Stars or Clouds? (A Process for Understanding)

When you've had your perspective invalidated in childhood, it can become harder and harder to see a situation clearly because other people's truth seems more important than your own. This is part of the reason that people with low self-confidence are so sensitive to what other people think! We learned that what our parents, or our friends, or our teachers, or society at large thought was more important, and perhaps even more truthful, than what we really thought and felt. This is one characteristic of codependent behavior--someone or something else is more important than ourselves.

In my experience, this has caused me to become obsessed with trying to see things objectively. It has caused me to dissociate and dis-identify from my own feelings, truth, and beliefs. The problem is, when you leave your truth out the of the totality of the situation, in an attempt to be "objective," you are not being objective at all since your truth is part of the situation you are in. The conclusion I've found is that under the surface of all things, the highest objectivity is love. I have a process below that I took myself through, and a few pointers that I hope will continue to help me and others identify with our emotions and our truth.

1. Look at the things that happened, and what people say, and realize it for what it is.

*What actions were taken? What words were said?

*What is their responsibility in this scenario? What is mine?

2. Take responsibility for what is only your responsibility: your actions, words, and reactions.

            *I cannot control how others react to me.

            *I have power over what I feel and think.

            *I am only responsible for my actions, words, and reactions.

            *Have I treated them the way I would like to be treated?

3. Be understanding to where someone is, and why something may have felt a certain way to them.

*This may have nothing to do with me, they might be reacting and feeling this way because of something else or because it’s a trigger for them. I can understand that.

4. Be understanding to yourself and speak out for why you feel the way you do.

            “I am triggered right now.”

            “When this happened, it made me feel _______ because…”

5. Speak out for what you won’t allow into your reality from the space you are in.

           

*I won’t accept harshness. “Please don’t talk to me that way.”

*I won’t do things that feel bad to do. “I’m sorry, but I can’t take care of that right now.”

6. Speak out for what you need from others.

*I need an environment that allows me to express who I am and how I feel authentically.

*I need to have a relationship that is emotionally aware.

*I need an environment that supports softness of mind and heart. “Could you please talk to me calmly?”

7. See where you allow others to not take responsibility for their actions.

            *Because I didn’t speak out, I allowed for this or this to be said to me.

8. Realize when the law of attraction is at work.

            *This is not my responsibility, but how might I have attracted this into my reality?

Another thing that really helped me was repeating the affirmations:

"I know what I have lived through and I know how I have felt."

"I know my experiences and my life."

"I am the only one that has lived my life, and only I know the truth of what I've felt and experienced."

Doing solar plexus (where our ego is located) strengthening exercises helped as well. People have a misconception that the ego is a bad thing, but letting ourselves identify with it is in fact a vehicle for our expansion. We came down into our individual perspectives for a reason, and owning this perspective instead of discarding it is self-loving. When we own our individual perspective, it's like seeing a puzzle piece clearly so we know where to place it.

To give an example of a little bit how this process went for me, I used an example from yesterday:

1) Talking about the crowded shopping place and how we all felt.

“You’re very good at blocking out everything around you and focusing only on yourself.”

“I’m good at ignoring the things that don’t benefit me.”

They look to each other.

Triggered. I feel insulted. It hits the deeper level of shame. I make what they said or did mean that I’m selfish and unaware. I stop talking. Later…

“What did you mean by I’m good at blocking things out things?”

“You’re good at being unaffected by things.”

I talk about how I have a great ability to change my focus, but I am actually affected a lot by some things. I say this can be a good thing, but I had used it in the past to not really address my emotions. I address the fact that sometimes it makes it hard to be present with people, but that there is benefit to seeing objectively how people act and think. I say that I like to observe other people and their actions to get a better understanding of them.

“That’s incredibly subjective.”

“Yeah, it’s actually judgmental.”

Triggered. I feel frustrated, mostly with myself because I can’t explain what I’m trying to say in the way I mean it. I feel misunderstood, and like they are jumping to conclusions.

2)        I cannot control how they react to what I say. I cannot control what they think of me. I can just be myself the best I can and show the world my authenticity, and be my kindest to all without sacrificing this. I know that a weakness of mine is communication, and I can work on communicating what I’m talking about more clearly in a way it can be understood.

3)        I feel like they have a huge misconception of who I really am and what I really stand for. If this is true, I can understand why they react the way they do given their misunderstanding. I don’t really know why they looked at each other after I said that.

4)        I was triggered because I made their actions mean that they think I’m selfish and unaware. I was triggered because I felt misunderstood. I shut down because that’s the coping mechanism I use when I feel this way—frustrated or angry—because it was not ok to express these things as a child.

            “When I’m not explaining things in a way you can understand, can you please tell me so that better understanding can be reached?”

            “When I’m trying to explain something and it’s not coming across as well as it could, can you please try to comprehend rather than jump to surface judgments? A good way to do this is to ask me specific questions so that I can better describe what I’m talking about.”

            “When you react to me with anger when I’m triggered, I feel shut down. Can you talk to me calmly and seek for understanding?

5)        “It doesn’t make me feel good when I’m trying to explain something and I’m interrupted. Please listen and wait when I’m talking to you.”

            “I feel upset when I’m trying my hardest to communicate something, and you immediately call it something not nice.”

6)        “I need an environment that seeks for understanding. Understanding, both of heart and mind, is where love and empathy flourishes.”

           

“I need an environment where who I say I am is recognized and respected.”

           

            “Something I want you both to know is that I’m actually a deeply caring, loving, and compassionate person… sometimes to the extent that I forget that it’s not loving to anyone to deny it to myself. Even though I know deep down that I’m very loving, caring, and compassionate, sometimes a veil or fear and hurt falls over this and I need you to be sensitive to that so that I’m not ripping off that veil, but lifting it.”

7)        I know I need to work on my communication skills. Due to my lack of ability to clearly explain how I really feel and what I really think, I wasn’t making understanding any easier.

8)        Feeling misunderstood is a trigger for me. This means there is a part of my being that is unhealed, and that is a large point of attraction for me.

This helped me a bit. As always, I am constantly growing and still have a lot to learn from myself. Peace.