Those who have been reading this blog for a while will recall that I've felt like I was in a transition for at least a year, maybe 18 months. I have talked about "feeling pregnant," sure that I was going to "deliver" a new and fuller me without really knowing what that meant.
All of a sudden, it feels like I am in the final moments of giving birth. I still don't really know where it is going, but I do know that I've learned a huge amount about myself and life over the last few months. Whatever is coming feels like I've taken a quantum leap in the cycle of spirit growth.
In the process of doing some "cleaning up of the past" so that I can really move forward, I stumbled onto "self-trust" as an issue. It ends up that the whole self-trust thing has come up before. 20-plus years ago, I had a cranial-sacral session in which the practitioner said, "You have self-trust issues." I was indignant.
My integrity is critical to me. I wouldn't/couldn't lie, cheat or steal. I am the girl who argued about the integrity of exceeding the speed limit by 5 miles an hour even if everyone else was doing it. How could I have self-trust issues? But self-trust...even trust...is more than that. In fact, integrity is much more than not lying, cheating, or stealing. As soon as I was able to break through my self-righteousness after each of these messages about self-trust, everywhere I turned I was able to see lack of self-trust.
Integrity derives from the same Greek root as "integer"--a whole number. Being in integrity is being true to who you know you are in your heart. Self-trust is acting in accord with that "soul's intention" for your life. Sometimes I've been very good at acting in alignment with my truth, but I admit that in recent years more often than not I've more reliably acting in accord with what the world around me has expected of me.
The world around me tells me that financial success, a well-founded retirement, and increasingly higher status jobs is "success," but I've really know that wasn't my definition of success. Why have I tolerated a job and superiors who treat me so disrespectfully for years? Do I not trust myself to do the things that I know are right for me? For that matter, why is it that I can't keep my intentions to avoid sugar, or to write this blog, or to meditate everyday? Those are the intentions that I know to be true to my heart.
Several months ago I mustered the courage to tell my boss I was quitting at the end of the summer...without another job in hand. That was integrity and self-trust. I gave a long notice because I needed that time to make sure current projects were either complete or at the stage of development at which they could be handed off to someone else. Taking good care of clients I love was integrity. I couldn't have trusted myself if I'd done less.
As the weeks passed I found myself dragging my feet. I kept saying the words but inside me I was afraid I couldn't do it.
In June I began to feel a real physical exhaustion. Why, I asked myself, had I not planned to leave sooner? Two things occurred about the same time that reinforced my decision to leave, and they were the final straws. Suddenly I was like the proverbial horse headed for the barn. I may not know what was at the end of the tunnel, but I was sure it would be better. Almost overnight, I felt a super-charged sense of self-efficacy. In retrospect, I had recognized my ability to come out on top... whatever life presented me. I finally trusted myself. Whoo-hoo!
The Universe was very affirming. Almost as soon as I got really clear that I was going to come out better however I came out, things started popping. I had two interviews in a week for a job I'd applied for in February. The founder of a new consulting firm called and began salary negotiation for an executive position. I attended a conference and a professional meeting and walked away from both with several leads on contract work if I decided to go independent. All of this is 10 days time. Within another week, I had an offer for a job I've agreed to take that will allow me to do work that is better aligned with my strengths and is significantly more money and benefits.
I have wondered to myself a number of times what would have happened if I'd quit this job years ago. Did I just need to trust myself enough to know I would land on my feet for the Universe to support me? Although we will never know, I am guessing that is true.
After a dry spell, my date life is picking up again, too. No great loves on the horizon. What I've started noticing that if a man doesn't treat me the way I expect to be treated, I trust myself enough to just walk away (once in the middle of dinner) rather than politely tolerating unacceptable behavior.
One of my favorite rom-com movies is "The Holiday." In it, Iris, played by Kate Winslet, has been a doormat for her "former" boyfriend. Although he is in a relationship with another woman, he uses Iris when it is convenient for him. Iris encounters an octogenarian screenwriter, who "assigns" her movie watching of classic films with strong female leads.
Soon her boyfriend is once again asking her to do something for him again. This time she indignantly refuses. "What's gotten into you, Iris?" he asks. Stopped in her tracks for a split second, Iris hesitates before saying, "I think it is something resembling gumption."
"Gumption" isn't a word I hear often these days. Yet that is what I am finding seems to come in the wake of self-trust. When I know what is right for me in my heart, and when I act on what I know is true, the gumption part seems to come easily. Gumption isn't arrogant: it feels to me like a deep, peaceful truth that wells up inside of me, offering a sense of strength and focus that I haven't been conscious of for a while.
Trust, you see, is a lot like a hug: you have to give it to get it. Once I started trusting myself with the truth of my heart, the Universe has trusted me enough to support me in my truth. Can there be much more?
Showing posts with label self-trust. Show all posts
Showing posts with label self-trust. Show all posts
Saturday, August 13, 2016
Saturday, August 23, 2014
Can I Be Trusted?
Friday afternoon I was irritable with my colleague, and she happens to be the best teammate I've ever had at work. I was angry with myself for being unpleasant, but I was more angry for not being me. For a while I stewed over it: what was wrong with me? Then I realized what it was.
Like a bolt out of the blue, it came to me: I was resisting giving up the last vestiges of my integrity. The resistance--the fight to maintain who I know myself to be in my heart--had weakened me. Over the last couple of years, slowly I've carved away almost every part of me that I've felt to be right and true. Those who have read this blog for a while will know that I have struggled with eating sugar and a host of desires that sugar triggers. I have grappled with gradually carving exercise from my life. I have fought for time and energy to write...this blog and other things. I have strained to figure out how I could do all the work expected of me and still work a reasonable number of hours. All of these are things I know to be for me: they are important to my health, my life, and my integrity--who I know I am...in my heart.
So it is that yesterday, I sat at my desk in near tears trying to figure out how I could do 30 hours worth of work in the four hours that were left. Well, that isn't quite right: I'd been off the clock for nine or ten hours by then, but it was still the normal work day. "I am killing myself!" I thought. Just as surely as if I were to pull out a gun, the way I've abused my body, mind, and spirit is killing me.
Although I should have done so, I didn't bring work home this weekend. I have no idea how I will get everything done that I need to do for next week but, as the afore-referenced colleague has said, we've grown accustomed to almost no preparation for the string of events which we orchestrate. Somehow, I am sure I will figure this out...or I won't, but something must change. I need the rest. I need renewal. I need time to heal. I need my creativity.
A funny thought drifted into my mind. Over 20 years ago, I was having a session with a cranial-sacral therapist. I am not sure exactly what that is. The practitioner held my head in his hands and, for lack of a better term, rotated it gently for an hour or so. I had struggled for several years with pain following an accident. The total relaxation that I experienced in the "treatment" eased my discomfort.
One day at the end of the session, he said to me, "You have self-trust issues."
As much as I could do so in the state of total relaxation, I wriggled my face and wrinkled my brow a little. I thought he was nuts. Yesterday, I knew he was right. I couldn't trust myself: I couldn't trust myself to do what I know I need. Admitting this part should change things, right? Just stop all those self-destructive behaviors in which I've been engaging.
I've actually drawn a line in the sand several times. I would work these crazy hours until a long-promised new team member arrives. That was a process that started last October...almost a year ago. We've heard a number of dates when the person was supposed to be here: March, May, June, July, August, September. Two days ago the date we were told it will be October 6. With each new date, I took a deep breath and put my nose down to continue for just a month or two more. I've committed to some clients through the end of September, but I will not do this any more.
In the meantime, I am going to start taking those exercise lunches that have fallen away. Tomorrow I will dispose of the "healthy junk food," which has slipped into my kitchen. I commit to writing this blog more regularly and resuming regular attendance at dance events at least once a week. These small steps won't reverse the damage, but at least they will stem the losses and provide me with some resilience.
Hopefully, they will help me begin to restore my trust in me and my integrity, so that I will start to like the person I see in the mirror in the morning. I want to be a person who can be trusted, and if I can't trust myself to do what is right for me, then who else can trust me?
As with every intention, bringing it to life comes in the magnitude of thousands of small choices moving toward what we choose. Do what I need to do in this moment. Then, in the next moment, do what I need to do again. But, to do that I must be conscious--I must be awake, and this work addiction has lulled me back to that place, which the Upanishads calls "the sleeping place that men call waking."
That's all there is to it: stay awake. Of course, the Upanishads were written between 800 and 400 BC! This is a battle that humankind has been fighting for a very long time, apparently with limited success. I won't worry about that. I am confident that I will not change the course of human history by going to exercise classes and dances, cleaning out my junk food, and writing this blog. I don't need to change the course of human history. I just need to change my life...in this moment...and the next...and the next.
Like a bolt out of the blue, it came to me: I was resisting giving up the last vestiges of my integrity. The resistance--the fight to maintain who I know myself to be in my heart--had weakened me. Over the last couple of years, slowly I've carved away almost every part of me that I've felt to be right and true. Those who have read this blog for a while will know that I have struggled with eating sugar and a host of desires that sugar triggers. I have grappled with gradually carving exercise from my life. I have fought for time and energy to write...this blog and other things. I have strained to figure out how I could do all the work expected of me and still work a reasonable number of hours. All of these are things I know to be for me: they are important to my health, my life, and my integrity--who I know I am...in my heart.
So it is that yesterday, I sat at my desk in near tears trying to figure out how I could do 30 hours worth of work in the four hours that were left. Well, that isn't quite right: I'd been off the clock for nine or ten hours by then, but it was still the normal work day. "I am killing myself!" I thought. Just as surely as if I were to pull out a gun, the way I've abused my body, mind, and spirit is killing me.
Although I should have done so, I didn't bring work home this weekend. I have no idea how I will get everything done that I need to do for next week but, as the afore-referenced colleague has said, we've grown accustomed to almost no preparation for the string of events which we orchestrate. Somehow, I am sure I will figure this out...or I won't, but something must change. I need the rest. I need renewal. I need time to heal. I need my creativity.
A funny thought drifted into my mind. Over 20 years ago, I was having a session with a cranial-sacral therapist. I am not sure exactly what that is. The practitioner held my head in his hands and, for lack of a better term, rotated it gently for an hour or so. I had struggled for several years with pain following an accident. The total relaxation that I experienced in the "treatment" eased my discomfort.
One day at the end of the session, he said to me, "You have self-trust issues."
As much as I could do so in the state of total relaxation, I wriggled my face and wrinkled my brow a little. I thought he was nuts. Yesterday, I knew he was right. I couldn't trust myself: I couldn't trust myself to do what I know I need. Admitting this part should change things, right? Just stop all those self-destructive behaviors in which I've been engaging.
I've actually drawn a line in the sand several times. I would work these crazy hours until a long-promised new team member arrives. That was a process that started last October...almost a year ago. We've heard a number of dates when the person was supposed to be here: March, May, June, July, August, September. Two days ago the date we were told it will be October 6. With each new date, I took a deep breath and put my nose down to continue for just a month or two more. I've committed to some clients through the end of September, but I will not do this any more.
In the meantime, I am going to start taking those exercise lunches that have fallen away. Tomorrow I will dispose of the "healthy junk food," which has slipped into my kitchen. I commit to writing this blog more regularly and resuming regular attendance at dance events at least once a week. These small steps won't reverse the damage, but at least they will stem the losses and provide me with some resilience.
Hopefully, they will help me begin to restore my trust in me and my integrity, so that I will start to like the person I see in the mirror in the morning. I want to be a person who can be trusted, and if I can't trust myself to do what is right for me, then who else can trust me?
As with every intention, bringing it to life comes in the magnitude of thousands of small choices moving toward what we choose. Do what I need to do in this moment. Then, in the next moment, do what I need to do again. But, to do that I must be conscious--I must be awake, and this work addiction has lulled me back to that place, which the Upanishads calls "the sleeping place that men call waking."
That's all there is to it: stay awake. Of course, the Upanishads were written between 800 and 400 BC! This is a battle that humankind has been fighting for a very long time, apparently with limited success. I won't worry about that. I am confident that I will not change the course of human history by going to exercise classes and dances, cleaning out my junk food, and writing this blog. I don't need to change the course of human history. I just need to change my life...in this moment...and the next...and the next.
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