Thursday, August 22, 2013

Believe You, Me!

Believe You, Me!

I am about to tell you a freaky fact. So take a good, calming breath and listen up: If I believe I am right, I am right.

I can only understand the world based on my experience. That means that I will believe and trust mislearnings, misinterpretations, misunderstandings and stuff that is just plain made up. I will also believe stuff that really is True.

That means it will be a challenge for me to separate the true stuff from the True stuff. It means I can be absolutely one hundred percent committed to things that are really not good, or really not true.

Scary, huh.

So here I am. I will think that I am right, or I will think that I am wrong. Both, curiously enough, are beliefs, not Truth.

So the first bit is that feeling wrong is just a feeling and I can change that in an instant: How do I feel when I am right?

The second bit is to open my mind to the possibility that maybe what I believe is wrong. If a believe doesn’t support my perfect self, it’s probably wrong. If a belief doesn’t support me supporting your perfect self, it’s probably wrong. If a belief leads me away from loving you, it’s probably wrong. If a belief leads me to negative, emotional judgments, violence, despair, hopelessness, disregard for me or you, disrespect for same, it’s probably wrong.

Are you seeing a pattern?  

We are amazing. Brilliant, creative, innovative, curious, the list goes on and on. We are fantastic storytellers, and we start telling ourselves stories from the time we are pre-language. “Once upon a time, this is how the world is.” And we buy it.

So now that we are grown ups, we can look at the stories we’ve told ourselves, about how wrong we are, about how we aren’t good enough, about being stupid, or lazy, or worthless. All those stories we told ourselves back in our own dark ages.

Now that we are grown ups, we can correct our crappy beliefs about life being horrible and hard, and that we have to suffer with poverty, or loneliness, or pain, or existential angst, victimhood or martyrdom.

Now that we are grown ups, we can resolve our emotional traumas. We can heal our spirits. We can choose to spend time with people who uplift us.

Now that we are grown ups, we can accept where we are and move on.

If it’s True, it’s True for everyone.

How have I changed from believing in my old stories to believing in the highest good?

(c) Pam Guthrie 2013 all rights reserved 08222013

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