There's Something Wrong with Me!

So you've tried a few self-help books, trying to work your way through some of the problems that are in your life, and you've been astonished and dismayed to find out that most of them somehow make you feel worse!  Here's some woman or some man on a tape or in a book, giving you all sorts of wonderful advice on how to improve your life and make things better, and those upbeat and inspiring words are bringing you down.  It just doesn't make any sense at all--or does it?

I know from experience that trying to improve our lives by learning how to deal with life's curveballs and obstacles can be a rough road to follow.  Personally, I've had very positive programs that made a lot of sense to me act as a catalyst for depression, and I've spent many an awful day as a result of trying to learn more about what truly will make me happy.  As time has gone on and I've learned more, I've started to realize one of the main reasons for which this dynamic occurs, and here it is:

First of all, as soon as we start listening to a program that will help us to "improve" our lives, there's an obvious implication that we aren't doing something right, that there's something wrong with us.  After all, if there weren't anything wrong with us, why would we be listening to a self-improvement program?  While most of us are willing to admit that we aren't perfect and that we make mistakes, there's another aspect of who we are that doesn't want us to admit such a thing.  Many people refer to this part of our selves as our "false self," the part of us that's influenced by outside forces and that wants to please those forces.  

Once this false self gets the idea that we think there's something wrong with us, it goes into a defensive mode, trying to defend itself, for self-improvement is, in most ways, an attempt to dethrone this false self and to allow our true selves to live the lives they were meant to live.  And what's the most effective way to defend itself?  By drawing on those very feelings that make us feel that we need to improve our lives, by making us feel miserable and then blaming that misery on the very program we're listening to.

And how does it do this?  Through the negative self-talk that it's used so well for so long.  "What does she know about my life?"  "How can she tell me what to do to be happy--she doesn't even know me?"  "I'd like to think his advice is good, but he's so judgmental!"  "That may work for some people, but it wouldn't work for someone like me!"  "That's interesting, but it's so strange.  I've never heard anything like that before."  "Why is this guy telling me to change?  What's wrong with the way I am?"

You see, this false self doesn't want to change--it likes where it is, right there in charge of your life.  It can bring you down when it needs to by making you focus on petty, negative garbage, and it can keep you wondering why things never get better.  It can use feelings of self-righteousness, superiority, arrogance, selfishness -- all feelings that we intellectually despise -- to keep us down where it wants us.  It's afraid of change, for change means its end.

It's taken me years to figure out what's going on and how to work with it, and I'm definitely not completely there yet.  My personal false self is still quite strong, and it often keeps me feeling pretty low when there's no real reason for that.  But I am learning to recognize its voice, to take it for what it is, and to do my best to reject it as soon as I recognize it.  And it feels very good when I do so -- instinctively, I feel that I'm doing something right and advancing in my development as a person.

Deciding to improve oneself isn't a question of getting on a well paved highway and stepping on the gas and progressing at 150 miles and hour.  Not at all.  It's more like spying a beautiful clearing with a nice waterfall and gorgeous flowers and singing birds several miles away, and then seeing that between you and that clearing lie dark forests, fields of thorn bushes, people who want to stop you from reaching the clearing, wild beasts that are very hungry, and many more obstacles -- most created by the false self, who knows that it can't get to the clearing with you.  But the clearing is there, and it's waiting for you, and everyone can reach it if they just trust in their true selves and learn to recognize all that comes from their false selves.

 

A nice essay from the late Louise Morganti Kaelin

Top Ten Principles to Live by--Plus One

Many years ago, inspired by Steven Covey's "7 Habits of Highly Effective People" I created a personal mission statement.  In order to fulfill that mission, I also developed a set of 'Operating Principles'.  I think of these operating principles as the yardsticks by which I know how closely I am living that mission.  Although these are very personal, I choose to share them hoping to inspire you to develop your own.

1.  I Recognize God in Everyone
I unconditionally love and accept others, and in so doing I unconditionally love and accept God and myself.  I respect, without judgment or reservation, the beliefs and decisions of others as well as their right to those beliefs and decisions.

2.  I Walk What I Talk
All of my actions are in harmony with my innermost beliefs and values.  I keep all commitments I make to myself and others.

3.  I Seek Excellence in All I Do
I approach every aspect of my life with the sincere desire to do the very best I can, using the appropriate combination of skills, talents and resources to produce superior results.

4.  I Inspire through Example
I use all of the love, talent and wisdom within me to maximize my potential and to experience life as a rich tapestry, full of love, joy, wonder, abundance and mystery.

5.  I Empower through Love
I use all the love, talent and wisdom within me to serve others by helping them uncover the wisdom, strength and power within themselves.  I give each person what they need in whatever form they are most comfortable receiving it.  I am able to impact ever-larger groups of people while maintaining time and space for me.

6.  I Alone Am Responsible for My Life
I gracefully accept the responsibility for everything present in my life today and graciously claim the power to create everything in my life tomorrow.  I employ my imagination, conscience, independent will and self-awareness to create a joyful, harmonious and integrated life.  I recognize my greatest power as being the freedom to choose, in every situation.  I consciously, proactively determine the best alternative and most appropriate response, basing my decisions on conscience educated by principles.

7.  I Embrace the Journey
I interpret all of life's experiences as opportunities for learning, growth and contribution.  I choose to move without faltering on an upward spiral of growth and change, improving continuously. I desire at all times to be free of limitation.

8.  I Honor My Spiritual Self
I am a clear and open channel for God's divine peace, love and light.  I carry the inner peace of being connected to God's abundance and energy into every moment of my life.

9.  I Honor My Physical Self
I am a radiant expression of God.  I am perfectly attuned to the needs of my body and joyously respond to those needs.  I nurture myself with healthy food, rest, exercise and relaxation. My life is full of grace, comfort and cleanliness.  I enjoy financial security.  I recognize that material abundance is a manifestation of the richness of my true self and does not represent a choice between having and being.

10.  I Honor My Emotional Self
In all relationships, I freely give and graciously receive love, nurturing and support.  Honesty is the cornerstone of all my relationships.  I enjoy a warm, loving relationship with a principle- centered person who cherishes me.  Our relationship is based on sharing, and choosing to share, our lives, our time and our space with each other.

11.  I Honor My Mental Self
I seek to constantly expand my knowledge and awareness of life by regular exposure to new thoughts, ideas, people and places.  I explore the world, joyously and without fear.

 

* * * * *

 

Louise Morganti Kaelin was a Life Success Coach who partnered with others to help them turn their dreams into reality.  She passed away in 2011.

It's Your Life to Live

I love languages, and I love the ability we have to communicate simply by changing intonation.  I often look at sentences and think about the different implications involved in a simple shift in stress, a different way of pronouncing the same group of words.  The sentence that I'm using as a title to this column is one of the most important to me for quite a few reasons, no matter how we stress the words when we say it.

"It's YOUR life to live."  It's nobody else's life--we don't have to live to please others or to meet the expectations of others.  It's nice to want to meet those expectations sometimes, especially when we recognize that meeting them is in our own best interests, but we certainly aren't obligated to do so.  This is my life, and I have to do the things that I feel are right and best for me and for the people for whom I've freely accepted responsibility.  

For example, I have a wife and step-children, so I can't quit my job and go spend a year in the Grand Canyon, no matter how appealing that idea may be.  But even in the context of the family, I still must do what I feel is right and best for me.  In this case, I've accepted full responsibility for contributing to the well-being and support of my family, and it's in my best interests to live up to that responsibility and keep my word, for that's the type of person I am.  I can't pack up and go, nor do I wish to do so.

No matter what anyone else tries to convince me to do--enter this business, take this job, take these classes--I have to stay true to my vision of life and my conscience.  And since I'm fully aware of the implications of this way of being, I can't ask anyone else to do anything in their lives just because I think they should do it, or because I think it's what's best for them.  I have to tell them what I think and then back off and let go of all expectations, trusting that they'll do what's best or at least learn from mistakes.

"It's your LIFE to live."  You've heard it before--this isn't a dress rehearsal.  This isn't even opening night, with many more performances in the future.  This is the real thing, every minute of every day.  It's your LIFE.  It's an awe-inspiring thought for me--we've been given this wonderful gift of life, and we're living it every day, if we choose to do so.

We've all been given a wonderful opportunity to shape and craft this life we've been given into something useful, artistic, helpful, loving, magnificent.  But most of us get caught up in tasks--things to do and people to see and deadlines and contracts.  We forget to keep in mind that if we choose to do so, we can spend some of our time learning about LIFE, learning how to create a happy life with love and peace and hope.  I heard a wonderful short story on a tape program that I have--a preacher was driving on a country road when he came upon a beautiful small farm--tall rows of corn, produce gardens, a beautiful house--everything you could imagine in a small farm.  Spying the farmer, he approached him and exclaimed, "What a beautiful piece of land you have here!  God definitely has blessed you with a wonderful farm and a bountiful harvest!"  The farmer looked around himself and said, "Yes, I definitely am blessed with what I have, but you should have seen this piece of land when God had it to himself!"

"It's your life to LIVE."  A frightening thought--the absence of life in an organism that's been alive is death.  If you're not living, if there's an absence of life in your day-to-day routines, does that mean that you're dead?  In the film Harold and Maude, Maude, a 79-year-old woman who lives her life as fully as possible, tells Harold, an 18-year-old who's obsessed with death, that "A lot of people enjoy being dead.  But they're not dead really--they're just backing away from life."

Are you living your life, or are you existing?  Have you ever sat down and written out your goals and then worked to try to attain them, or do you just hang around and wait to see what each day will bring you?  Do you come home and do stuff you love to do, or do you just turn on the television set and let it "entertain" you while you sit there passive, not moving forward or adding to the value of your life?  Or are you so caught up in your 70-hour-a-week work life that there's no time for reading to your kids, for taking walks with your family, for writing letters to loved ones, for working on the hobby that you love so much but which you've been neglecting for so long?

It's YOUR LIFE to LIVE.  It's a beautiful thought, one full of awesome and glorious potential!

How busy are we?

A few years ago, on a liner bound for Europe, I was browsing in the library when I came across a puzzling line by Robert Louis Stevenson: "Extreme busyness, whether at school, kirk, or market, is a symptom of deficient vitality." Surely, I thought, "deficient" is a mistake--he must have meant "abundant." But R.L.S. went merrily on, "It is no good speaking to such folk: they can not be idle, their nature is not generous enough."

Was it possible that a bustling display of energy might only be a camouflage for a spiritual vacuum? The thought so impressed me that I mentioned it next day to the French purser, at whose table I was sitting. He nodded his agreement. "Stevenson is right," he said. "Indeed, if you will pardon my saying so, the idea applies particularly to you Americans. A lot of your countrymen keep so busy getting things done that they reach the end of their lives without ever having lived at all."

Arthur Gordon



http://www.livinglifefully.com/busyness.htm

Thoughts on Finding Fault

It's easy to find fault in things--far too easy for most of us. Somehow, the flaws are far more easy to see than the bigger picture, than the amount of work and thought and preparation have gone into a particular piece of work. Think about it--if someone just painted his or her house and missed a spot, what's the first thing we see? If someone just cooked us dinner and used a bit too much salt, what's the first thing we notice when we put the food into our mouths?

And if we do notice the bare spot on the house, aren't we doing the person a favor by pointing it out? And if the food's too salty we may not be able to eat it, so we'll definitely need to explain why.

Many of us carry this tendency to extremes, though. Many people feel that they need to tell everyone about every little fault that they find in every situation. They feel that they're doing people favors by pointing out what they see as flaws and problems, even though they may not be in a position in which people expect them to find mistakes. And when they do so, they risk hurting people greatly.

When a kid shows us a piece of artwork, for example, does it truly matter if the flower is taller than the tree? What possible purpose can it serve to point out what we see as a flaw when the picture already is finished? We really need to consider the effect of the criticism on the artist before we look for the problems. Is encouragement called for, or evaluation? We don't have to be teaching at every moment of our lives--we don't have to be finding things that need to be "fixed" all the time.

As a college English teacher, I find that very few people other than my students ever want me to read stuff that they write. There's a very simple reason for this, too--in their experience, they've found that English teachers look for the flaws and point them out, and they simply don't want to put themselves up for that kind of criticism. I learned this early and I don't point out things like misspellings or grammatical errors unless someone wants me to do so, but that doesn't usually help--once someone finds out what I do for a living, they want to avoid having someone else find fault in their work.

When we find fault in something that someone else has done, we're very often adding a negative element to our relationship with that person. We're defining limits of trust and sharing--if I know that someone is going to find fault with everything that I do, I will not share with that person unless I'm truly seeking criticism. As fewer people are willing to share with us, we lose much of the richness that comes from and through that sharing, and we become more isolated, less integrated. The loss of the sharing of others is one of the greatest losses we can cause ourselves, and it may even reach a point at which people just don't want to be around us at all.

There are, of course, times when fault-finding is appropriate. If a movie is simply awful, there's nothing wrong with saying so. After all, movies have been put out in the public eye, and criticism is expected. But if we take it too far and find things to criticize in every movie we see, we may find people trying to avoid us in the future. If a song is just awful, what's wrong with saying so? We just have to be careful not to alienate friends or loved ones who might like the song.

Fault-finding and criticizing, no matter what our intentions, tend to drive wedges between us and other people. A person who finds fault in everything is a person to be avoided, when all is said and done, and who among us wants other people to avoid us whenever they can?

Thoughts on character

If I'm to have a character that others admire, I need to focus on developing that character. I need to make decisions that are honorable and honest. I need to focus on others rather than myself. I need to be consistent in my dealings with other (while being careful to avoid what Emerson called "a foolish consistency"). And I must be true to myself, my God, and others. I should never seek the admiration of others, but if I develop an honest, loving, caring character, the admiration will come.

Faith and New Starts

I'm not quite sure what people mean when they say they're "putting their faith to the test."  I'm not sure that faith is something that gets tested, like light bulbs or cars or anything that's manufactured.  I am sure that the saying generally comes up when people take risks, especially huge risks--and by huge I mean potentially damaging ones.  When we take risks, we're putting ourselves in situations in which we can get hurt or damaged, emotionally, physically, financially, or in any of a number of other ways.

But isn't risk an important part of life?  And shouldn't faith be a natural part of our lives, also, and thus a natural part of any risk-taking that we may encounter?

Right now, for example, my wife and I are involved in a pretty large risk.  Because of our former job and living situations, as well as the current employment problems that still confound the world in general, we decided together to set out and move to a new place and new jobs.  While many people would see this as a huge risk, we don't necessarily see it as such.  We do see it as a risk, for there is the potential of damage, but we don't see it as a huge risk, mostly because of our faith.

You see, life always has been good to us.  Not in the ways that we sometimes wanted, and not in ways that have made us wealthy or that have given us an over-abundance of material goods, but in ways that have kept us safe and well cared for.  We both have faith that things will work out, and that faith helps us to see our current move in a very positive light, rather than looking at the world from a place of worry and concern.  When I was laid off from work last year, that wasn't the end of the world--after all, millions of other people were going through the same thing, many in much worse situations than I.  Rather than look at the situation as justification for losing my faith-- or questioning it--I saw the situation as life pushing me in a different direction.  And the work I ended up getting six months later definitely turned out to be a positive learning experience.

I don't see faith as trusting that God is going to look down and meddle in my life to make things work.  God is not going to flip a switch in someone's brain and have that person feel magically compelled to offer me a job.  God is not going to take over the steering of my car and drive me to someplace that's looking to hire someone with just my qualifications.  Rather, I see faith as simply trusting.  I need to go on doing what I do, following my conscience and following my heart, trusting that things will turn out.  What we tend to call "setbacks" are usually just minor obstacles that we need to go past.  I may apply for thirty jobs before getting one; some people apply for hundreds.  But the right work is out there for me, and it may be that the right work isn't anything at all like the work I had thought it would or should be, but if I approach it in the right ways, I most certainly can find any work to be fulfilling and gratifying.

When I was younger, I had a pretty negative relationship with faith.  I used to think that prayers would only be answered through strong faith, and that since none of my prayers were being answered, my faith could never grow.  And since my faith could never grow, none of my prayers would ever be answered.  That perspective, though, was about me and my thought processes, and not at all about the true nature of faith.

Many people have trust issues.  Adult children of alcoholics, people who come from broken homes, people who grew up with unreliable adults in their lives--all of us have internalized some sorts of problems with trusting others.  But even among those problems, we can see that such problems are inherently unfair to those who deserve our trust.  A woman who has been burned by several different men, may have issues of trust, but is it fair to the potential new men in her life that she treat them with distrust?  They don't deserve not to be trusted.

And very often, we don't trust people until they prove that they can be trusted.  This is the wrong way of going about things.  The proper way to view trust is that we should trust people until they prove that they can't be trusted (while still being careful--we wouldn't trust a person we've known for an hour with our life savings, would we?).

I do know that God (however you choose to see God) and life are deserving of our trust.  This trust is our faith.  When we have faith, we live our lives as if things are going to work out well, no matter how they may look at any given time.  And the fact that we're living our lives that way can help us to create the lives that we have our faith in, thus helping us to strengthen our faith even more.

My wife and I don't take God for granted.  We don't say, "Well, we're taking chances so God will make things work."  Rather, we say that we have a lot of hard work ahead of us, looking to make things work in our new home, and we trust that our hard work will help us to find what we need to find.  We may not find the work that's what we envisioned, but we have faith that we will find the work that's best for us at this point in our lives.  And that faith is going to help us not to worry and not to feel too much stress and to be able to give our best no matter what we do.  And that faith is going to allow us to live each day fully in the meantime, not squandering days because of concerns about the future.  Faith truly is a strong tool in our lives, and one that we can go about strengthening on our own.