Receptivity To Change: When We Are in Our Own Way

The Union Path Podcast

"Receptivity To Change: When We Are in Our Own Way"

Transcript:

00:20
It would be really difficult to acknowledge when we're the problem, when we're the ones in our way, when we're the obstacle. Whatever we're trying to do, whatever we're trying to get done, whatever change we're trying to create, whatever change we're trying to see made manifest, it would be really difficult not only to see our own role in this creation but to see all the ways we're actually blocking this creation from happening or, at the very least, all the ways that we're not 100% united around the idea of this change. In kind of a funny paradoxical way. It's fairly easy, if not fairly common, to want something and simultaneously not want it. To have a conflict exist within ourselves of where we think we want something and we actively make effort towards it, but there's actually a part of us that's blocking that change, that specifically doesn't want that. It's kind of this funny cognitive dissonance that can happen, of where we can really endeavor after something and not realize that there's a part of us, if not a big part of us, that's actively standing in the way, that's actively holding us back, because it doesn't want whatever we're trying to create to actually happen. That would be so easy for the mind especially to get fixated on something, on some achievement, on some attainment, and get a ton of vision, get a hyper focus on trying to create that as soon as possible, to make that happen, to make that manifest as fully and as quickly as we possibly can. This is obviously one of the areas where self-awareness really comes in handy, because if there's something we really want, if there's something we're trying to create in our life and for whatever reason, that hasn't happened, especially if we haven't had it for a while, this isn't something we started working on and putting effort towards last week. We've put weeks and months and years, if not decades, into making this happen, but still it hasn't.

02:28
What's holding it back? What's blocking it? What's standing in the way? Because there has to be some sort of justice, some sort of order to having the desire in the first place. This seems a little out of order, a little out of whack. Then I'm going through life denied, like why do I have these desires for this, things that I can't ever really seem to get? That doesn't really seem very fair Of. Why would I want something just to be separated from it, just to live in a lack of it?

03:01
That seems like a trick and I don't believe life is a trick and that oftentimes, when something seems like a trip, there's just some deeper meaning that I haven't really comprehended yet, that it's something I don't understand. In fact, that's the benefit things appearing to be a trick in the first place. That causes me to look deeper. But this fundamental belief that Everything that happens isn't just some random assortment of atoms crashing into each other, but it also isn't some punishment for something else, something external of me, some external judgment Either rewarding me or punishing me based on past performance. There is actually an order, a congruence, a balance for what's happening, and this balance exists between my outside and my inside. And so, in these times where things really don't seem to make sense or really start to feel like a trick, I think those are excellent times to start to probe within, to really start to look for meaning, because, personally, every time I've done this, I've always found it. And so, building this habit, building this response To when life doesn't make sense, to use this as a prompt and an encouragement to go within, I've had to be uniquely helpful, and I know I'm not alone in that. I think one of the interesting things that comes up when I really ponder these times of not getting what I want and I'm from a basic perspective with something I'm really pursuing, so that's really important to me. Why is it that this hasn't shown up yet? Well, without fail, if I look deep enough for long enough, I can always find somewhere that I'm in my own way. I can always find some way that I'm playing the part of the obstacle that I'm pushing back, that I'm saying no To this thing that I want. And it seems to me anyway that when our internal energy, when it's part of us, is a yes and part of us is a no, that's the perfect recipe for stagnation.

05:11
And oftentimes stagnation is what's experienced at the heart of this lack of fulfillment, because we wouldn't be feeling so unfulfilled If something else was really happening for us, if something else was really moving forward for us, that if we had asked for a but instead gotten B, we wouldn't really worry so much or really probably even put a lot of thought or energy into thinking about that lack of a. It's really kind of the lack of anything no A or B or any other letter that causes us to get fixated on our lack of what we want. It's the stagnation, it's the lack of change, it's the lack of results, it's the lack of positive outcomes that have caused us to focus on the lack of fulfillment of what we want. It's the stagnation that causes the discomfort. It's when we find ourselves in these places of stagnation we find our lives are stagnated or just stagnated. Lives are stagnated or just our lives are just kind of stopped progressing towards the things that we really want.

06:11
It's important to look inside of ourselves and see if we're truly receptive, truly in alignment with what we want, because on superficial level, first blush would seem of course. Of course I am. This thing would be awesome. Why wouldn't I be on board? This is we're probing a little bit deeper comes in handy, because there might be part of us that isn't really ready for this thing that we want. There might be a little bit of trepidation there, there might be a little bit of fear there, a little bit of insecurity there, and where our minds are saying yes, yes, yes, but something inside our bodies are saying no, no, no. And in these times this is really important information. This is really important to bring these bodily knows to our own awareness, to surface them. These are truths that it's important for us to understand, because the body may very well know things that our mind has either forgotten or doesn't. And also, it's just important to bring awareness to those times in our life where our full selves aren't in alignment with our own life, and it's been my experience, anyway, that nothing causes stagnation more than a lack of alignment, creating this push-pull within ourselves, these opposing forces of part of us saying yes and part of us saying no.

07:34
And this can even present in more simplistic ways too, like, for example, if we have a family and we ourselves want to change something about where we live or what we do, for a job or something else. We have this burning desire within us, this very strong one, this very strong wish. This may have been present for years, but, for whatever reason, it hasn't happened. We feel just stuck in what we're doing, while it's important to ask ourselves, well, if we actually got our wish, if we weren't actually able to do what we wanted, would that harm the people we care about? Would that harm some other aspect of our life? Would there be an effect, a hit on someone or something else that we care about? Are we actually fully in alignment with this change? Of course, these are questions we must ask ourselves, because only we can answer them. Only we can really know for sure. But it's a useful exercise.

08:35
In times of stagnation are we as a being out of balance, not fully in alignment with the change that we seek, which is then causing the stagnation that we experience? Because, again, it can be so easy, it can be so automatic to assign everything outside of us as the obstacle, as the problem, as the thing in our way that's preventing fulfillment and attainment and achievement and possession of what we want to change. But it's equally important, especially during times of stagnation, to look within ourselves, to look for the ways that we ourselves are the obstacle, because sometimes this is a really good thing. Sometimes we can realize we're chasing after something we don't actually want, that there are higher priorities blocking this for our own good. In the case of the situation with our environment or our job or what have you, that would negatively harm those around us that we care about. Well, obviously that's more important For many of us.

09:39
The idea of doing harm to the people we care about is far worse. It doesn't even come close to balancing the benefit that we would attain and achieve through having our wish granted that. That harm not only wipes away all of the benefit, it actually makes it worse. This can be a difficult thing to realize, but it's also a very liberating thing to realize, because we realize we're actually getting what we want. We can think what we want is change, but what we want, even greater than change, is to not cause harm. And that's precisely what we're getting.

10:15
And this doesn't mean that whatever change we want can't be created. It doesn't mean that we're experiencing these desires for change and are meant to just be tortured by them, that the purpose of life is just to give away everything we want, to live life from sort of a brutalist perspective of acceptance. I don't think that's really the case. I believe we have desires for a reason. I believe we have dreams for a reason. I believe these aspects are fundamental to ourselves. I believe these fundamental aspects of ourselves are actually the ideal of ourselves calling us forward.

10:56
But where our part of it is, where we participate in our own desires and our own dreams, is choosing what we do with them, choosing how we interact with them, choosing how we entertain them, choosing how we pursue them. This is all up to us. We're given the feeling and we could choose how we transmit that into our own behavior, what we do with that, how we let that animate us. So if we're going through a time of stagnation and we realize that this stagnation is being caused by ourselves, that we're actually the obstacle, in a way, of our own change, then that's new information that we get to choose what we do with it. Perhaps this obstacle can be cleared. Perhaps it's not so much about causing harm to those we care about. Perhaps it's our own fear, it's our own insecurity, it's something inside of us that, when we think about living this change that we're trying to create, isn't really ready, doesn't really want that, is scared. Well, that's something we can work with as well.

12:01
But oftentimes, when it comes to getting what we want, this is the work is bringing ourselves into alignment fully with all aspects of our being, with whatever it is we want, and if they're part of ourselves that aren't currently aligned, well, that's our work. That's our work is realizing that the part that isn't aligned is actually right, is actually more fundamental to ourselves. It's a better opinion, it's actually correct that what we're pursuing wouldn't actually be good for us, that we're pursuing it for other reasons. This is one of the ways that we can often easily spot our own self-centeredness is when something else inside of us is pulling back, is trying to restrain our own gratification because it's not truly in line with our entire being, especially when it's our bodies doing this. I think it's something that's really important to not ignore that our bodies know the truth, but at the very least our bodies know a truth that is important for us to understand. It's asserting itself for a reason. There's something we should know. There's some missing aspect, missing element, missing piece of information that's fundamental, that's integral to whatever we're trying to do, and so our bodies are speaking up.

13:29
But where this can get complicated is when we want to do something, or we think we want to do something, but our body says no. Sometimes it's not really clear why that no comes out. Is just a no, it doesn't come out as no because on and on and on and on, getting at those reasons can take some time. You might actually have to feel around for that a little bit. That might not be inherently obvious, especially for trying to do something that we've been trying to do for a long time. If we've got kind of lost in the momentum of the habit of the repetition of doing something and have become more and more aware over time, that something in our body is saying no. Interrupting, arresting that momentum can be really difficult, but it's useful.

14:23
It's useful to listen, it's useful to know what all aspects of ourselves are trying to communicate to us. This communication is meant to not only be understood, but integrated. These are truths that we're supposed to do something with Now. Sure, it's useful to know it, but where it really finds its usefulness is in its use, in its integration. I'm not only getting the message, but putting it into practice.

14:54
Sometimes this just takes time. Sometimes we have to listen for a long while before reasons and meaning start to appear, especially if this is part of ourselves that we've ignored for a long time. It's part of ourselves that we've overridden. If we've been doing things, if we've been making decisions, engaging in behaviors, that's caused us to override this fundamental part of ourselves and may have gotten pretty quiet. We may have sort of forgotten the language and the dialect that this part of ourselves speaks to us in, and it may just take some time to be able to listen again, to be able to hear again, to be able to understand again. But the clarity is there and we'll find it if we seek after it.

15:41
So what are we supposed to do? What are we supposed to do with this information? Or where we find ourselves as the obstacles in the way of what we want? Well, if we find that these things we want are truly things that we want, aren't just a passing fancy, or aren't just another aspect to glorify and gratify the self, these truly are deep felt desires. I feel like they're coming from within us, from deep within us, but there's part of us that isn't on board, that isn't aligned. What do we do? What do we do with that information? The simple answer is we seek after alignment.

16:17
We realize that, especially if what we want is a circumstance, that even if the parameters or supporting circumstance doesn't currently exist, things are always changing. This is still something we can lean towards. We can also use this lack of congruence as encouragement, as inspiration to learn and grow. Perhaps there's something we need to change about what we're doing. Perhaps there's an option that we haven't been able to see yet that actually integrates everything we want far better than what we've been pursuing. Perhaps we've gotten a little too fixated on getting what we want through one specific means. There's actually a better way to get more of what we want that's more inclusive, that doesn't have the downsides or doesn't have whatever's causing that internal rejection within us. Perhaps there's a better way to get more of what we want, but we need this interruption, we need this obstacle in order to see that, in order to try something different, in order to see things differently. Or it could be we realize that we're not getting what we want, or at least we're not getting what we think we want, because there's higher priorities being served.

17:36
Right now we can take a little bit of solace in that we can find acceptance of that From the highest perspective. We actually are getting what we want and that's okay. It doesn't mean we need to give up or lose hope in whatever we've been pursuing. We can, at very least, take a little bit of solace, a little bit of comfort and the fact that we have been getting what we want, that things important to us have not been violated, because when we are the obstacle in the way of what we want, there's usually something pretty fundamental, pretty profound, that we can learn by really looking into this, by really probing within ourselves to seek after why what's out of alignment, what part of us isn't really fully in on this change that we're trying to create and use that as a way to endeavor creating change with our full selves. Because often, when we're experiencing stagnation, that's been the missing piece that whatever change we're trying to create, it hasn't been being done with and through our full selves.

18:52
And so, if it's change that we want to create, it's important, it behooves us to find ways to create that change fully with our full selves, with our full alignment, because the more out of alignment we are with whatever we're trying to do, the more effort will be required, and sometimes we can override and overrun this lack of alignment. But we will tire. Will is not infinite and oftentimes the harder we push, the more we're presented with things to push against. Seemingly it will lead us back to this fundamental truth, the fundamental truth that we should seek alignment first with anything that we're doing in our life, but especially trying to create change. Create change from a place of alignment, not to create change, to try to gain alignment.

19:47
I don't think it works that way. In fact, in my experience, when I've tried to create change, when I haven't been aligned with that change, that chasm, that conflict only grows. That if we can first seek union and unity within ourselves, then we'll find the change that we really want to create. We'll live the change that we really want to create Because we'll be able to do it fully. We'll be able to do it fully. We'll be able to experience it fully, because we're doing it and experiencing it with our full selves. We are fully in alignment with the change that we want to create. Thus, we can not only create it fully, but live it fully.