Category Archives: Psychology

Sincerity

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Many people struggle to cultivate positive emotions in meditation, because the task feels forced or insincere. How can I practice lovingkindness when I don’t feel it in my body? How can I cultivate happiness if there’s also fear, anger, or sadness present?

For me, it is very often the case that pleasant and unpleasant feelings arise together. Rather than waiting for a moment when things are only pleasant to deem it “sincere” to practice lovingkindness, I have changed my definition of what sincerity means.
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“For Us, There Is Only The Trying”

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I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the different ways people relate to the explorations of their lives. Certain underlying views can significantly inhibit a person’s sense of skill, capacity and security in exploring (in careers, partnerships, etc.). These views tend to be self-fulfilling prophecies, leading to timid, incomplete ventures and unreliability.

But they are not objective truth. (Is there such a thing?) They are merely colored lenses we were long ago conditioned to wear. We can treat these views as meditation objects, watching the distortions arise and pass instead of assuming that we are seeing things the way they are.

As I’ve worked with my own distortions, I’ve realized: more than keeping me from succeeding, they keep me from trying. When self-doubt and fear prevent me from being both-feet-in, I never get to know if I would have succeeded or not. In other words, giving in to fear of failure ensures failure.

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There Is Nothing Wrong With You

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There is nothing wrong with the part of you that feels sad, scared, or alone. There is nothing wrong with the part of you that doesn’t understand. There is nothing wrong with the part of you that desires things or people. There is nothing wrong with the part of you that wants to run from others, even when what you need most is to connect.

There is nothing wrong with the overachiever, the inner critic, the unworthy one. The overwhelmed, the humorless, or the numb. There is nothing wrong with the jealous one, the selfish one, the one who is ashamed. There is nothing wrong with the part of you that thinks there is something wrong.

All these orphaned parts, they don’t need to be fixed. They need to be allowed in. They need to be lovingly led back from exile, or gently coaxed down from the soapbox, and brought to their seats at the table. With acceptance and understanding, we earn their trust. With trust, they settle into balance, no longer distorted in their influence.

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Memory & Forgiveness

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I was doing forgiveness practice this morning, and an old, important memory from childhood arose.  It was an uncomfortable exchange in which I felt scared and sad—one of tens of thousands of early experiences (good and bad) which mix together to form the overall sense of self and world that underlies an adult personality.

We often fondly remember the good moments of our early years, but we file away the painful ones like unwanted boxes in the attic. It seems as though we can rid ourselves of these experiences, but as long as we hold resentment and blame about what has happened, we are influenced by those holdings. They consistently, subtly affect our views and our behavior (check out this article for more info).

So let’s take the blame out of what happened, however insignificant: Is it your fault that you adapted to the imperfect conditions of your childhood in the way you needed to at 1, 2, 3 years old? Is it your parents fault that they operated with the conditioning they were given—even with the best of intentions, falling back to sometimes misguided habits in the overwhelm of child-rearing?  Is it your grandparents fault for giving that conditioning to your parents?  Is it your great grandparents fault?

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A Waypoint on the Journey Into Authenticity

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big red feetAs I move into more authenticity in my relationships, I often notice and talk about the hard parts: the fear of rejection/abandonment, and the sadness of old, unprocessed loss. However, an unexpected benefit on this journey has been a shift in values, from pinning my worth on other people’s acceptance of me, to assessing myself on the basis of my own internal congruence: How complete have I been? How fully have I represented myself? Have I left anything unsaid? Have I been kind, and in accord with my principles?

From the perspective of a person who derives their worth from others’ acceptance (as most of us do when we’re just starting this journey), authenticity is a tremendously risky proposition. Rejection, or abandonment, equates to worthlessness. And of course, if we are simply authentic, simply ourselves, sometimes we will be abandoned!

However, as the sense of self worth shifts from being derived externally to being derived internally, the risk associated with authenticity, and abandonment, diminishes. It’s a virtuous cycle:

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