What? If someone is rude to me I’m not supposed to take it personally? When my mother or daughter, father or son hurts me, I’m not supposed to get upset? The boss blows up in my face and it’s his problem? Oh, and here’s my favorite – when my boyfriend/husband or girlfriend/wife says something to me in anger that really feels like it cuts me in half, that’s ok? It’s MY problem?
I’d heard this before and thought it absurd. My family had its share of alcoholics and codependency, so this whole concept felt outrageous to me. We hurt each other all the time with words, and I know that pain was very real!
Years ago I was in a serious relationship that was falling apart despite all my best efforts. Then, a friend suggested I read Women Who Love Too Much. A couple of years later I read Codependent No More, and later down my path the powerful book The Four Agreements. All of these helped me understand that other people do the best they can with what they know. They love us in their way. The behave according to their experiences and interpretations. No matter how much something they do hurts us, they would do the same thing to anyone else in that situation because it’s what they know. Often, they are treating us as good as they possibly know to given their understanding of what’s happening and how to handle it.
So, where does that leave us? On our own healing path of understanding that nothing anyone else says or does is personal. Whether they think we’re wonderful or horrible, brilliant or stupid, beautiful or ugly, all of that is just their opinion! We didn’t create it and we can’t fix it.
Only we can choose the people we fill our daily lives with and the reality that creates for us. Only we can decide then that nothing anyone says or does is personal. Their judgment of us is not reality. It is quite simply THEIR OPINION. It also has nothing to do with how THEY FEEL about us.
Replacing our foundation with this and beginning the journey to align ourselves and our thoughts and feelings to this is nothing short of life-changing. It is, in my humble opinion, a transformational journey that is well worth taking!
Now more than ever it is imperative that we each find and stand in our own personal truth. Still, our truth often doesn’t match the truth of those we love in our life, and that makes it less than easy. This is increasing as the energy heightens our intuition and empathy.
We must be true to ourselves, for anything less results in us living others’ dreams for us instead of our own lives. Therefore, let us help one another learn ways to stand deeper in our own individual truths with as much love as possible for ourselves and those around us who love us, too.
This week, rather than writing about this topic, I’d prefer for YOU to share with us any helpful insights or experiences you’ve had with this. Specifically, how would you respond if your best friend in the world asked you:
How do you speak your truth to someone you love when you can feel it causing them anger, fear, sadness, or disappointment?
Thank you for sharing your best tips on this common challenge. For all who celebrate Thanksgiving this week, may your holiday be joyous while standing in your true and authentic self.
Someone recently said to me that all love is the same. Do you agree? I can think of several people in my life who I feel I love in very different ways. One feels more like family, one more romantic, one not like either of the other two. When I look back through my life, did I really love the same at 16 or 17 as I do now? It sure didn’t feel the same!
As this conversation continued, I began to agree that there is only one love. Love is love. However, we don’t always do the best job of identifying and separating all the other feelings that can bundle up with that love, because it’s easier to lump it together and call it love. In the prior example, loving someone romantically tends to involve a degree of passion, endearment, loyalty, etc. When we love someone like family, there may be loyalty as well, but maybe it is deeper, and then maybe there’s nurturing, protecting, and familiarity or comfort also present.
Can you remember a past relationship you called “love” that seemed like something else as it continued? In my past, I definitely did that and then there was confusion and hurt. All this makes me wonder how we got so cloudy about our own feelings.
I attended a workshop once in which they asked us how we felt in that moment, and we were given a huge poster listing various feelings, each with a sketch of a face next to it showing how that may look. There must have been dozens of faces on that poster. Dozens! Typically, we use about four or five in our conversation, saying we are happy, sad, mad, lonely, etc. It’s kind of difficult to learn how to understand and express our feelings in relationships when we don’t even talk about half the feelings we have!
I love a lot of people in different ways, and it’s interesting to sit and really think about all the other feelings that are bundled up with that love. The idea of one soul mate as the only person we would love romantically in our lifetime is really hard for me to imagine. Look at all the other love I’d miss along the way! Maybe they aren’t really referring to just love when they say that. What do you think?
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The Celestine Prophecy is an entertaining and enlightening book that is even more enjoyable for those on a path of self-discovery. In the chapter called Clearing the Past, the main character is invited to view his parents and childhood in a unique way. Rather than getting hung up on what was good or bad, right or wrong, he applies a blame-free framework to discover how his life perfectly prepared him to this point for his passion. Using prompting questions from The Celestine Prophecy, An Experiential Guide I applied these principles to my own life and found it very interesting.
Many people believe, as do I, that we repeatedly reincarnate with other souls into different characters to learn various life lessons. (If you are interested, there is a great children’s book on this called The Little Soul in the Sun by Neale Donald Walsh.) In The Celestine Prophecy, the main character is invited to look closely at what each of his parents stood for by reviewing their lives, and then examine what purpose he may have come here for that he chose to be born of those parents into those circumstances. He was told, “…the real you began in a position between (your Mom’s and your Dad’s) truths…you were born there to take a higher perspective on what they stood for.”
When I looked at my own life, my first observation was the themes that dominated my childhood: sex, money, religion, education, and government. I saw how my Mom represented one extreme on these issues while my father took a generally opposite view. For example, one lived in terror that we’d run out of money while the other pursued dreams and knew we would be fine. One was spiritual but abhorred religion yet the other made sure I was able to visit every kind of religion in our area that I might choose one. I see now how POWER and CONTROL are used in every one of those themes. I recognize how the roles of bully, victim, and martyr shifted around the family depending on the topic and stance of the conversation. Other family members and friends also got involved.
The central theme was how people give power to others and take power away from them using sex, money, religion,education, and politics. I had a perfect training ground to watch this play out in childhood with family and then watch it play out much rougher in “the real world” in later years. Now as I finally go deep enough into my exploration and healing to stand outside of the drama, I see clearly that we are all born filled with a Divine power and strength untouchable by man. Even when we are victimized as small children, there is nothing anyone here can do to diminish our deepest power or break our invincible spirit. We have all that we ever need at birth, and the rest of this is just a school to teach us that. Truly, our only occupation here is to love one another and enjoy this beautiful playground rather than getting all caught up in fighting over toys or sandbox territory.
I invite you to explore your life and lineage in a similar way. I would love to hear your comments, questions, or concerns!
As the news reports murders, rapes, escaped prisoners, drunken accidents, wars, divorce, and suicides, one cannot help but wonder, ‘Where has God gone?’ What loving God would allow this madness? Innocent people being killed….so much destruction and pain…has God forgotten about us here?
Sitting outside this morning, I hear the birds sing their morning greetings. The tiniest of flying insects stops by my arms and feet, landing briefly to say hello during my meditation before flying along on their way. The trees pour forth the very air I breathe to sustain my life. I feel at one with the Universe and all that is perfect and good. Here God is certainly everywhere!
Where then is the disconnect? How can we go into nature and so quickly find God all around us, remember God deep within us, and then feel such a restless separation when we return to daily life? What can we do to stay connected to that perfect Divine Energy that permeates all of life?
Consider the following without guilt, judgement, or resentment, merely as a possible explanation for our spiritual disconnection. We have constructed modern society devoid of any real contact with nature. We live in concrete jungles, eat manufactured foods, and breathe artificially filtered, temperature regulated air. We raze the land to built modern housing and then plant St. Augustine grass and trees (often non-native to our region) to please our artificially programmed, media driven taste, with little forethought to drainage concerns or the quality of the soil and nutrients. As if all of this wasn’t enough of a disconnect from our true origin, we then isolate ourselves into our office or our house rather than living in the more communal groups like those of our ancestors around the world. Even if we become “active” in our communities, we rarely live as a true community…even without our own families. Our routine involves school or work, computers, possibly some exercise in an artificial gym environment, and then driving home and pulling straight into our garage before closing the door behind us and entering our house to watch TV or whatever. We may read a spiritual book or attend a weekly service, but the rest of the time we shake our heads at the pained world and wonder where God went.
The God we frustratingly seek is as easy to find as returning to nature. Find a native park, river, lake, or forest. Go to the ocean and get lost in the smells and sounds. Retreat to a still place in which your senses can soak in the Divine from all forms of nature and the beautiful Divinity within you can awaken to return love back to nature. Create that magnificent flow and feel alive again! THERE’s God…right within you all along! Now, how will you regenerate that feeling and keep God alive within you all the time?
As always, I welcome your thoughts. Please feel free to comment below.
Thanks to our website designer and online marketing consultant Mario Rosales of Tech Life Balance for joining me in another chat about technology and how it impacts our relationships. Being the Heart & Soul of Success means being present in this moment and fully connecting with others. On this we all have room to improve!
What do disagreements sound like in your family? Do they turn into horrible screaming matches where you are reminded of every wrong you’ve ever done? Do you walk away scared, ashamed, or embarrassed? Do you feel loved?
As I’ve shared, I come from a family in which alcoholism dated back to…the dinosaurs? Anyway, because they didn’t often drink (my folks were a shopaholic and a workaholic), I didn’t understand until my 20s and 30s that we had the same broken communication patterns, and those are especially evident during arguments. Insults, digging up old disagreements and rehashing them, yelling louder and louder to ‘win’, the idea that someone wins and someone loses, suggesting that not seeing things my way (opinion) means you are stupid (fact), one person allowing insecurities to fuel jealousy that they take out on another person who didn’t do anything to bring them about in the first place…does any of this sound like your family, too? No one agreed to disagree or tried to learn something new from another disagreeing with them, they simply felt threatened and yelled louder until the other gave up or broke down, which meant the loudest person had finally ‘won’. How painful!!! Besides, when everyone in a loving family is hurt, scared, and defeated, how can anyone be a ‘winner’? Aren’t these the people who are supposed to have our backs no matter what, be in our corner, be on our team?
When there is physical abuse, there are physical signs and we can seek legal action and get protection. However, we may go years, or even a lifetime, without healing the effects of hurtful, destructive words said to us by loved ones in the heat of an argument. There are no restraining orders for broken hearts and bruised egos, or destroyed self-esteem, yet they surely shape our lives every day moving forward until we heal that hurt. We take those broken communication patterns and that win/lose, smart/dumb, right/wrong attitude with us into every relationship, picking the same types of partners, and wonder in the end why that one doesn’t work out either.
Today I simply want to share a very strong reminder that you deserve to love and be loved in a way that builds you and the other person up, so that each of you becomes MORE, not less, of yourselves. That love begins with loving and healing ourselves so that we can approach others as a whole person and end the cycle of punishing others for our own insecurities and incompleteness. You deserve to love and grow and heal!
For me, this has not been a weekend retreat or a year alone to heal 30 or 40. It is instead a lifelong process that starts with some deep work and then continues as I grow and change, and more of myself is revealed to me. However, the Journey to self is our greatest Journey of Possibilities, with God as our navigator loving us through every step of the way. A good book that helped me begin to open and may do the same for you is Your Sacred Self by Dr. Wayne Dyer.
Our parents loved us and raised us the best way they knew. They were operating within the boundaries of their own family of origin, knowledge, and experiences. Now it’s up to us to begin here and make our life the best experience possible. I will admit to having walked through a lot of pain to get where I am. I will also promise you it’s worth every step along the way to get to a place where I can experience this level of immense joy and love! I don’t need anyone to complete me but God; I am complete and I feel complete. Others enhance facets of my life, and this is how relationships should be. Our disagreements allow me to learn from them an expanded way to view the world and all in it, and we love one another regardless of whether we agree or not. No more personal insults, painful jabs, or destroyed self esteems. We build one another up and understand that is how it should be. I pray that in sharing this with you today you will talk to someone, find a meeting, open a book like Your Sacred Self, and finally begin the most precious Journey you will ever take! Above all, I know that you matter and you deserve it.
It was my honor and pleasure to meet Ritika Arya when she came to The Woodlands, TX to speak at this event. She is a very bright and shining Spirit with a beautiful openness and caring that drew me to her almost immediately, and I’m grateful for her friendship still.
I wanted to share her presentation with you because it provokes so many thoughts and emotions. She touches on some important lessons here about people and how we behave independently and interact with one another. When I am honest with myself, I have allowed the words and actions of family and both well-meaning and not-so-well-meaning others to limit what I would even consider as possible. Such limitations do a disservice that extends far beyond our own lives, for we may never achieve….or worse, even TRY to achieve…our potential if we believe what others tell us. The impact of such short sightedness is seldom limited to ourselves.
May the insightful truths Ritika shares here spotlight some of your own ill-serving limitations. Consider what these youth can achieve without such fears and inhibitions, and think about the monkeys in your cage. Remember to return to nature regularly to rejuvenate yourself and your Spirit to know that you are in this world for an important Purpose.
“Give thanks for unknown blessings already on their way” ~ Native American Saying
This quote was on the wall at a body shop where I was awaiting an estimate to replace my headlight kit from clipping a deer late the night before. I was so sick about my failed attempts not to hit the deer and how I’d done harm to a life now in pain (he lived) because of me that I’d been in an unshakeable funk. Nonetheless these words shook me on a deeper level about life as a whole. Pondering that sign, I considered Martha Beck’s words at a conference earlier in the week about how are built to worry, to which I’d considered how nonchalantly we share our worries with others as a normal state of being. Why don’t we treat blessings the way we do worries?
I need land and a building to start the Journey of Possibilities center here in Texas. God has shown me a beautiful vision and attracted people to me who are now WAITING for this vision to become a reality! From the day of that vision, every day has been an opportunity to be grateful that this blessing is coming. Instead, I often catch myself worrying in thought and conversation about how I can get there. This is typically treated as normal, both by me and others. However, on other occasions when I share that I am so excited to have a center opening in the future, and as they learn I don’t have the resources, they look at me skeptically as if I’m a liar! Rarely does someone remind me to stay positive and know that it’s coming, and it’s a stretch from there to actually be THANKFUL for what is not yet materialized, yet THIS IS THE ROOT OF THE LAW OF ATTRACTION!
What better week than Thanksgiving to consciously shift our awareness when we recognize a thought of fear or worry, and shift to one of thankfulness. One way to catch ourselves is surround ourselves with others who will remind us, by sharing this message with your friends and family, so they can catch you! Let’s shift our thoughts and thus our lives, one appreciated blessing at a time…before they appear!
Join Founder/CIO Sheryl Sitts for an online radio interview! Linda Ballesteros will interview Sheryl about the creation and future of Journey of Possibilities on Power Talk Radio on Wednesday, October 26th at 9 A.M. CST.
CALL IN to 347-989-1363 Option 1 during the show with your questions or comments. Too far away? Interact online from anywhere in the world. This Journey is much more interesting with you, so please join us!
