You Had It All Along (written 8/7/07)

Hello Travelers. It's been a while. . . and I've missed spotting you along the path. How have you been? Our internet went down for a bit, and I was preparing for my presentation for the writers conference I attended, and overall, just striving to keep up with an increased and complicated pace to things. Here's what I've been thinking about : QUITTING VICTIM-HOOD. Let's see what I can do with this one.

I'm going to title this: You Had It All Along



(The original ruby slippers from the Wizard of Oz)

Over these last weeks, I was preparing for my ninety minute talk at the Pacific Northwest Writer's Association. Last minute mix-ups caused there to be NO projector for me to use for my powerpoint presentation, and left me scrambling to find one on my own (which worked out fine in the end).

I spoke to a small group of mostly women, who asked many questions, and were very engaged - many who returned for the autograph party to buy the book and have me sign it for them. I felt good giving the presentation and sharing my ideas. And then I began to drive home. And I didn't feel so good any more.

It was a small group, you know - not as big as I would have liked. Wouldn't it have been great if it had been a lot bigger? And then, what about those times I was awkward? How many of those times were there anyway? And what about this general feeling of INSECURITY that was sinking in around me now? What was that all about - surely it had to have some legitimate, fact-filled reason for existing. Maybe I should search my mind for any and all "evidence" I could find to support that feeling of insecurity.

However, at this point, I recognized that I didn't have to do any of that. There were, other things upon which I could focus - things that simply did not and could not support feeling lousy. The choice was in my hands.

An example of this occurred, again, days later, when I gave another presentation at a local bookstore which has been very supportive of me. On the drive home, once more, I began to sink into that feeling and my mind was drawn to try and assess and judge the experience. It was on a hunt for a certain kind of information, as though it had been once told that to find the negative in a situation was to find the TRUTH. I stopped and this time asked ( myself): HOW DO YOU ACTUALLY WANT TO SEE IT? I really wanted to see it in the positive. AND HOW DO YOU WANT TO FEEL? I wanted to feel good and confident, and open to more new experiences. At that moment, it really just seemed like a CHOICE, not like some definitive, static TRUTH catapulting towards me over which I had no control. I understood I was framing my own experience. There were perspectives to be offered that could easily support the way I actually wanted to see my experience, right there, WAITING for me, if I was interested; if I was willing.

The other day, Bill and I got into a discussion with Max in which he was expressing how much he wanted Sawyer to just leave him alone. He claimed he wants Sawyer to think he's "an idiot and " completely ignore" him. Sawyer, sometimes, will ask many questions of Max (as he does with Bill and me), and sometimes, those questions can become repetitive and tiring. Max was vehement about this and very emotional. We talked for a while, trying to help him understand Sawyer better, perhaps soften his view a bit, also encourage him to express how he feels more directly, clearly/calmly to Sawyer. After a bit, he turned to me and said, "Could you give me a nudge?" Could I say something that would nudge him in the right direction, to turn the dynamic. I told him to focus on the times when Sawyer is not bothering him - like, for example, right then as Sawyer was watching t.v. alone. I reminded him of how much time Sawyer spends playing and pretending by himself, in his room and outside. And I told him that the truth was that there is much more time that Sawyer is not bothering him, than time he is.

The Victim writes the script in which things are happening TO him, even feelings. The Victim feels powerless and looks for evidence (unconsciously) to support those feelings of powerlessness and misery. The Victim writes the story in which he loses his power and then has to recoup it. But the truth is, like Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, with her Ruby Slippers, we''ve had it all along. There is nothing we have to GET or GET BACK. We never lose it; we're never without it. The power to go where we most want to be is with us from the start.

I am learning that quitting victim-hood requires a monumental powerful decision. I have to decide that it is more important to me to create what I WANT than to prove that I AM BEING WRONGED.

Dorothy travels a whole journey in which she meets up with her MIND (the Scarecrow), her Heart (the Tin-man), and her COURAGE (the Cowardly Lion)- which is really the act of using one's mind to act from one's heart. And at the end of this journey, she is reminded that she had the POWER all along to go where she always wanted to go (home, in her case), but it's only once she's come to love and embrace these aspects, that she is able to melt what frightens her (the witch) and be reminded that She Had It All Along. Just like us.

So,regardless of what I may be feeling or thinking in the moment, regardless of what Flying Monkey appears to be chasing me I do, in fact, HAVE IT; I have the power to get myself where I most want to be. It's with me all the time. If Dorothy had never believed those slippers could do the trick, she would have never clicked her heels together. It was her belief, ultimately, that enabled her to use what she HAD.

So, like Max, me, and Dorothy - what we're wanting is right in front of us, waiting for us, unperceived because of our current focus, with our ability to perceive it solely dependent on how willing we are to use our hearts to inform the thoughts and decisions of our minds.

Let what you really want to feel guide how you think.

Hope you're all doing wonderfully.
Lots of love,
All is Well.
Jen

Less Than (written 7/16/07)

Hi Peoples! This week's NEWS covers Making Yourself Less Than, Who's Dominating Whom?, and The Power of No. Hold onto your hats, I feel a storm a-comin'!

This week I had some gripes with Bill, and eventually, he with me. My main gripe was that he was dominating the decisions that were being made without enough consideration of the others involved ( only me?). At one point, he was off getting the Teriyaki chicken take -out for dinner (that I did not want, but that he did not want to hear about for fear I would make us cook and he didn't want to cook). And I heard myself mumble to myself something about being "dominated". I usually don't use this word and it stuck out to me because I remembered using it in my thoughts earlier in the week as well. I stopped myself and tried to go into the truth. Intellectually, I could see that if I had found my calm, thrown out new ideas and options, the whole situation could have turned. So, that, to my mind, does not constitute domination.

But even though I had dispelled some of it, there was still a lingering feeling that ultimately could not be considered conducive to my heart maintaining a healthy and stable beat. Later, when I spoke to him about it and other thematically similar events, the situation got ugly. But here's what I realized in the middle of us both being reactive, hurt, and defensive: I feel bad a lot. And everything that I was angry for him thinking about me, I think about myself. The more I looked inward, the more I realized that every time something comes my way that doesn't immediately make me feel good - like an exchange with another person or a tricky or challenging situation - I feel crummy. But that's not the important part - the revelatory part is that I am feeling BAD because I am making myself LESS THAN in relation to whatever is before me - Less Powerful than whatever is outside me. So Bill pushes ahead for Teriyaki and I'm angry and feeling pushed around but the only real reason I feel so bad is because I have immediately and unconsciously made myself NOT as powerful as Bill or the situation. Which is simply a lie. If I was recognizing my power in the moment, I simply could not have felt that way.

And as I turned this situation over in my mind, I realized that I do this OFTEN. It's not just once in a while; it's many, many times throughout a day. I realized that I am in the habit of seeing myself as Less Than, not Equal To, and that, that leaves me understandably Frightened of what might happen next and so sometimes reactive and tense. If I see myself as not as powerful as what is around me, the stuff of Life basically, then of course, I'm going to be coming up with ways of trying to cope with that (self-created) feeling and regain a sense of control and power. And in the course of my life, my ways have included a lot of retreating, hiding, narrowing my range of experience to a manageable, familiar smallness.

For Sawyer, currently, he is in a pattern of doing the same. It's "no" to horseback riding lessons, it's no to pooping (this has temporarily shifted, Thank You Lord), it's "no" to going on a picnic, to working with Nicole (the young woman we hired to spend time with him, whom he LOVES). There are a lot of "no's" and not because he actually does not want the experiences, but I have to believe, perhaps, because, he like me has made himself LESS POWERFUL (in his own eyes) than the world around him. And so, the preference, as it certainly was for me as a child, is to try to greatly restrict or control the input from that powerful world. "No", in this context, becomes our attempt at regaining the power that we have unwittingly stripped from ourselves.

It is an old habit for me . I had always thought the world/the events/the people were MAKING me feeling less powerful, but this is not the case. It is in that moment of recognizing myself as Equal To, that I will relax and realize I have all I need, and Am all I need to be.

So, I will strive to think these new thoughts this week.
Hope everything is going great for each of you.

Much Love.
All is Well,
Jen