Finding the Soft Spot

Finding the Soft Spot

You know I like easy. You know I like simple. There are so many ways I incorporated those values into my daily life. One of the perhaps unexpected ways is in being vulnerable.

This is such a huge change in my life. In my days of yore, I would do anything to feel protected. I was always fine. I did spend a lot of time talking about my misery, but it was never what I was really miserable about. I was so well-defended that I had that truth hidden even from myself. It took years of the gentle ministrations of a wonderful teacher to help me get at my own truth. I had to learn to identify what I was feeling as an adult. Wow.

Why am I intimate? What makes me feel close? How am I safe to be vulnerable?

Many of us get the idea in our head that to be vulnerable is to be weak. We think that asking for help makes us less than. We think that feeling our feelings, letting them flow through and out, is childish. Oh, we are so wrong. This is such a big and common mislearning.

Our feelings, like our physical symptoms, let us know when something is happening in our thoughts. We may be aware of that something, but as often as not, it may well be unconscious. When I feel healthy and happy, chances are good that my thoughts are wholesome and supportive. When I feel unhappy and unhealthy, chances are good that my thoughts are dark and unsupportive.

A lot of nice things happen when we open up. We feel more integrity. When we say, ¨Fine,¨ when we aren’t fine, we feel dishonest. As we change our answers to match our insides, we feel more congruent within ourselves. My new favorite response for many days has been, ¨Good enough.¨ I like it because it reminds me that I have a lot of latitude in how I can feel light and peaceful.

When I tell you that I am feeling scared or angry, ashamed, or guilty, you may choose to respond to me. I have good friends who will often repeat back to me what I am saying and it sounds ridiculous out in the world, while in my head, well, it can be enough to make me sick!

When I choose to be vulnerable, to be open, I am choosing simple. I am choosing easy. I don’t have to censor, or edit. I can just say. When I do this, I consistently feel more love, more support, more compassion both coming and going.

Sometimes we think we are being vulnerable by ¨telling it like it is¨ but we are wielding our vulnerability like a bludgeon, almost daring others to challenge us. Perhaps we are feeling victimized by our feelings or physical stuff, and so we lash out with our truth to punish the world for our discomfort. Usually, we have something buried in our unconscious memory that is influencing this behavior. Getting help to find out what this is, addressing it and finishing it up will allow us to release the topic and enjoy feeling vulnerable instead of being afraid.

Sometimes we think we are being vulnerable when what we are doing is saying the same thing over and over, rehearsing our misery almost by rote, like playing a recording again and again. We do our recitation but feel no compassion coming back to us, no love, no support.

If I think I am being vulnerable, but I am not feeling more connected, more engaged, more love, and so on, there is a good chance that I have something else going on. It’s a good time for some self-inspection.

How have I changed from feeling closed off to feeling open and soft?

(c) Pam Guthrie 2015 all rights reserved 08202015

Power and Intimacy

Power and Intimacy

One of the lovely things about being a person is our ability to love and be loved, to care about someone, and let them care about us. To help, and be helped. These are nice aspects of being intimate.

In order to thrive, we need places to be intimate. We need to feel close to at least one person, one place to say the things we are kind of quiet about, things we often think of as our real selves.

Why am I intimate? What makes me feel close? How to I connect?

My public face is pretty cheery most of the time. I feel pretty cheery most of the time, but not always. Sometimes I get angry, or scared, or sad, or combinations of those things. I have a number of people I share those moments with. They tend to be my closest friends, and that intimacy serves me well in a whole buncha ways.

When I share my feelings with you, I often feel connected. If I am scared about something, telling you about my fears usually shifts them down into a less energetic state. I calm down. And because you care about me, I feel comforted.

When I tell you my histories, I often feel connected. Because I have told you something that happened to me, and given you a bit of information about how I am who I am, I feel more engaged with you. I feel like my experiences matter. This is a mark of friendship for me. I like to know about you.

When I am working with a teacher, my stories are almost irrelevant. My beliefs are way more important to address for my growth. Being able to let go of my stories, to know that they are just stories, gives me so much freedom to live my life in a way that supports me, and when I feel supported, I can support you so much better. I have resources to draw on, I have behavioral tools to pull out during interesting times. I own my power to impact my life in ways that make me grow, and it is easy, and relatively comfortable.

Having carefully handpicked my friends for their unbridled awesomeness means that I can see my own unbridled awesomeness much easier. I can assume it most of the time. I can take it as a given that my experience, my wisdom, my intimacy and joy will give me the foundation I need to take my life as it comes, and address with grace and joy whatever shows up.

Why do I choose to be positive? Why do I choose to be intimate? Why do I choose to enjoy?

Being intimate with our trustworthy friends, gauging our level of intimacy with less trustworthy people, using our judgment for when to say intimate stuff and when to be quiet helps us feel safe in the world. We know that we are strong, and competent, and capable, and have all the support we need as we need it, even if it is coming from unexpected sources.

Being intimate gives us experience trusting, and that allows us to trust both the universe more, and ourselves, that we will know what we need, and from whom we want it. Sometimes that doesn’t pan out, and we don’t feel cast adrift, but know that we will find out that we may need something other than what we thought, and we can be okay with that.

How have I changed from being closed off to opening my heart well and honestly?

(c) Pam Guthrie 2014 all rights reserved 08082014

You Ol' Sofite

You Ol’ Softie

We all have stuff, big stuff, little stuff, stuff. We have current topics, we have history. We have old, well-established patterns that are so ingrained in us we don’t even notice them. We may even think that everyone feels like we do.

One of the ways we can uncover our hidden patterns is by talking with other people.

Why am I intimate? What makes me feel close? How do I connect?

As we talk about ourselves, as we disclose our thoughts, our feelings and beliefs, our loved ones may question what we believe. They may give us opportunities to question our ideas about how the world works. They may help us find ways to think about relationships, about people, about our own histories, that make way for us to feel more comfortable, happier, and to get along better.

Sometimes the stuff that comes up as we talk is scary or painful. Integrating these memories is one of the ways that we grow. As we address these topics, we develop resiliency. Our self-esteem grows stronger as we see what we have survived. We find our sense of personal power as we are able to let the past go, break those old, destructive patterns, and replace our mislearnings with wisdom, understanding, compassion, and self-respect. I needed a lot of help to do this, and I found that each time I needed a wonderful teacher, a wonderful teacher showed up.

Why do I like me? How do I know I am strong? Why do I choose to be vulnerable?

Choosing to be vulnerable is an interesting thing. I used to say that being vulnerable was like giving someone a pointy stick and telling them where to poke you to hurt the most. When I had friends who didn’t really like me, I would open up, and they would poke. Owie. I felt justified in thinking that people were basically cruel and self-serving.

I am so glad I was wrong about that.

I have had to leave a lot of relationships over the years for a lot of reasons. I have made a lot of new friendships with lovely people, who listen carefully when I tell them where to poke, then say, “You can keep that pointy stick, I don’t want it.” They treat me kindly, compassionately, and don’t poke.

When I am vulnerable with untrustworthy people I can get zapped. There are lots of trustworthy people out there, and one of the things we get to do is find them, and trust them.

When I find my trustworthy people, I don’t have to trust all at once. I don’t have to scare myself. I can take baby steps, and trust on my own timeline. I can practice trusting. Well, that’s what I did, anyway. Making that effort is worth it.

When I trust my trustworthy people, I can choose to be vulnerable with them. I can choose to disclose, I can choose to be soft, I can choose to be comforted. I can choose to receive help, and compassion, and let their love into my heart. As I do this, learning to receive, I can also choose to feel gratitude, and appreciation. I can choose to notice how nice my life is. I like that.

How have I changed from feeling distant and shut down to opening up to intimacy?

(c) Pam Guthrie 2014 all rights reserved 07092014

Resect Your Secret

Resect Your Secret

I have a few minutes in the morning when my thoughts can go anywhere. This morning I noticed I was thinking about secrets. I won’t go so far as to say that secrets are the opposite of intimacy, but there is a correlation.

There are some secrets that I love to keep; what I got you for your birthday or winter holiday gift, for example.

I also love to keep your secrets. The image I get is that I put your secrets in a box, and lock it up tight.

My secrets are for telling.

I am doing my best to tell all my secrets to at least one other person. This takes trust, something I really stunk at for a long time. One thing that really helped me start to trust was realizing that there were people out there who had jobs where being trustworthy was in the job description. They have to keep secrets, you know, lawyers, clergy, therapists.

It was a good place to start. And there are some really good reasons for telling.

When I am living my natural life, I am relaxed, in my muscles, in my thoughts, in my emotions.

When I am harboring my secrets, I am clenched in my emotions with fear that someone will find out. I am clenched in my thoughts with trying to hold it down. And those things will often clench up my body. Ow.

When I am harboring my secrets, there are usually some big feelings attached, and when the thoughts of those secrets cycle through my unconscious mind, I will often end up feeling crazy because I don’t know why I am feel so bad, or scared, or angry. As I tell my secrets to trustworthies, that feeling of crazy subsides. Not only that, but I get better and faster at noticing when I have a lot of unconscious material whanging around in my head, and can address more effectively.

When I am harboring secrets, I am also disconnecting from my life. Ow. I cannot have a loving and respectful relationship with myself if I am denying my experience. That’s a big and controversial idea there, so give it a moment.

Why do I own my life? How am I responsible for me? What makes me feel connected?

If I am denying my experience, I am putting conditions on loving myself. Dang. I want to love unconditionally, but as long as I say “no” to my experiences, I am putting limits and boundaries on my love.

As I tell my secrets, and feel the feelings, I remove those edges. I can release the fear, or shame, or guilt, or anger I felt, and now I have more room inside for the nice stuff, loving myself, compassion for me, and you, wisdom, insight. My capacity for connecting with me, and connecting with you, grows, and I enjoy more intimacy, sweeter, and more profound, than I could have imagined before.

How have I changed from clamping on my secrets to feeling free?

(c) Pam Guthrie 2014 all rights reserved 05312014

Secrets, Intimacy, and Trust

Secrets, Intimacy, and Trust

What does being intimate mean to you? I was so intimidated by that word. Physical intimacy was easy, but emotional intimacy? I couldn’t get my head wrapped around the concept. I had the feeling that exposing my feelings, my thoughts, my very self, that I would end up flayed. Not very encouraging. I was so sad that I had failed at intimacy.

I chalked it up on the side of Stuff I Can’t Do, and went on with my rather lonely life. I was in a couple 12 step groups at the time, and working on step 4, I took a moral inventory of myself as fearlessly as I could, then told a chaplain what I had done, and how I felt about it. I felt a little better. I found a sponsor and told her secrets. I felt a little lighter.

I told my secrets and shared the attendant feelings. And as I uncovered more secrets, I told those. My secrets, not yours. I made some kind friends, I found a wonderful therapist (my eighth, if you were wondering) and told my therapist everything, and I had a ton of secrets in my life, and I told my dear friends a lot. Little by little I turned my poisonous secrets into something benign. Little by little I integrated the traumas I had kept hidden. Little by little, I cleaned out my emotional basement. Lonely is often a result of a crowded emotional basement, and so I found myself feeling less lonely. (I define lonely as disconnected from ourselves, and lonesome as disconnected from others.)

Why am I intimate? What makes me connect? How do I engage?

One of the answers I get for all three of those questions is, I trust.

I sure wasn’t good at it, but I had to start somewhere; I was great at trusting the wrong people. So I went to professional people who seemed like they would have being trustworthy in their job descriptions. Babysteps. We want to move forward, but we don’t want to go too far too fast. If we scare ourselves, we will often just stop.

I didn’t trust me, I didn’t trust my gut, and I sure didn’t trust my judgment. And as I told my secret stories, and felt my feelings with someone, that started to shift.

Why am I soft? How do I enjoy feeling vulnerable? What makes me drop my defences?

I will say, I am not always running around defenceless. I am not always soft and vulnerable, but I am more often way more often than I used to be. I also have a lot of trustworthy friends now. I also know that I feel easier when I am vulnerable. I trust me, I trust that I can cope, I trust the universe will provide what I need to take care of me.

I enjoy a bunch of intimate friendships. I am good at them. Intimacy is now easy and pretty much second nature. I appreciate it as part of my natural life, but also as one of the paths to my natural life.

I now have a personal rule, namely, I have no secrets of my own. The secrets others tell me aren’t mine to tell, but my secrets get told to any one of several people. Sometimes I tell all of them. It keeps crap out of my emotional basement, it keeps me feeling fresh and light.

How have I changed from feeling isolated and lonely to feeling connected and close?

(c) Pam Guthrie 2014 all rights reserved 05042014

Have you found your trustworthy people to tell your secrets to?

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The Price of Intimacy

The Price of Intimacy

We are all in it together. At the very least, we have being alive in common. At the most we are deeply connected, one spirit at our core, and at best we are lovingly intimate. In general, we are sliding around somewhere on those continua.

As we choose to grow up, our relationships get nicer and nicer. We find ourselves more intimate, closer, with deeper, more meaningful connections. We care more about each other, it is easier to be aware of each other, more thoughtful, kinder.

We find that we can stop ourselves from saying cruel or cutting or demeaning  things. For me, for example, I stopped using sarcasm as a weapon, and found that I didn’t need to engage in angry exchanges like I used to. We find that we prefer clear communication, and spend some effort to ensure it.

For a bit of mindfulness and awareness on my part to treat you with love and respect, I am rewarded like mad. I am supported. When I need help, you help me. When I want comfort, you are there for me. When I need to be heard, you listen. If I need space, you are respectful of that, and never take it personally.

Wow. That’s sure not like the old days.

How am I connected? Why do I enjoy being with you? What makes me glad to see you?

I manage to think twice about how I say things to you. I care about your feelings. When I was little, I didn’t have much sense of you as an individual, you  were more just there to provide for me. Little by little, I began to understand that you were like me, you had feelings about stuff. You cared about things, you had things you didn’t like, you had a past that didn’t have me in it. I might be the center of my universe, but I was not the center of yours.

Why can I see you? What makes me aware of you? Why do I notice?

Back then, I was kind of wedded to drama. Big emotional conflicts, terrifying pronouncements, lots of thoughtless behaviors that got me in trouble, little trouble, big trouble. I put myself in dangerous situations, got involved with people who had as little awareness of me as I had of them. Poor we.

I pretty much have broken up with drama. We have coffee from time to time, but it’s never very satisfying.

I used to wonder what intimacy meant. I thought there was some mysterious, secret thing about it. And so I would go to my special people, the ones I can talk to about anything, really be myself without fear of censure or negative moral judgment, and talk about it. Heh. Wondering what intimacy is when I am right in the middle of it. Cute.

Why do I choose intimacy? What makes me want to be close? How do I share?

When I have people I feel close to, I tell my secrets. It’s like exchanging my secrets for freedom. I like that. And I like being able to tell you anything.

How have I changed from keeping myself locked up to sharing the real me with thee?

(c) Pam Guthrie all rights reserved 02262014

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Misery Buddies

Misery Buddies

I was at a big event recently where I saw a lot of people I haven’t seen this century. I recognized faces as being very familiar to me from my yesteryear, but mostly found no names coming to mind. What I did find was a nice lift at seeing the faces. I’ll take it.

Why am I glad to see you? How do I connect? What makes me open my heart?

When I choose to engage with you lots of interesting things become available to me. For one, my life gets bigger. For two, I get to have a bigger love exchange; more coming in, more going out. That keeps my spirit healthy and happy. For three, I get more experience. More joys, more fun, and more sadness, too, as we share life things.

I joke around about being a gregarious introvert. There are lots of thoughts out there about what makes an introvert. I love spending time with people, but I recharge on alone time. Good to know.

The other thing that’s good to know is what a huge impact we can have on each other’s outlook, point of view, attitude, opinions, and so on. We can encourage each other to be our best selves, or, um, not.

I used to be a wonderful misery buddy. Now, I will say, I appreciate that we all have stuff, I have stuff. I find it useful to talk about that stuff to find solutions. Complaining, whining, being offended, running a litany of what’s wrong with whatever, or whomever, negative emotional judgments about stuff, feeling either superior or inferior, paying a lot of attention to the negative, brushing off the positive, you know, for example, all work to keep us feeling miserable.

As with so much of our daily lives, misery is a habit. We start in the dawn of time, maybe as hungry or tired babies whining to go home while our mom was running errands. Then we get in the habit of feeling whiny at the store, or in the car. In NLP, we call that “anchoring,” when we attach a feeling to a situation. We are supposed to grow out of it, but sometimes we get stuck.

Giving up those things is part of becoming a grownup.

It’s kind of like we all begin by out looking for the bad stuff. Maybe it’s an old survival thing, but we all mostly do it, like it’s our starting point. It’s easy to see the crap.

As we grow up, we learn that being happy is way better for us is a lot of ways. We sleep better, we have more energy, we stay healthier, we have more fun, we connect more deeply, we find more things to enjoy, we take ourselves both more and less seriously.

Why do I want to be connected? What makes my relationships mutually supportive? How do I engage with you?

We learn to look inside, and we learn that connecting with each other, establishing bonds of intimacy, makes everything nicer, easier, more fun, more profound.

Connecting with each other from a place of positivity, love, and support is so nice. When we have really strong connections with each other, we don’t even need to be in each other’s company to feel supported, we have that history with our loved ones. Our world is bigger, and cozier.

How have I changed from having misery buddies to enjoying grownup relationships?

(c) Pam Guthrie 2014 all rights reserved 01132014