Relationship Advice That Matters Part One

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It occurred to me I should just jump into what often feels like the “muck” of a better relationship with self because that is so often where the intense work is being done. It can seem like a crisis or the scuffles of getting through the day. Instead of focusing on our relationship to the self, the creator of the perceptions we are reacting to as absolute truths, we too often turn the glaring spotlight on others in our lives.

This tendency traps one in a victim role where others hold the power to dictate what we feel or do. To quote Steve Biko, “The greatest weapon of the oppressor is the mind the oppressed.”

Consider that there are so many chances to look at how you talk to yourself, rather than obsessing about what your partner may have neglected to say to assure you or the colleague who didn’t hand you an agenda at the meeting when everyone else got one.

Usually, it seems this opportunistic moment is precisely the one where we often select to falter, back track and undo the work that’s been accomplished instead of seizing the opportunity to move even closer to the goal, our true destination— ourselves.

There is an intangible quality to choices and experiences. I believe this is why we have visceral reactions to them. For now lets just agree to call this idea of intangible substance energy. This energy is expressed in demeanor, attitude, and deeds put into being, when they are not productive we must find the courage to be honest about that reality.

The self is calling you to claim your gifts, which exist to provide you with a temporal road map to success. The mission is to unearth, learn from, and apply it with the intention of eventual mastery. This is the point where a simple plan becomes an important part of “getting on with it” in a way that is meaningful.

But what is the key to doing this? I have shared the above with several people and too many didn’t get it. It wasn’t what they wanted to hear, so I wondered, “Had I failed or had they?” And did that matter? After all, its not as if we are in school being graded. But then again, isn’t that exactly what we do to ourselves?

To use the phrase coined by Iyanla Vanzant, people get grounded in “Spiritual Special Ed” where they keep creating the same drama over and over again. Yet, they react in the same way and waste even more time by pouting over it and then in effect starting all over to end up acting out the same script again as if they are oblivious to the opportunity to choose to react differently.

Each time they are re-victimized, perhaps this is a consequence of a fear-based society, but since not everyone subcomes this can’t ultimately, in my opinion, be used to justify self-defeating responses.

My decision on the issue of who failed? Once I clarified what my goal was and what the need was that I was attempting to help the other person address my focus became how to shift the experience into one that was mutually empowering.

After getting permission to share examples from our work together, I decided to share specific examples based my case studies in the hope of illuminating critical aspects of recovery from battered self-esteem and its symptoms.

During a session with someone and she pointed out my comfort with abstract concepts and her inability to grasp abstract ideas. I found this to especially true for her when it came to issues that required her to release what was familiar, especially if this meant giving up victimization because that was how she got her energy in relationships.

It was the refusal to face this that ultimately held her back, and kept her going from therapist to therapist and relationship to relationship. Notable progress was made however, when we realized where she could begin, using a specific process to change one thing at a time. One important first step we dealt with self-talk, correcting the dialogues she had with herself about the events of the day, as well how she allowed others to speak reat her.

In my own personal experience, back when I felt fragmented and compartmentalized, I began working diligently on that issue over a decade ago and it is an ongoing process. One morning I was reminding myself of the “to do” list I had failed to write down in the organizer and the appointments I hadn’t written into the day planner.

Now one response to that would be to berate myself for not writing it in the organizer, as I had engaged in a long-term dysfunctional relationship with procrastination and disorganization.

There was a time when I would have willed myself into a nasty mood because of what I was saying to myself. Without even realizing it I might have colored my day, week or year. I have made some progress with procrastination by determining what were the priorities for me.

I took a moment to remind myself of that when the mental post-it incident occurred. So my response was to make that my first priority after I got my cup of coffee and sent an email. When I began working on the “to do” list, this article practically wrote itself as I allowed myself the freedom to journal a bit as I wrote the list of items I needed to complete into my sketchbook.

Interestingly, writing this article was at the top of the list. I decided that this made up for any other inefficiency in my customized system. I trust in this process because it has allowed me to merge my creative and analytical sides harmoniously in a way that contributes to my happiness and sense of self in a way that is gratifying. It is consistent with my goals and so it does come together to work as a system.

I have claimed my power to make it OK if I make a list of books to read, songs or artists to look for, ideas, rough drafts, and even drawings or collages in the same place because it served no one to make me wrong for doing it. Sometimes I do have to transfer information into other locations, but at least I am not procrastinating on my ideas and insights (which are the seeds of my potential for success) I take immediate action, even as the next step to take emerges.

My reason for sharing these anecdotes is to illustrate the point of the notion mentioned earlier in regards to getting on with the business of truly living. It is my intention that I have provided more relevant insight into the journey to the self as an essential part of achievement. Especially where this is chosen over nursing wounds of past disappointments and failures. What ever happen, it is the past and nothing can change it. The important thing is NOW because that where the seat of power lies in terms of linear time. It is the present that will create your future. So, what are you doing?