There Is Nothing Wrong With You: Should Story vs. Heart Story

What if the person you've spent your entire life trying to become isn't actually the person you want to be?

I recently sat down with Dr. Rick Diamond for the second time on my Create Your Fate podcast, and within minutes of our conversation, we were unpacking something that I think almost everyone can relate to: the stories we tell ourselves about who we're supposed to be.

Rick is a story healer and the author of a new book with a title that I absolutely LOVE: There Is Nothing Wrong With You: A Guide to Story Healing.

And at the heart of his work is one idea that I want to share with you today.

Are You Living Your Should Story or Your Heart Story?

Rick explains that we all have what he calls a Should Story. It's the story we've spent our lives constructing based on the expectations of our families, our communities, our culture, and the people whose approval we've wanted.

It's the voice that tells us we should have a certain career, should be married by a certain age, should be successful in a particular way, or should behave a certain way to be accepted and loved.

And the tricky thing about our Should Story is that we often mistake it for our identity.

I know I did.

I shared with Rick how, around the age of 30, I found myself married, working a job I didn't particularly enjoy, and living a life that looked perfectly reasonable on paper. I had followed the rules. I'd made the choices I thought would make other people happy. And yet, something inside me kept insisting there had to be more.

I couldn't have told you what I wanted instead. I just knew that what I had wasn't it.

Looking back, I can see how many of my decisions had been driven by one underlying belief: If I do the right things, I'll be loved.

And when you've spent your whole life making decisions based on what you think will earn you love, acceptance, or approval, it can be incredibly difficult to recognize what you actually want.

That's where Rick's concept of the Heart Story comes in.

Your Heart Story isn't another version of yourself that you have to work harder to become. It's the part of you that exists underneath all those expectations. It's your own wisdom, desires, values, and sense of what feels true for you.

And according to Rick, the process of story healing isn't about fixing yourself. It's about recognizing which stories you've inherited, questioning whether they're actually true, and giving yourself permission to choose differently.

The Scary Part About Choosing Differently

One of my favorite moments in our conversation was when Rick shared a story about an old dog named Blue, who spends his days lying on a porch with a nail poking him in the side.

The dog whimpers and complains, but he never moves.

Why?

Because it doesn't hurt badly enough to move.

I couldn't stop thinking about how often we do exactly the same thing.

We stay in relationships, jobs, routines, and identities that don't feel right because they're familiar. We convince ourselves that things aren't that bad. We come up with a hundred perfectly logical reasons why changing something would be too risky, too complicated, or too uncomfortable.

And sometimes, acknowledging that we want something different is the scariest part, because once we admit it, we have to confront the possibility of actually doing something about it.

But here's what I loved about Rick's approach: You don't have to know what your entire Heart Story looks like before you start living it.

You can begin with a much smaller question.

What do I actually want right now?

Not what would make everyone else happy. Not what makes the most sense on paper. Not what the person you've always been would choose.

What do you want?

Maybe you don't have an answer yet. That's okay. If you've spent decades asking yourself what you should do, asking what you actually want might feel like learning an entirely new language.

But every time you ask, you're giving that quieter voice within you an opportunity to be heard.

And maybe that's where the real transformation begins. Not by becoming somebody new, but by finally getting to know the person who's been there all along.

“The gatekeepers can't see what the heart can see.” — Dr. Rick Diamond

Want to go deeper?

This is only part of the conversation. Get the whole story on this episode of Create Your Fate.

LISTEN ON APPLE OR LISTEN ON SPOTIFY

And Rick's new book, There Is Nothing Wrong With You: A Guide to Story Healing, offers practical exercises and guidance for identifying your Should Story and reconnecting with your Heart Story.

GET DR. RICK DIAMOND'S BOOK →

Before you go, consider this:

Where in your life are you still making decisions based on who you think you're supposed to be rather than who you actually are? And if you stopped worrying about what you should want, what would you choose for yourself?