Interpretation: Happy
Halloween From a Different Perspective!
In Halloween legend and understanding,
costumes were worn to ward off evil spirits in an attempt to protect
oneself from perceived harm. In a way, Halloween is played out every day
in the masks that we put on in different environments, whether we are at
home, at work, in public, etc.
Unbeknownst to most people, when a
person goes into emotional reaction, that reaction acts to push away what
they fear might hurt them. It is not much different than the origin of
physically putting on a costume.
If I put on my angry costume, it will
make you defensive so that you go away, so that you don't see my own fear,
misunderstanding, and judgment. If I put on my "you hurt me"
costume, then it will likely make you feel guilty and resentful for being
blamed, again effectively pushing you away from me.
If I put on my sad costume, I can get
you to empathize with my pain, acting like a band-aid instead of
effectively looking for the source of the pain and looking for a solution
together. If I put on my offended costume, I try to make you take on
responsibility for how I feel, instead of looking within myself to see
what I am misinterpreting as being unsafe.
If I put on my hatred costume I must
really be warding off evil! But is is only the hurts of my own past that I
think I still feel the need to chase off. If I put on the costume of
apathy then I have successfully chased myself away.
Let this Halloween be the one where we
all do what we can to learn that we really are emotionally safe, that we
really don't need to wear these masks anymore. It is fear that is behind
all these negative emotions and it causes us to hide from the world in
case we might get hurt. But it is the fear itself that ends up hurting us
by guiding us to believe in ghosts that aren't really there.
Fear leads you to misinterpret and
misunderstand what is happening in your own mind and in the mind of
others. Fear does not protect you...it is the source of your pain. Fear is
the only "evil spirit" that you ever really need to come face to
face with. The beautiful part is that in doing so, you learn that fear is
not real.
You stop needing masks and you stop
being afraid. You stop thinking that there is something out there that you
need to protect yourself against emotionally. You learn to first and
foremost feel safe within yourself and then you can project that safety
outwards. This is your personal power. Use it to eventually take your
masks off and make your personal spooky life a thing of the past!
Imagination: How Do You See
Your Life Experiences?
In thinking about what I wanted to write
about today, I thought about my own journey to where I am now. About all
the fears, hurt, and pain that I had to overcome in my own life. At times
it has been a long and hard battle. Many times it had felt like "why
bother". Then I think to where I am now.
If only there was a way to allow people
to have a glimpse of this journey. To have a preview into the movie of
intensely rewarding personal growth, which can be
their own life. And I am nowhere near the end of my own growth. But the
payoff to reach even just this point is quite frankly, amazing.
I have many times likened life to be
like a video game, where as soon as we master one level of the game, that
particular "reality", or how we see things just melts away and a new one
almost magically appears. In this next level, there are many new things that we
did not know about, that we explore to find both hidden challenges as well
as bonuses, some of which we could not have even imagined.
These levels occur within you, all while
life goes on around you. Sometimes, when we don't master the level on
which we are playing, we have to go back to the beginning of that level
and start all over. Sometimes we get stuck at that level and can' seem to
move on, experiencing the same hurt repeatedly.
But if you think about it, that level,
when you experience it over and over, is so darn familiar! It is because
in this part of the video game, you have stopped exploring and you are
repeating the same movements again and again. Of course you get more or
less the same results each time. It is only when you try something
radically different, something totally unexpected that you finally
"figure it out" and are able to move on.
And just like with a video game, this
experience we call life is supposed to have a large element of fun. It is about
exploration, frustration, discovery, dead-ends, excitement, hitting walls,
climbing walls, determination, giving up, getting new ideas, falling
down, getting up, and on it goes.
As you get better at this game called
life, the hurts go away. Yes, it is possible for all hurts to completely
disappear. What a goal to have...consider it getting the best score
possible! Like any video game player knows, the fun of the game is the
game itself along with your personal achievements in it. If you can shift
your focus off of all your problems and look at life as this bigger
picture, it will help you put your life into a better perspective, where
there is much more joy and far less pain.
You have this control and if you think
about it, to control a video game, you use a joystick...not a painstick!
Reclassification: Who is
Considered to be a Sensitive Person?
I think that all people would fit the
term "sensitive". Yes, even those people that instantly come to
your mind as "no way, not so-and-so". In fact the person (s)
that you just thought of is actually quite sensitive, you just don't
understand how or in which way, because they experience being sensitive
differently than you do.
A person who is insecure or who has a
lot of self doubt and reacts easily fits the typical definition of
sensitive. "Oh, you are just too sensitive. Stop taking things so
personally" is the usual response. That particular kind of sensitive
person takes in the same information as everyone else, but gives it a lot
of extra meaning.
When I say takes in the same information
as everyone else, I mean that we are all sensitive to so much more that
what we are aware of in other people. We subconsciously and consciously
pick up on cues and clues from miniscule muscular micromovements in facial
expressions and body language. We can hear the nuances of a persons tone
of voice. Our brains can match up tens of thousands of combinations of all
three types of input.
Then add to that the words that people
choose to use when they speak and the possible interpretations
exponentially rockets off of the scale. No wonder the information that we
unknowingly take in can cause a lot of confusion for most people! If you
cannot parse out some basic meanings, you will quickly end up being
defensive at one point or another.
That person that you thought of
originally, the one that couldn't possibly be sensitive, that personality
subconsciously covers up their insecurites in a way that pushes other
people away by how they react. And they usually do an excellent job of
distracting you from their hidden sensitivity, don't they!
So lets look at the other extreme. A
person who feels relatively secure about who they are takes in this exact
same information, but can see it for what is is. All people express their
inner selves, whether they are aware of it or not. What most people are
not aware of is how easy it is for a secure person to see and understand
this. It can be seen because there is no personal emotional reaction to
it. It carries no additional meaning than what it is.
In fact, the more insecure a person, the
more signals they throw off. It is as if the more a person tried to hide
within themselves, to cover up their fears and insecurites, they more they
end up flooding their environment with all these hidden cues and clues.
This is the real reason why it is tiring to be around some people. Our
brains can go into overload trying to make sense of it...if you do not
understand it.
When two people with insecurities are
together, they see and pick up on all this information, but incorrectly
interpret the signals. They understand only enough to know that something
is not quite right for the other person. Their insecurites cause them to
instantly assume that the signals they pick up from somebody else is
somehow about them. They end up making it all about them.
So when one person gets defensive, all while
trying to hide their fears, they unknowingly send off a barrage of extra
signals. The other person senses this, but does not understand what they
are sensing. We tend to fear that which we do not understand. This wave of
signals is interpreted as potentially unsafe. The person feels the need to
protect themselves from what feels like an onslaught.
This second person now gets defensive as
well and they start to subconsciously send off a slew of hidden, but
really not so hidden, signals of their own. The cascade of
misunderstandings and misinterpretation not only begins it escalates. If this
cycle is not recognized or stopped, it happens over and over and over
again. The hidden fears and insecurities get stronger and reinforced in
the pathways of the mind.
Everyone can learn how to understand
this constant information that we are all receiving about each other. We
really are not capable of hiding our fears. In fact, the harder we try,
the more they show! We are all incredibly sensitive to one another. The
difference is how are you interpreting what your sensitivity is showing
you about other people. This is yet another tool that you can develop in
your quest for personal growth.
Germination: Using
Attraction to Plant the Seeds of Growth
If you think about it on a deeper level,
why is it that we like some people and do not like others? Why are we
attracted to certain people? Why is that we just feel so safe around some
people? Why do people feel the urge to take that next step and have
affairs?
The answer lies in feeling innocent
again. We want to be around people who do not judge us, who appear to
accept us exactly the way we are. When we live our day to day lives, most
people, especially family and partners, seem to remind us over and over of
how imperfect we are. But not with those that we are attracted to.
When we are attracted to a particular
person, it really has nothing to do with that person or who they are; it
is the reflection of ourselves as being innocent again that attracts us.
It is because we have not embraced that feeling within ourselves that we
think we see the source of it in another person.
It is not in them, it is just a reminder
of what we are not seeing in ourselves. If you felt about yourself the way
another person "makes you feel", you would not be attracted to
them. You would thoroughly enjoy the reflection that you get back, but it
would not make a difference in how you feel about yourself. You would
simply recognize that you are seeing what you already know about yourself.
If you find yourself attracted to
another person, ask yourself, what is it that I am feeling right now? Am I
feeling special, wanted, not judged, accepted, desired, smart, worthy, and
so on? Take the time and effort to identify what is making you feel good
in that moment.
Then take that wonderful feeling and
literally place your focus on it within yourself. Breath in and out slowly and
deliberately focusing on that feeling. What you are feeling is really who you are. You are
feeling the source of your essence. In reality you do not need anyone else
to make you feel like that.
If that feeling is usually only
triggered by somebody else, then that is a red flag for you that that is a
piece of the puzzle that is missing within yourself. This is a feeling
that you want to encourage within yourself at all times, not from that
external source. Take your focus off of that person, shift your awareness
and bring it to that wonderful feeling inside of yourself.
Take that small little flame and nurture
it, encourage it, believe in it, embody it. This is just one of the paths
that you can take to find inner happiness. It is one tool of many that
will uncover the truth of who you are. Live it, breath it, and love it!
This was a hilarious and delightful
movie (1991) that was all about overcoming fears. If you managed to
overcome fear in one lifetime then you were then allowed to go to the next
far better level. If you did not, then you had to come back to earth and
try all over again to live a life that overcame your fears.
Even though this is classified as a
fantasy, watching it made me raise my eyebrow in that it actually expressed
many beliefs that I have about how incredibly important it is for us to
face and overcome our fears. Only by going through this process do we
allow ourselves to live our lives freely, with full joy and appreciation.
When a person experiences fear, that
fear also blocks ones own innocence. Fear is survival mode, which prevents
a full experience. It is the caveman part of the brain which has yet to
evolve in humanity as a whole. Currently fear is instead largely
perpetuated and made to be more real than the existence of life itself.
But that is no way to live.
The two leading characters in this movie
were well thought out and acted by Meryl Streep and Albert Brooks. You can
clearly see how a person with fear acts very differently than a person who
does not live in fear. Their experiences (of a person who has fear vs. one
who does not) are at times opposite of one
another. Their choices are even that much more different.
Our perceptions are the key to removing
fear from our lives. Living in fear is a choice, whether a person is aware
of that as a choice or not yet. For those who do choose to step into this
unknown realm, life drastically changes for them. We don't need a movie to
show this to us, but it sure is a great reminder about what should be a
priority in your life.
Education: We Believe
Whatever We Choose to Believe
From "The Secrets Inside Your Dog's
Mind" by Carl Zimmer (in Time Magazine) I just read:
"A team led by cognitive scientist Josef Topál
of the Research Institute for Psychology in Hungary recently ran an
experiment to study how 10-month-old babies pay attention to people. The
scientists put a toy under one of two cups and then let the children
choose which cup to pick up. The children, of course, picked the right
cup--no surprise since they saw the toy being hidden. Topál and his
colleagues repeated the trial several times, always hiding the toy under
the same cup, until finally they hid it under the other one. Despite the
evidence of their eyes, the kids picked the original cup--the one that had
hidden the toy before but did not now.
To investigate why the kids made this
counterintuitive mistake, the scientists rigged the cups to wires and then
lowered them over the toy. Without the distraction of a human being, the
babies were far more likely to pick the right cup. Small children, it
seems, are hardwired to pay such close attention to people that they
disregard their other observations."
People often wonder why they behave the way they do,
why they have certain fears and belief systems. To me this short piece
sums up the answer. Even as babies, we are focused on watching our parents
behaviors to the exclusion of logic. We learn almost exclusively from them
or whomever raises us. It is not just physical imitations that we make, we
also psychologically imitate them and that forms the foundation of our
subconscious minds.
When you train yourself to raise your self awareness,
you become highly cognizant of this factor at work within you. You don't
judge your beliefs, you just look at them to see what you would like to
change and then take the steps to change it. It is very much like learning
a new language, where it takes a long time to master it. But the first few
times you try to change, not much seems to happen!
The older you are, the more deeply imbedded your
beliefs. That just means that it is a little harder to start to get the
wheels in your mind turning in the other direction. There is more inertia
to overcome, but regardless of age, once you start the process, it just
gets easier and easier.
When you become conscious enough to choose even a few
new beliefs and behaviors, you open the floodgates to truly knowing
yourself. Life becomes a process of self development in ways that you
never even knew were possible. Changing the meaning that you learned as a
child is your key.
Well, I finally sent out my newly
formatted Ezine tonight, the one that I have toiled over for weeks! In my
determination to finally get it out before dinner, I rushed through the
last final steps, sending out a beautiful, artistic, creative, helpful,
wonderful (I could go on and on you know) Ezine....with a blaring typo in
the second paragraph!
A couple of things to comment on here.
Nobody put pressure on me to send it out when I did. I had that little
tweak in the back of my mind saying look over it one last time (what is
one more time after a 100 times!), but I ignored it. Just as I did the
thought to wait until the morning to send it out when I was feeling
refreshed.
I had seen the mistake before...and to
those unlucky people who don't know what I am referring to I wrote "I
hope you to this brand new format". The word "to" was
supposed to be "like". I was cutting down my love of words from
a far lengthier sentence that was "...introducing you to this
So
as I was saying, I had picked up that the error was there yesterday, but
got distracted with one of the many other issues that I had to deal with,
rather than fix it immediately. I have sent this email to masses of
people. When it was first pointed out to me by a friend, it was like a
shock wave that hit my body.
Oh
the horror of it all! What will people think? I am supposed to be a
professional. Will they take it seriously or throw it down in disgust and
unsubscribe. How could I make a mistake like that? Why didn't I listen to
myself? Oh it has ruined everything because the Ezine isn't
"perfect" anymore. Oh I wish I could take it back or send a
corrected version. My brain actually thought all of this and more in a
millisecond.
In
the next second I simply reminded myself that I had a choice here. I was
at that fork in the road where I could continue down that path of feeling
culpable and worked up about the mistake, or I could simply observe what I
did closely so that I could learn and grow from the experience. Besides,
this had great blogging potential.
Guess
what I decided to do! All that training, hard work, and persistence at
changing my subconscious patterned responses has paid off. My first
thought was, if that is the worst mistake that I make (in my life), boy am
I doing really well! Actually, in the larger scheme of things this is
very, very minor. The reality is that ninety nine point nine nine percent
of the Ezine is perfect and wonderful. Am I seriously going to focus on
the speck of dust on my table? What an opportunity to see humor in all of
this.
I
do believe that people are far more forgiving than we all imagine they are
when we go into emotional reaction. The only person who can try, judge,
and find me guilty is me. So I pound the gavel of justice and declare
myself free! Free of all those nonsense thoughts and feelings and free in
allowing myself to learn and grow and even love myself through every
experience!
Next!
And by the way, I am still open to suggestions about the Ezine so that it
can be more "perfect" for all of you each and every time.
Determination: Will I Ever
Figure This Out and Get it Done?!
Over the last few weeks I have been
working on creating a new Ezine template. It has been a long and many
times frustrating process as I learned first how to use the new tools and
then had to create the design and content. Some of the frustration comes
from the incredibly long time it has taken to put it together. What I
thought would take a few days has almost turned into a month!
Most of the frustration comes when I
make mistakes because I don't understand what I am doing wrong when things
don't work the way I think they should. But of course the real reason is
simply because I haven't learned all the nuances of the newsletter
creation service that I have invested in.
This made me think about personal growth
and how when people are given new tools, it is initially exciting to have
these new interfaces and to be faced with the prospect of learning
something new....until you get into the nitty-gritty of actually trying to
use these tools which seem so simple in theory!
Yes, it takes far more time than you
think to get good at using them. You have to practice using these new
tools and it is definitely a process of trial and error. Sometimes lots of
error before you realize that you are using the tool incorrectly! Then
sometimes the information you read so that you can do something more
complicated makes your eyes roll to the back of your head and you realize
that your brain feel like a shaken can of soda.
That is when you need to just take a
break from it all. The harder you push yourself the more mistakes you will
make. You need to stop what you are trying to do, go do something entirely
different, preferably something physical, to relax your body and distract
the mind and fully give it a break. You have to not judge yourself for not
figuring it all out right away.
Regularly remind yourself that every
part of your life is a work in progress, that it doesn't have to be
perfect, and that there are no expectations for you other than the ones
you place on yourself. You can only keep doing the best that you can,
which of course changes sometimes even from moment to moment, depending on
whether you are hungry, tired, have other challenges or pressures, etc.
It will all fall into place exactly as
it needs to and you will be a better person for what you have learned in
the process. It is important to note that frequently the end results is a
little different than what we picture, so allow for some flexibility so
that you can take advantage of opportunities that don't seem directly
related at first.
In the meantime I have managed to create
and customize a signup form for my Ezine which I encourage everyone to subscribe
to. I "should" be able to get my fabulous
new Ezine sent out either later today, or more likely, tomorrow, or
even the day after if I come across more challenges that I need to find
solutions for!
This movie is an interesting documentary
about one Laotian family filmed over a 23 year period. It is a story
of their survival in the aftermath of war. There is much to learn and
understand about people in this movie, but what stood out was this lovely
Laotian teaching that was profoundly spoken towards the end of the movie by
the elderly mother.
To have a hand is to make good things.
To have a foot is to walk on the right
path.
To have eyes is for seeing good things.
To have a mouth is to speak kindness and
peace.
To have a mind is for thinking good
thoughtsand using wisdom.
Besides this video being great
entertainment that will make you laugh, it can also become motivation to get
you to move however the music moves you! Dance your heart away, move your
body however it wants to move, without the fear of somebody watching you.
This same freedom of spirit in your body is still there. Have fun,
remember to play and most all all remember to move with a smile on your
face and in your heart!
Baby Cory dancing to Beyonce's
song Single Ladies.
Personalization: Why do you
Really Dislike Somebody?
I think that there is a phase that
many people go through in their personal and spiritual growth. It is one
where as a person strives towards the ideal of finding peace and love
within and widening their capacity to love themselves, they become more
sensitive to their environment and inadvertently become temporarily more
judgmental of others.
This is an innocent reaction to what
they don't yet understand. We are being taught by many sources to just
avoid people that we don't like. That if we don't like somebody's
"energy", that we move away from them and not spend time with
them. At some point in your growth you will have to revisit this belief.
In order to fully love yourself, you
must be able to extend that love outwards to everyone, with no exception.
What this does not mean is that you have to actively love everyone, I
don't think that is even possible. What this means is that you release
all the judgments that you have that make you feel separate.
What I mean by that is, if your
reaction to a person that you dislike contains any element of you being
better in any way, shape or form, or that they are not as good as you,
then you are standing in judgment of that person. That is not love.
We are all equal in the eyes of God
and that equality must extend towards each other. Accepting a person for
who they are and what they are in the current moment precludes societal
judgments of good and bad. A person either experiences love or they
experience pain. It is quite obvious who is in pain.
Yet our reactions are to push away,
to judge what we see as rejectable. Whenever we reject another human in
any way, we are rejecting a part of ourselves. This is all great in
theory, but putting this into practice is a life long journey, one that we
must all eventually undertake if we are to reach peace of mind within
ourselves.
When you are around somebody that you
do not like, what are you seeing about that person? Are you really seeing
what is going on inside of them that is causing them to act that way? Or
are you in emotional reaction in a form that you have not yet learned to
recognize? If you can't recognize it you are unable to be accountable for
it.
Ironically when you can see the true
essence of a person and understand how some form of fear motivates their
behavior, their behaviors around you change. Because they can feel that
they are not being judged, they feel safe enough to let their guard down
and not have to put up that front that you can't stand to keep you at arms length.
When a person has any form of fear,
they take actions that contribute to their fears becoming real. That
applies to everyone's insecurities and how they are afraid of being
judged. A person is judged by others for the things that they are most
afraid of when they subconsciously act out of their fears.
The exact personality traits that you
don't like about somebody are what they use to "protect"
themselves, to create a sense of safety. It is a false safety because
people end up isolating themselves with these subconscious behaviors. They
are not only subconsciously trying to push you away, they are succeeding.
Have you ever even considered that you are being successfully controlled
by somebody you don't like?
By so successfully distracting you
with the behavior that you don't like, it keeps a person "safe"
from you ever getting close enough to them so that you can't see the pain,
fear, and insecurity that lives in them. The subconscious mind creates a
brilliant defense for itself in this way.
Choose instead to understand that you
do not really understand that person and are only seeing your own judgment
of them. That beyond the facade is yet another wounded person. That what
you are seeing is only there because you give their behavior a definition
that your subconscious is choosing. It is not the truth about them, but it
does act as a mirror for you to see yourself.
Use this mirror to learn from and
release yet more judgments and assumptions about others. Use this as an
opportunity to teach your mind to look even deeper when you look at
another person. Use this to then cause yourself to go even deeper to
release all judgments. Love one another as you love yourself.
Foundation: What Will
Motivate a Person to Change and Grow?
A discussion recently came up about
motivation to change. For some people there seems to be little to no
energy available to change their circumstances or how they feel. This all
came about when I used a analogy to body building. Anyone can build up
their muscles to the maximum, but it requires hours of work on almost a
daily basis. Inner strength is similar to that, the more time you put into
making inner changes on a daily basis, the faster you will build that
inner "muscle".
But the question still remains of:
how does a person develop the motivation to become that body builder,
internally or externally? How does a person build a big enough emotional
"Why" to change? First we have to describe what happens for a
person when they lose that will.
We need to think about how fear and
hurt affects people. If a person repeatedly experiences being put down,
feeling down, believing all the bad things they hear about themselves and
from within themselves it is debilitating. A person's sense of safety in
the world becomes almost nonexistent.
A person who is so beaten down almost
exclusively lives in a world of hurt. Each time they try to step out of
that world they find a reason to believe that they have failed in their
attempts and the failure just adds to the hurt that they feel. They beat
themselves up for not being good enough, trying hard enough, not changing
fast enough, etc.
This type of person already feels so
much pain, that to consciously, deliberately, and unwittingly add more
pain feels so uncomfortable, that they stop trying to change. The pain of
trying hurts as much if not more than the normal pain that they have. At
least they are familiar with the pain that they know. It does not make
sense to them to keep inflicting this additional and unfamiliar pain onto
themselves. This is the catch-22.
Yet a person in this much pain only
seeks help when their world feels like it has already collapsed or when
they are about to implode. The problems in their life are so huge that to
address them directly is overwhelming. Even if successful little steps are
taken, they are so small in comparison to the big picture that they are
frequently fairly meaningless to the person needing to change and
the pain rushes back in.
So what is it that will allow a
person to break that catch-22 and be able to make the changes that they
need? How do they break that inertia and get the ball rolling in the
direction of positive change?
The first step is to recognize the
need for change, not just externally, but both internally through feelings
and externally through choices. The next step is to develop the belief
that change is possible and that you are actually able to change. The
third step is recognizing and understanding what the reward for change
will be: increased peace of mind, happiness, and fulfilling relationships
with others.
Most people understand these steps,
but to overcome the doubts there needs to be a feeling of safety in order
to make just a small leap of faith to start to actualize this. This leap
of faith requires a modicum of safety and a counselor can provide that
bridge, creating that initial safety for you until you can develop that
safety within yourself.
This feeling of safety needs to be
reinforced and nurtured on a daily basis. With that the foundation of
growth is created. If you think of a spiral, there is that first pixel in
the center that starts the spiral. You can't even see it because it is so
small in relation to the rest of the spiral.
Yet it is at that miniscule point
that change starts and over time it will continue to grow, along with your
peace of mind and your happiness. Going back to the body builder analogy,
for anyone who has ever exercised after a long time of not doing so, it
hurts a lot! Many people stop building muscle after a few attempts because
they don't like how it feels. Why?
Because the muscles have been largely
inactive for so long, it is easy to overdo it. Too much effort brings a
disproportionate amount of pain!In the beginning only the smallest
of efforts and the littlest of extra movement is all that is needed. This
is also true for your own personal growth.
That way it will feel good to make
the changes, you will want more of that good feeling, and most importantly
you will see that you are capable of creating it yourself. That in turn
develops into your motivation to change.
Lady
Saturday, October 03, 2009
12:46:48 PM
Good article . Will definitely copy it to my blog. Thanks.
Ewa
Sunday, October 04, 2009
10:00:00 AM
Hi Lady, thank you! I have corrected some typos on the page so you may want
to copy the amended version.
dvd
Wednesday, October 07, 2009
05:19:02 AM
Thank you for this valuable post. It changed my approximation
october 1 2009
Becky
Thursday, October 08, 2009
04:54:11 PM
How do you start to trust again? How do you figure out who to trust?
Ewa
Friday, October 09, 2009
09:59:19 AM
Thank you DVD (?) and Hi Becky, It is not so much a matter of trust as it is
a matter of raising your awareness, of understanding how fear motivates people's
behaviors as well as your own. You can learn how to observe people clearly ...
is a persons choices congruent with their actions and choices? Watch how some
try to appeal to your ego if you are insecure. If you feel good based on what
somebody else tells you, you will be vulnerable to wanting more from that source
and will "trust" the wrong person. When you meet your own emotional
needs, you already feel good. Then when you experience somebody stroking your
ego (to fill an emotional need of theirs) it is an instant red flag. To
understand this on a deeper level, read this article: http://www.onlinecounseling.org/May2007.htm.
Barbara31
Saturday, October 10, 2009
12:01:27 PM
This is not easy work, but the rewards are significant: a stronger civil
society where all members feel included, respected, and responsible for building
community.
Ewa Monday, October 12, 2009 03:36:58 PM
Hi Barbara, thank you for
your comment. If everyone were able to work through their fears we would live
in a remarkable world!
10-20-09 Stacie Sunday, October 25, 2009 07:03:30 PM
I just wanted to tell you thank you for taking the time to write about all of the topics you do. Your writing has helped my mother more then anything else, getting some things to "click" in her awareness of herself. Thank you from a grateful daughter. By helping her, you have helped an entire family continue to grow and learn and love each other.
Ewa Monday, October 26, 2009 03:36:58 PM
Hi Stacie, thank you for your kind words and acknowledgment of my work. I appreciate it! I love sharing what I think will help others in their own growth. We all have so much to offer each other by taking this journey together.
Clemento Thursday, October 29, 2009 05:06:38 AM
Valuable thoughts and advices. I read your topic with great interest.
Ewa Monday, November 2, 2009 01:02:39 PM
Thank you Clemento!
John Tuesday, November 03, 2009 02:22:50 AM
Are you a professional journalist? You write very well.
Ewa Tuesday, November 3, 2009 08:37:23 AM
Hi John, thank you for
your comments. I have always loved words. I can sense how people will feel
when they read something I write, which determines how I write and shape my
sentences.
