The Best Self / Anti-Self Character Method
Name and draw the two characters inside you, then choose which one shows up.
- Difficulty
- Easy
- Time to result
- ~weeks to results
- Steps
- 6
- Confidence
- 95%
Mike Bayer's core coaching move is to stop treating change as an instruction and start treating it as a cast of characters. You inventory the traits present when you're at your best and the traits present when you're sabotaging yourself, then name and draw each as a distinct character — Bayer's best self is a wizard named Merlin, his anti-self is a friendless male witch who complains and looks for why the glass is empty. Because the characters are external and slightly absurd, you can examine your worst patterns without the ego pile-on that normally shuts the exercise down. In any tense moment, the prompt becomes 'how would the wizard show up today?' rather than the useless 'be confident'. Bayer runs this with individuals, executives and corporations, and keeps wizards physically around his house as reminders.
Origin
Bayer built the method from his own coaching practice rather than clinical training — his psychiatric and interventionist credentials came from formal education in Minnesota, but the authenticity work was his own creation. He found that telling people (and himself) to 'be confident' before public speaking or a hard conversation simply did not land, so he began building characters instead. His own best self became a wizard named Merlin, and he now surrounds himself with wizard imagery as a physical trigger.
Core principles
- 01Abstract advice like 'be confident' or 'stay calm' gives the brain nothing to act on; a character does.
- 02Externalising a part of yourself into a named character creates third-person distance and self-awareness.
- 03Humour in the naming alleviates the ego so self-examination doesn't collapse into self-attack.
- 04Everyone's best self is uniquely theirs — the coach's job is to help them identify it, not assign one.
- 05The question 'how would my best self show up here?' is actionable where 'be yourself' is not.
How to run it
- 1
Inventory your best-self characteristics
Write out every characteristic that is present when time stops and you are fully in the moment — funny, clever, compassionate, confident. This is the mixture that makes you uniquely you.
Pro tip If someone struggles to claim a positive trait, use a concrete scenario: 'if a stranger dropped their grocery bag, would you pick it up?' Then name the trait it reveals — thoughtful.
Watch out Naming positive characteristics about yourself is genuinely hard for most people; expect resistance and push gently rather than accepting 'I don't know'.
- 2
Map the anti-self by finding the stuck pattern
Ask what situations bring the most stress, what you worry about, what gives you anxiety, what keeps you up at night, what your biggest conflict is and who you're angry at. Look for the repeating pattern — that's the anti-self.
Pro tip You are hunting for a pattern, not a single bad day. The anti-self is the part that reliably gets stuck.
- 3
Name both characters
Give each character its own name. The naming injects humour, which is what makes it survivable to look at the parts of yourself you don't like.
Pro tip Bayer's are a wizard named Merlin and a friendless male witch — the sillier the name, the less ego is in the way.
Watch out If the naming turns into another way to beat yourself up, you've missed the point — there has to be some alleviation of the ego in it.
- 4
Draw them
Actually draw the two characters out on paper. Writing them down and drawing them makes them concrete objects you can look at in third person.
- 5
Build a summoning ritual
Create a small physical ritual to tap into the best self before anything that makes you nervous or afraid — Bayer drops to his knees, looks in the mirror and says 'bring out the wizard'.
Pro tip Keep physical totems of the character in your environment. Bayer has wizards all over his house and one on his shoulder.
- 6
Deploy in the moment
In any misaligned or high-stakes situation, ask 'how would my best self show up in this?' rather than issuing yourself an abstract command.
Pro tip Use it before the conversation, not after — the whole point is avoiding the post-hoc 'I should have said that'.
In the wild
Bayer identified his own best self as a wizard named Merlin and made it physically present — wizards throughout his house, a wizard on a stand behind him, a wizard on his shoulder. Before anything that makes him nervous, he drops to his knees, looks in the mirror and says 'bring out the wizard'.
→ Even as a working professional coach, he uses the cue to stay reminded of what it means to be authentically himself in charged moments.
Bayer's anti-self is a male witch, in his version a character who has no friends, sits around complaining, and is always looking for why the glass is empty rather than full.
→ The absurdity of the character lets him spot and name the complaining pattern without beating himself up, and he has run the same exercise with corporations and executives.
Common mistakes
Substituting instructions for characters
Telling yourself 'be confident' or 'stay calm' before a hard moment leaves your brain with nothing to imitate, and it immediately counter-argues with 'yeah, but you did this and this'. The character gives behaviour to copy.
Turning the anti-self into a self-attack
If examining the anti-self becomes another round of beating yourself up, the exercise fails. Humour and naming exist precisely to take the ego out of it.
Doing it only in your head
Skipping the writing and drawing keeps the characters abstract. The physical artifact — plus totems in the environment — is what makes the cue available under pressure.
Is it for you?
Best for
People who repeatedly leave meetings, confrontations or performances thinking 'I wasn't myself' and want a portable, in-the-moment cue.
Not ideal for
Anyone in acute psychiatric crisis needing clinical treatment rather than coaching, or people who need a purely analytical process and find character work too playful to engage with.
From the transcript
“sometimes it's really hard to change when we are just told be confident or you got this or be yourself”
“my best self is a wizard named merlin i've wizards all over my house before i could do something where i'm like feeling nervous or…”
“when you give it a name it gives a little humor because when you're looking at parts of yourself that you don't like the the…”
“so basically the exercise is you write all the elements or characteristics of your best self then you write all the characteristics of your worst…”
From the episode
Coach Mike Bayer: One Decision To a Better Life
Coach Mike Bayer