Successful individuals often create alter egos as a psychological strategy to enhance their performance in various aspects of their lives. From sports to business and everything in between, the “Alter Ego Effect,” allows individuals to adopt different personas that embody the traits and characteristics they aspire to exhibit in specific situations.

David Goggins calls on Goggins to persevere. Beyonce uses her alter ego Sasha Fierce to bring out her inner confidence on stage. Kobe with the Black Mamba and the list goes on and on.

Most of the alter ego’s that I see being created are positive. What I mean is they help someone channel more of themselves to accomplish a goal. They call on this positive alter ego to help them push through their current barriers. But what if there is a better way to create and label alter egos?

My theory is there are at least 3 versions of yourself you can call upon in different times. There’s your current, the person you see in the mirror and is present in everyday reality. There’s the image of person you strive to become, the future version of you and lastly there’s the side of you that pulls you away from being the person you want to become.

Whenever I need to dig deep and get something done, I call on Magnus. Magnus is my guiding star. He has achieved everything that I am currently working towards. He has the health, wealth, career, love, social circles, hobbies and personality I am currently working to obtain. When things get tough, I call on Magnus. “What would Magnus do? Magnus would push through. Magnus would find a creative way. I am Magnus, I can do this,” is usually how my internal conversation goes.

Magnus as an alter ego is amazing because channeling him allows me to push beyond what I can currently do. Most of the alter ego’s that celebrities, entrepreneurs and athletes create are a “Magnus,” type of alter ego. However, there’s another alter ego that I have and my guess is you have him/her too, you just haven’t labeled it yet.

Meet Wilbert. Wilbert is the alter ego that pulls me away from my goals. Wilbert is cunning, tenacious and constantly trying to slow down momentum. When you’re on a diet and there’s a voice in your head egging you on to eat cookies…that’s Wilbert.

What I’ve found is, my current self, Kelvin, can do the activities I need to do in the present moment by focusing on the image of Magnus and mitigating Wilbert as best as possible. Wilbert isn’t all bad, but if left unchecked, he can ruin most forward momentum.

Wilbert has many many many ways of pulling you back. Let’s see if any of these resonate with you:

• I don’t feel like going to the gym, i’ll go tomorrow
• We can send the quote out tomorrow morning
• I can eat this *insert tempting food item here*
• I don’t want to go to that event
• That person is so *insert gossip or negative topic here*
• You look fat, slow, old etc…

Those are just a few examples of Wilbert at play. You can see how devastating he can be. However, now that I’ve got him labeled, it’s easy for me to shut him up. When a negative thought like the ones listed above present themselves, I chuckle a bit and say things like, “Man Wilbert you don’t let up,” and continue forward.

Somedays I can’t stop Wilbert and that’s okay. The idea is to mitigate him as much as possible. Give more power to Magnus. Magnus is my ideal-self. The version of me that has achieved everything I want. Magnus is the guy. Kelvin is working towards becoming Magnus.

In conclusion. Find your positive ideal version of yourself. Give that person a name and let that person motivate your current self. That is your positive alter-ego. Next, give the negative version of yourself a name. The voice that pulls you towards making regrettable decisions. Once that voice has a name, anytime it rears it’s head, your current self can label it, and dismiss it. It’s a neat little trick and I hope it works for you!