by Deb Schanilec
Yes, it’s true—at times even this blissmonger (some of you folks know me by that persona J) encounters what some might call “choppy waters”.
Without going into too much detail, I’ll simply say that a worldview epically polar opposite mine inserted itself into my presence recently. Someone significant to my experience on the planet was trying to be supportive in the only way they knew how.
This worldview focused on lack, playing small, hedging against all possible contingencies, contraction, fear, doubt, worry and anxiety to the degree that this person couldn’t hear otherwise if their life depended on it.
Of course they had the same opinion of my worldview, as polar opposites are wont to do.
I wasn’t being reasonable with my focusing on abundance, playing large, expansion, belief, knowing and positive expectation, and my life depended on being able to hear otherwise.
There was a time in the not-so-distant past when circumstances like this would have had me stewing because of the meaning I attributed to someone else’s opinion being different than mine.
I would have been lost in anger, blame, guilt, or some other savory spot on the emotional scale, and quite possibly even succumbed to the temptation to abdicate my worldview for theirs altogether.
I would have been up most of the night, losing sleep because of the Tasmanian Devil of a tizzy I’d worked myself into, thinking of the perfect come-back that would convince them of my position that I hadn’t had the presence of mind to articulate at the time in my state of shock.
However.
Because of the investment I’ve made in choosing where my mind hangs out most often, doing the maintenance work that keeps it there and supplementing with enhancements as often as possible, my response was much different this time.
I just felt sorry for them.
I understood why they felt the way they did, what life events had brought them to the beliefs that held them prisoner, and I felt sorry for them.
Their gloomy outlook didn’t change my plans a lick.
As a matter of fact, it helped further anchor my resolve to see them through.
Not in a knee-jerk, “I’ll-show-them” kind of way, although that spirit certainly has its place, especially if you’ve spent most of your time stuck in anger and resentment.
My gut told me that I was right on track, didn’t need to detour here, and everything was going to be fine.
I had successfully traversed a particular grouping of baby steps along the emotional scale, and boy, did it feel good.
We often attribute progress towards a goal in physical baby steps, or the accumulation of tasks that can be tangibly measured.
That’s great, that’s empowering, that’s satisfying.
But the ones that really count are the ones that you take, gradation by gradation, from your set point day-in, day-out being that of anger most of the time, to discouragement, to blame, to worry, to doubt, to disappointment, to overwhelment, to mere frustration, to pessimism, to boredom—and then things get really interesting.
And you can tell how you’re doing with this tweaking by how the people around you typically respond to you.
When they stop reacting to you from those same pockets on the emotional scale, now you’re cookin’ with gas.
You’ve done the work to divest yourself from the Velcro hook of triggers, and taken your power back.
Even though their stuff and their projections are all about them, it’s still really all about you.
And that’s great news, because that’s all we can ever do anything about: our response to what does, or doesn’t, happen.
Recent Comments