For my second post, I am going to share with you what I dedicated an entire page to on my Strategic Intnervention, Holist Life Coaching website (www.NoItsNotPersonal.com), because the topic is that good and worth sharing. Additionally, I'm putting it here as well because my website and my blog are not on one site, someone might come across one and not the other.. so here goes..
If Your World is Your Mirror; Where Might You Need Work?
After figuring out what you want, the second step is figuring out what may be keeping you from your amazing self and subsequently your sensational future!
The next sensible step would be to find out what your positive and negative traits are, so that we could use your positive traits to help you get to where you need to be, while improving any of your negative traits along with way...
While we're working on getting from the here and now to the then and there you will notice that within a few weeks you will be able to taste how sweet the end result will be.
Unfortunately without knowing or trying, we've all mastered patterns to get in our own way of happiness. We will have to figure out your favorite way of sabotaging your goals so we can get rid of those negative patterns once and for all!
Side note- ALL limiting beliefs, negative thought patterns, ways we sabotage our own happiness contrary to how we believe we are acting.. started out as a good intent! They are our inner children protecting us. So although those belief patterns, ways of keeping us safe.. no longer work for us, they were put into place by our inner children to keep us safe, sane & secure in the scary adult world they [our inner children] lived in- back then.
Knowing and accepting our weaknesses (ways in which our inner children still protect us today) knocks down the brick wall we've been living behind so we can see our 'True Self' and not the 'False Self' we've had to become! Facing and breaking down this wall will inevitably lead to self acceptance, which leads to better relationships, then to an unbelievable amount of personal world change.
CHANGE? Oh wait, how many of you started sweating or shaking when you read that word? Nah, change is nothing to be afraid of... in order to survive we need to change! I came across this article earlier and it's a great metaphor for why change is about survival...
Titled "Chains In Your Mind"
"Consider the public zoo elephant in my mother’s village where she grew up; Sapporo Japan. When the elephant was born, they put a shackle on it’s ankle and chained it to a little post. The baby elephant struggled against the chain at first, but eventually realized that no matter how hard it tried, it could not break free. A year went by and the elephant, now weighing several tons could easily rip the post from the ground and go anywhere it wanted, but because it learned early that it was held fast, it ceased trying to get away. It gets to the end of the chain and stops. Eventually, zookeepers remove the chain and post entirely. The elephant remains in the circle wearing nothing but a shackle on it’s ankle. Don’t be shackled by fear. Embrace the paradox that change is scary but not changing is scarier."
Here it is.. found it on this web page:
http://mindmulch.net/small-and-medium-business/6-ways-to-make-change-less-scary
We all have limiting beliefs that sabotage our efforts to move forward in a positive way in life, you're not special and No,it's not personal. What will be personal will be your sweet victory when you finally do reach your goals!
Right about now you may be thinking, well I've gotten this far and done just fine without having to face my limiting beliefs; what if I don't even have any?
Honestly I can't really argue with you, for all intents and purposes you have gotten this far without having to face your limiting beliefs, and where you are. may seem like an amazing place... but what was more than likely over looked may have been how much drama and emotional pain to either yourself or others it has cost. Or, is it still costing you?
Think back to a time (or perhaps now is that time) that no matter what you've tried you feel stuck, uncertain, confused, lost, unable to move forward, down in the dumps, in a rut, or just plain ol depressed or maybe even angry. Those feelings are all too common in a hectic 'get it done yesterday and don't you dare bitch about it' society. The good part is that those feelings blow over and most people are back on their feet sooner rather than later. However, have you noticed how those feelings have this really, really bad habit of coming back to bite us on the ass when we're not paying attention, despite our best efforts to keep them at bay.. Next thing you know is once again you're on the merry-go-round of life for yet another spin that's guaranteed to make you so dizzy that you won't know what hit you or which way is up! Round & round you go, where you'll stop nobody knows..
If Your World Is Your Mirror; Would The Image Be Just Like You, Or Would You Even Recognize It?
Ironically, it's when we're not on top of our games, when we're frustrated or stressed that we feel the need to turn to our partners or friends for help. It's usually to help get us back to our center.
Unfortunately, because of that mirror of life.. the people that we spend the most time with, are mirrors of ourselves and are on the same emotional playing field as we are. So, how can they really help us? They can't!
Wait a second here, am I saying that everyone in my or your circle is exactly like I or you are? No.
Well, my guess is that your wondering then what I am saying. I'm saying that even though the mirror of life doesn't put people in our world's that are exactly like we are.. (C'mon that would be way to dayum easy to figure out. I swear we're like experiments and there's somebody up there watching us all the time..they have to make these games hard or what fun would they be to watch!) [shrug]
No, what happens is the people in our lives are there to show us what needs to be done to better ourselves and subsequently better our lives. These people act as a mirror, a testimony if you will, of what emotional space we were in when we met them.
And if they're still in our lives, is it that we haven't fixed what needed to be fixed? Well, the answer to that is twofold, on the one hand if they are exactly who they were when we met, and we are still in the same emotional space, (in other words if we haven't had any serious insight into who we are), then the mirror is the same! On the other hand, if they've grown and have insight into who they are and why they kept going round & round on the merry go round of life, then they're in our lives to show us where we want to be and how to get there.
Our 'invisible, except to the soul, internal, color coordinated, matching magnet & metal sets' (yeah, say that three times fast- I dare ya- shaking my head laughing), anyway, those internal 'almost computerized, people magnets' if you will, wouldn't allow us to interact on any kind of serious long term level with anyone who's on a whole 'nother emotional playing felid, unless we're ready to move up & out of our present emotional comfort zones.
If Your World Is Your Mirror; Could I Offer Any More Than My Word As Proof?
Want proof of that? I did. Ok, here ya go, have you ever met someone of the opposite sex who was a knock out, gorgeous, a must have... then once you started talking to them, they lost any shot at you dating them? Or on the flip side of that... have you ever met someone who wasn't anything to write home about, yet once you started talking to them, you had to have them in your life? Well, that's our invisible, except to the soul, color coordinated, matching magnets, hard at work. Ya see, the exterior of a person isn't what we need as our mirrors so that we can move forward and heal our inner-world, it's what the person is all about inside that denotes who we allow into our world and who gets locked out or looked over. So, with that said, the chances of someone in our immediate circle knowing where the yellow brick road is.. are unlikely at best, non existent at worst.
I dunno 'bout you, but I need to know how that whole thing works. Do you have any idea? No. Well, neither do I, except to say that it has to be a sign that our wonderful Universe (or insert your higher power's name) is hard at work, whether or not we know or we don't know, whether we like or don't like it, and whether or not we do or don't understand it...
In case you haven't figured it out yet..our Universe is more powerful than any of us could imagine, and it's always working for the greater good of each and every one of us, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. All we have to do is to stop and listen to it, it lets us know what's what by the way we 'feel' it lets us know when we are out of alignment with our greater good, via emotional pain, and it lets us know if we're in alignment with our greater good, via emotional pleasure. It's that pain & pleasure principle you'll no doubt know like the back of your hand should you hire me to work with you. That pain & pleasure principle rules our lives..
Given that truth, whether it's obvious to you today, or not.. the look into the mirror of life trick has been known to those who truly understand life for quite some time now. I guess you can say it's been a well-kept secret that only the most driven of us laymen will find. I was first introduced to a vague concept of it a few years back when I was reading a book by Theodore Reik, a student of Freud's, written in the 1940's, titled 'Listening With The Third Ear' in which he wrote a sentence that had me baffled and in denial about for years. The sentence is, "One can only see that, which is within oneself". Well, as that sentence sunk in, I couldn't help but think.. 'hey wait a min, I'm beginning to see the pure evil in some people, I'm beginning to see how manipulative, conniving, shrewd, devious, self-centered, dominating, controlling and exploitive some people are... does that sentence mean that all of those qualities are also within me?
Yes, that's exactly what it meant! Oh boy, did I have dozens more self-help books to read before I understood and accepted that as it was meant to be- therapeutic & eye opening. That sentence had me digging & digging into my psych for days, weeks, months, & it actually would be a few years before I totally understood it.. and that he was talking about the mirror of life and how what I call 'the invisible, internal, color coordinated, magnet & metal set's' inside each of us; which will only allow us to connect with those whose magnet sets are on the same color frequency as ours and can teach us the depths of what we need to fix to get from here to there - really work!
In my readings, I've also come across a quote from a time much earlier than Reik's, that says pretty much the same thing..
'If you hate a person, you hate something in him that is a part of yourself. What isn't part of ourselves doesn't disturb us." ~ Herman Hesse (Demain, 1919)
How about, "Show me your friends and I'll tell you who you are!"
Or, "Birds of a feather flock together!"
Or, "Opposites attract!"
If Your World Is Your Mirror; Am I Saying That The People Who Make Your Life Miserable Are There For A Reason?
Whether or not the people in our lives (the mirrors in front of us) are exactly like we are, or exactly opposite of who we are, when all is said & done insofar as the mirror of life is concerned, one way or the other it will teach us what we need to fix, as long as we're open to the fact that there is a mirror!
Unfortunately, some people will suffer and perhaps even die from one or more of the illnesses that are born out of (accepted or not) internal stress, chaos and misery, if we make the bad choice of choosing to ignore what we are being shown over & over again that needs fixing, we leave ourselves open to the physical ramifications of our choices!
Now talk about uncomfortable, that's probably the hardest pill for any of us to swallow. No, wait lemme speak for myself here, that was the hardest pill I've ever had to swallow!
Pssst, c'mere... closer... closer, I need to tell you a secret and I can only afford to say it once; I don't wanna jinx myself or anything (smile)! Yanno those people who irritate us the most? The ones that we'd love to send off on the next really turbulent flight or missile to 'I don't care where as long as it's not on my planet'... Oh c'mon you have a few of those in your world.. maybe even more than a few- hell I had a list of 'em.
Anywho, I hope your sitting down for this. Ok, I'll wait, please make sure you're sitting in a somewhat safe place (I don't want you to fall then get hurt & have to finish reading this holding your ribs) Ok, I gave you the chance, I'm sure you're sitting. Well, from the list of really annoying people that live too close to you on your planet, pick the one that you would like to have had out of your world yesterday.
Yes, the one that you dislike the most, doesn't matter if they're friend, foe, family or neighbor... figure out what their major malfunction is.. and ask yourself, self: what is it about this person that's within me that I need to work on the most? Because that's exactly where you'll find the answer to the question you didn't know you had!
Again, you may be wondering why I'm saying that. Well the long and short of it is, that's the relationship or non-relationship as you might have it.. that has the most profound message to teach us..their being is a message that we absolutely, positively, without a doubt need to work on the most within ourself if we want to get to a place of happiness, success or fulfillment. And the kicker is, those relationships display some of the most limiting beliefs we have that stand in the way of our happiness. But, if that's the case with us, that's also the case with our partners and close friends which would render them useless in helping us find out what needs to be figured out.
So wait, am I saying that all the people in your world.. those that you like/love, dislike/can live without are really different parts of yourself that need to be figured out and addressed before you can be in that phenomenal future I was talking about? Yes, yes, yes, yes & YES!
It's as if I can hear you now... "No,no, no, no noooooooooo" (gulp)! Yeah, I know that's a hard one to swallow.
When I had begun understanding this concept I had no one teaching me. Well, no one in the here and now. I had many therapists eons ago when I was in, and leaving my abusive marriage but the last ten years it's taken me to figure all of this out, it was simply trial and error, and a zillion self-help books later.
Well, yanno that's not one hundred percent true either, there was this therapist Charlie who I refer to all the time, although the lesson he was trying to teach me was some thirty years ago; looking back he was the only one who had ever told me the God's honest truth about myself, even though back then I had refused to hear it.
If Your World Is Your Mirror; How Would You Know What To Look For?
Of course I'm going to share with you what Charlie told me, but am I telling you because I expect that you are who I was, and you may need to hear it as well? Maybe, maybe not.. perhaps I'm just part of your mirror..
So Charlie looked me in the eye and whispered, (he always whispered so his clients would listen closer to what he said) "If I put one hundred men in a room and they all looked identical to each other, and then I brought you into the room to choose which one you wanted to have as a partner or friend.. I guarantee you that you will leave the room with the biggest asshole in the group!"
His words were a lot stronger than that- but for now, that's close enough, and as if that wasn't insulting enough, he said that even if he were to give me a second or third chance at it.. that I would always leave the room with the biggest asshole of them all!
Wait...wait.... wait a second, was that really fair of him to say? After all I loved who I was back then. I freely admitted that I would have been more than happy to have a partner that treated me exactly like I had treated him. I would love a dozen friends exactly like I was...(rewind -wurppppppppppp- or would I?) back then I thought he was being extraordinarily cold, and way off base! I left his office and never went back. (Fast forward thirty or so years -zipppppppppppppppp-). That single decision was the biggest mistake of my life!
Let's take a much closer look at how that mirror of life thing works.. as long as I would do almost anything for my partner and friends including giving them the shirt right off my back. Then why wouldn't I want people around me that do the same?
Hmmmmmmm, interesting question - right?
Well for starters, the first people who would jump on the kindness of someone who would give the shirt off their back would be someone who would take the shirt off another's back! Ummmm hello, well that's a no brainer. And, to be quite frank with you.. I can't say I blame them.
On the other hand, the people who wouldn't mind hanging out with someone who is never protected from the elements, who is always either freezing, wind burnt, soaking wet, or burnt like a lobster from the sun are other people who don't mind watching others suffer from being vulnerable to the elements as well.. those people who don't know what it's like to walk through life with a shirt on their backs!
What's that they say? Oh yeah, misery loves company!
Yanno, that could be called two peas in a pod kind of thinking. Well, if you're anything like I was back then, you may not see a problem with all of that taking your shirt off thing, but believe me it matters not which side of the shirt your on both sides will have troubled, disappointing, emotionally exhausting, painful and drama filled lives.
This is the part where Charlie then, and I now, as a Strategic Intervention, Holistic Life Coach would come in and show you how the mirror version of either the giver or the taker is a severely distorted one. Yanno, kinda like the mirrors in a fun house where you see yourself all discombobulated, shrunk or stretched until you can't even recognize who you are!
Welcome to life in the fun house mirrors 101, where the taker takes and the giver gives, as they live life in the distorted mirrors, which by the way reflect back both of their their limiting beliefs. Lets start with the givers. In these mirrors the giver sees themselves in a shrunken version of who they really are!
So on that note, you might be as curious as I was, and wonder why someone would choose to go through life, where they saw themselves as distortedly small!
It took most of my life to figure this one out.. many people don’t actually know that the image in the distorted mirror isn’t a true reflection of who they aren't..
Sad huh, It’s the peace makers who only know the shrunken version of themselves.. the people with the big heart who tolerates more than they should; the don't rock the boat person; the I'll give them another chance person; the one that always gives everyone the benefit of the doubt (despite the fact that more often than not the person getting off the hook doesn't deserve it); the one that sees no reason to get into a conflict or confrontation; or the one that has no problem getting into a conflict but when all is said and done; they still give or enable the takers to get what they wanted despite the drama filled argument or straight up fight!
Or the flip side of that distorted mirror is... the person who believes that.. I deserve it and if I don't take it somebody else will!
So, you may be wondering what any of this has to do with needing a Strategic Intervention, Holistic Life Coach. The answer is... it has everything to do with it!
When someone feels stuck, when they're not getting what they need out of life, or worse when they don't know what they need out of life, they just know that something's missing, or something seems to be getting in the way and they can't figure out what it is; the problem, no matter what it appears to be, is always internal and not external... and is able to be fixed; together we can do it!
That's one of the reasons why I offer a free initial consultation.To make sure the client and I feel that we are a good match and can work together to figure out what the fun house mirror versions are, and what the limiting beliefs are, to out they go.. and then we can figure out what's real...
Then it'll be time to work together to get what needs to be gotten, done!
When you are ready to change what you see in the mirror take a look at my website..
@ www.NoItsNotPersonal.com
Then contact me for your free first session @ NoItsNotPersonal@aol.com..
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