The following is a guest post from colleague Marcia Reynolds, PsyD., author of the newly released book: Wander Woman: How High-Achieving Women Find Contentment and Direction. Marcia works with leaders, top talent and entrepreneurs to achieve their goals with ease and grace.

I do not believe in the concept of having one authentic self. I believe you are made up of many selves that you draw on in various situations. The more successful you are, the better you are at drawing out the parts of yourself that will help you achieve your goals. When you define yourself as “a fighter” or “a nurturer” in every situation, you win some and you lose some.

If you cultivate your “selves concept” you accept a bigger reality of yourself.  You may have a core seed of self that doesn’t change, but then you modify aspects of who you are in order to handle the situation you are facing.

The process of expanding your sense of self–which includes the many selves you call forth–requires you let go of who you think you are to allow the many faces of you to emerge. This can be scary. You rely on a strong sense of self to succeed. Yet that strength can hold you back. The more open you are to considering new ways of thinking and acting, the faster you will succeed. One way of making this process tangible is to work with archetypes. Archetypes are patterns of energy that you demonstrate whenever you interact with someone. Some patterns are innate, wired into your brain when you are born. Other patterns take shape as you learn how to deal with difficulties and you are rewarded for specific behaviors. These patterns develop throughout your life. This also means you can recognize more latent patterns in yourself and expand them so that you can adapt to situations more readily.

The names given to the archetypes, such as Warrior, Martyr, and Inspirer, are designed to help you identify a set of behaviors that might serve you or hurt you in a situation. For example, calling on your Queen/King archetype can be useful to you if you need to stand your ground when you are negotiating for resources for your team or family. These same behaviors can be harmful if you play your Queen/King card when arguing with your spouse.

Sometimes we naturally shift our patterns with maturity. For example, I called on Warrior energy early in my career to help me fight my way up the ladder in two male-dominated corporations. Now I gain better results when I call on Connector and Inspirer energies. All three are still aspects of who I am but the balance has changed. Additionally, I learned that Rebels focus on what is wrong while Revolutionaries focus on what good we can create.

If you can identify the dominant and secondary archetypes present in your life right now, you will better understand the motivations for your actions and then choose new responses instead of acting habitually in various contexts. When you are running a meeting and it is not going well, you can call forth another archetype that might be more useful to you than the one that usually dominates. On the other hand, if you understand how the archetypes you are expressing serve your higher purpose, you can better articulate why you choose to behave in a certain way to help people understand what is driving your behavior.

This process of identifying, focusing on some, and decreasing other behavioral patterns is how you expand who you think you are. Open your mind to possibilities and you will find you will fight less with other people without having to surrender what is most important to you.

The following archetypes are the most common in the high-achievers I have coached, but represent only some of the patterns you may express. You will find a more comprehensive list of descriptions in my book, Wander Woman: How High-Achieving Women Find Contentment and Direction.

Exercise: Choosing Your Board of Directors

When you look at the narrative of your life, what characters do you see yourself playing?

Step 1. Circle your top six dominant selves. If you struggle choosing, ask someone who knows you well to help you limit your list to six.

Step 2. Add two or three archetypes that you feel you own but haven’t yet developed (come up with your own names too). Add these to your dominant six and you have the Board of Directors making your life decisions. When you are struggling with a relationship or life decision, ask your board, one by one, what to do.

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About the Author

My name is Evelyn. As Founder & CEO of Evelyn Kalinosky LLC, my coaching practice specializes in working with high-level women executives who want to achieve a more sacred kind of success. The goal is a search for significance, a journey to uncover the wealth of the self, a rite of passage to their highest purpose, and to a life that is as unique as their fingerprint.

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