I think is extremely important for being successful — “Transforming yourself requires you to Become Your Big Self”.

Being highly successful in work, in family, in hobbies, and in life many times requires transforming yourself from what you are now to what you want or need to be. Sometimes the change required is relatively small, but there are times when a fundamental or large change is required if you want to achieve really important goals. I now call that large change situation “transformation”, because you really are transforming your old self to a new self.

Big Self vs. New Self

What I really like about the phrase “transform to become your Big Self” is that it says that everyone has this Big Self in them. It is not whether you can transform — it is that in order to transform, you have to become that Big Self that we all have in us. That Big Self may be difficult to find or understand or buried deep, but it is in there for sure…in all of us.

I am a big believer in setting goals, writing them down, and, if possible, even create a vision board or vision map creating visual versions of your goals, and reviewing them often. When I pick or set my goals, of course some of them (ok, maybe even many of them) I really do not know if I will achieve them or not. I have faith in myself that I can achieve them, and I would like to think that I ‘know’ I will achieve them, but I have never been able to have that 100% belief that I WILL achieve them. Rather, I know 100% that if I honestly intend to achieve them, and that intent is strong enough to take consistent action towards achieving them, that I have a very good chance of achieving them. I know that is because after many years of setting goals, intending to achieve them, achieving many, falling short on others, and actually achieving something more significant on yet others — I can rely and have faith in this formula. Set Goal…Create Strong Intent to achieve goal…Take consistent action to achieve goal = very high likelihood of achieving goal.

The Big (Mental) Self

Getting back to the transforming and becoming your Big Self concept – after I read this phrase, it really created a feeling and a visual for me to help foster the Intent part of my pursuit of attaining or reaching a goal. I had rarely thought about pursuit of most goals as a true transformation of myself into a new self, and I think it is a bit of an abstract concept. It’s abstract from the perspective that a very large (and much larger than most people think) portion of achieving lofty goals is ‘mental’. I have learned this through my own experience as well as from highly successful people. Most people think of a transformation only in physical terms. Whether it is losing a lot of weight or getting into better physical condition, or even achieving some form of a work/project goal or monetary goal — most people only think about the physical, tangible changes. The reality is, gathered from all of my reading as well as interacting with highly successful people in different areas of business and life —- it is the mental transformation required that is the most important AND THE MOST DIFFICULT.

2 Levels of the Big Self

When I think of transforming and becoming my Big Self on any particular goal that I am trying to accomplish, I clearly see that ‘Big Self’ on 2 distinct levels: the physical Big Self and the mental Big Self. This is very powerful, because making the mental shifts, changes, and transformation required is so critically important to achieve big results at whatever you are pursuing. And because the concept of transforming to my Big Self “assures” me that that Big Self is in there somewhere, it gives me great confidence that ignites the all-important intent to pursue the goal and begin taking action. Knowing that the Big Self is in there helps create that strong belief that the goal is achievable. And that feels good.

If you are not a big goal setting person, I recommend that you become one. Many times people shy away from setting and writing down goals because of their fear: ‘what if I don’t succeed at achieving the goal I set?” The reality is that nothing bad happens if you fall short of a goal you set for yourself. The other reality is what you achieved in the process is probably significantly bigger or better than what you would have obtained had you not set the goal. Thinking about transforming into your Big Self (that is already inside you) will make goal setting less intimidating. And if you are already a goal-setter, leverage this transforming to your Big Self concept to become more effective at achieving your goals or achieving even bigger goals.

Be Your Best,
Todd D. Gifford