I woke this morning thinking that a very important aspect of flourishing is BELIEVING that you can, that you deserve to, and that you indeed will flourish! OMG--check it--that's the title of my blog site! Woot woot!!
So I've broken down the beliefs into these 3 categories, which I explain in further detail below. If you are having any trouble in any of these areas, then there needs to be a radical shift in your thought process.
1. Believing that you CAN flourish:
This is about you trusting in your abilities to get you where you want to go in life. You may have a tiny mad idea that tells you that you aren't smart enough or you're too old or you aren't physically capable. You are only limiting yourself with thoughts like that! If you trust in these tiny mad ideas, then you know what? You're right. Whatever thoughts you choose to put stock in, you will self-actualize. I have experience with this.
I used to have such low confidence in my intellect. I just didn't think I could keep up academically or in conversations. Every last one of my friends happens to be really intelligent so no matter who I surrounded myself with I always felt inadequate. I would get incredibly nervous and stumble over my words because I didn't trust at all that what I had to say was "smart enough." It got to a point where my thoughts were just so muddled all the time. And then what happened is I isolated myself like crazy because I couldn't bear being the dumb one in the bunch. And remember what I said about not being able to flourish in isolation? Yeah...that definitely wasn't working for me.
But I changed--I eradicated that thought and now I trust in my mind. I trust that what I have to say is intelligible and meaningful. I stumble no more. I can speak in front of large crowds even. I can command the attention of a small group of friends. People seek me out for guidance. It's pretty super awesome.
What's your tiny mad idea about your abilities?
2. Believing that you DESERVE TO flourish
Believing you don't deserve to grow results in either a plateau or worse--a steady downward spiral. I once had this "why bother" mentality because I didn't think I was worthy of much at all. I didn't care about growing because I was hopeless about my future. Depressing, huh? I thought this way because...well, I was depressed. Depression is when tiny mad ideas become catastrophic inane ideas. Depression ultimately leads to feelings of worthlessness.
I talk with ladies (gorgeous, intelligent talented, and successful ladies, mind you) all the time who struggle with self-love and at the core of their struggle is a lack of self-worth. Why on Earth would we believe we are not deserving of happiness, inner peace, health, and growth? These are our basic human rights! So, change this thought--you can think of it one of two ways. a. You can believe that you are worthy just as much as anyone else because no one is special--so therefore you are no less worthy than anyone else. If everyone were special then really no one is special, right? or...b. You can believe that you are incredibly special and therefore absolutely worthy of happiness, inner peace, health, and growth. I think they both get you there--if you're not feeling especially strong right now, then the former might be a good starting point.
What's your tiny mad idea about your self-worth?
2. Believing that you WILL flourish
This is about trusting that the Universe has got your back. I keep hearing this everywhere so it must be true! :) I hear this from all of my spiritual guides constantly and let me tell you...when you surrender to this notion, you can really really relax and enjoy life. I love this.
I think perhaps I was born a pessimist and then my pessimism kicked into high gear when my beloved grandmother (we called her Honey) died when I was 14. She was my second mom. She was this amazing woman that everyone adored and therefore I could not make sense of why she was taken out of this world. It was then that the "waiting for the other shoe to drop" mentality was born in me and from that point on, that was my lens through which I saw my life circumstances. I used to feel so uncertain all the time. I didn't trust my choices and I felt like what did it even matter what choices I made because bad things happen randomly to good people and it would only be a matter of time before my number was up again. Is that any way to live?
What I needed was a major shift in perspective. What I needed was to learn to trust in my intuition and to start to trust that my thoughts become things. I needed to trust that the Universe has got my back as long as I do my part everyday (see yesterdays post.) So now I start and end the day with gratitude for what I have and what I will have because I know it will be splendid. The Universe loves being thanked in advance, by the way. And sure random bad stuff will happen--but I am so so so much better prepared to cope with that stuff now and it doesn't mean that I won't still have all the greatness I desire too.
What's your tiny mad idea about what your future holds?
So, what's the lesson today? Change your thoughts--change your life. It's really that easy. BE your best! LIEVE the rest!
Grow grow grow, beautiful flower.
Much love,
Brooke
Hm. Wonderful blog today. I have a few thoughts, one of which I would love to open for discussion. First thought (open for discussion, but it's a little personal) - I'm working on the surrendering to some higher power. In fact, I wrote about it this morning. It's something that I still struggle with, but I find it interesting that more and more instances are happening in my life which suggest I might try this. Second thought - You meet with these gorgeous, talented, intelligent, successful women who are struggling with low self-worth. I often wonder about how sexism plays into this. Women are valued for different things than men are in this society, and it's time we change that. When a person isn't paid what they're worth, is objectified, and is considered a 'minority,' why wouldn't they harbor some internalized sexism? My thought is, not only do we all (men and women) deserve to love ourselves, but we must demand a radical shift of values in our society. Sexism (and so many other -isms) have got to go!
ReplyDeleteThanks, CJ for your post. You say you write too--what's your preferred format in which you write--do you journal? Morning Pages, perhaps? A blog? Just curious.
ReplyDeleteAbout the first thought...if you are finding that more and more instances are happening that suggest you should surrender, then the best thing I can suggest is to keep yourself open to having more of those experiences. I hope you don't turn your back on those instances out of fear but rather let love lead you to more of them. The more of those instances you have, the more you will trust and hopefully surrender. Like I said...it's pretty awesome.
And about the second thought. So, I did indeed qualify these ladies with characteristics that are kind of stereotypically how we value women. I did this to make a point that people would be really really surprised to know that soooo many people feel shitty about themselves and we would be surprised by who those people are-we assume that people who "have it all" must feel awesome about themselves because they have "no reason" to feel low. I want to make the point that more people than we think are struggling with self-love so people don't exacerbate their self-loathing by thinking they are the only ones struggling with this. I hope you don't think I was feeding into sexist stereotypes by saying this--that certainly wasn't my intention.
But I agree with you about the internalized sexism--absolutely. And I agree that we deserve to love ourselves no matter what characteristics we have--I am the biggest proponent of this--like I said, it's our basic human right. How do you suggest we encourage this radical shift in values?
The writing I currently do is Morning Pages.
ReplyDeleteIt seems that my original post was not as clear as I'd hoped. I was attempting to say that women aren't frequently valued for their intelligence, talent, or success unless it relates to something along the lines of their beauty, sex appeal, friendliness, mothering, etc. (Think stereotypical female roles) I also want to iterate that I find this to be appalling. What I was trying to say was that in a society where we (men and women) tend to already feel like we don't deserve to flourish, that we CAN flourish, etc, it is doubly hard for women, in our society, to believe that when there are daily reminders through media that tell women what is expected of them. I'm saying, it's pretty normal for a group of people who are oppressed and referred to as a 'minority' (think about the message THIS sends!) to have a hard time believing they deserve to succeed, flourish, thrive. I'm given unwarranted privilege every day because I'm straight, white, and male. Others have to work very hard to 'deserve' the same stuff I'm just given. And even with all that, I still find it hard to believe that I deserve to flourish. What if I had to work 10x as hard to be considered 'successful' or 'talented' and was reminded every day through social norms and media that those things weren't valued in me? I think I'd have a hard time feeling like I deserved to thrive just being myself.
I think the women that you told us about above are lucky to be seen as talented, successful, intelligent, and gorgeous by you. They probably work their butts off and aren't told that enough. How wonderful for them to know that you believe this truth about them.
In terms of radical shift - It won't happen overnight. Men have to take initiative and stop sexist jokes. Men have to be willing to relinquish our unwarranted privilege and stop using it to keep us up while we keep others down. Men need to talk about this stuff, and we need to talk to each other about it. And we need to SHUT UP AND ACTIVELY LISTEN when women and others talk.