Extending Love – A Powerful Game Changer

July 10, 2015July 10, 201515 Comments

A long time ago now, I was studying A Course In Miracles. The most striking thing I learned, that has stayed with me for more than a decade, is that everything is either an extension of love or a request for love.

I reflect on it often. It seemed improbable when I first heard it, but in my own journey to openheartedness, embracing all that shows up on my path, the meaning of it has seeped into my being. The implications are profound. It is top of mind for me as I see posts on social media reminding us that “hurt people hurt people”, an adaptation of Thich Naht Hahn’s quote, and as I see quotes about forgiveness.

When someone issues a request for love it does not come in a question. It comes in behaviour that looks like anything but a request for love. Actually asking for what we need puts us in a place of vulnerability and for many of us this is a fate almost worse than death.

A request for love often looks and feels like an attack. The default is to respond with your own request for love. Attack meets attack. Defence meets defence. And the game is on. Not only is it on, it is hard to break the pattern. It is a vortex we get sucked into. Until we don’t. Until we become conscious of the pattern, our own contribution to it and set an intention to step out of the pattern, dance a new dance.

An extension of love does not come at the sacrifice of you and who you are. It cannot truly come at the subjugation of yourself because then you are still acting from the place of requesting love. You can only extend love to another once you have extended it to yourself. The more you extend love to yourself, the more capacity you have to extend it to another person, the more likely you are to break the patterns.

A beautiful side benefit is that you fuel your own boundaries. It is much harder for someone to “request love” through an attack when your boundaries are clear – first to yourself, then to others.

When you understand that when someone is behaving inappropriately, it is a reflection of their own internal state of being – it really is more about them than you – it can change how you respond. When you change the way you respond, you can change the nature of the relationship. If it is an intimate relationship where you are at risk, it does not mean you stay. But you exit differently. When you extend love to yourself, you will not put yourself at risk or stay in a situation of risk.

When you can forgive someone for their behaviours or actions, it does not condone or excuse their behaviour but it releases their grasp on you. As long as you hold onto the pain, they continue to have power over you – essentially you give your power away. Forgiveness is a means of reclaiming your power. Refusing to forgive is like drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.

It is easier to forgive if you can see past the behaviours of the other person, to the child within, see their soul essence, see the request for love as what it is – an expression of their own pain, their own desire for connection – with an inability to articulate it, possibly even to themselves. It becomes easier to extend love to the person and bring the whole situation to a higher vibration. This does not mean you do not act in ways that are appropriate to the situation, but the range of options you can draw on expand, sometimes exponentially, when you are in the place of extending love to the person or situation.

Reclaim your power. Step into it fully. Extend love every chance you get.

Limiting Beliefs – Dichotomies: Happy or Rich, But Not Both?

June 29, 2015June 29, 201511 Comments

How much is enough? Do we need to make trade-offs to receive some of what we want but not all of what we want, so we do not appear to be greedy? Do we need to make choices to accept one thing at the expense of another?

We are bombarded by messages that pitch limiting beliefs, unconsciously strengthening so many of the dichotomies many of us grow up with. You can be happy or rich but somehow not both. “You can’t have your cake and eat it too.”

“Teach your kids to be happy, not rich, so they’ll know the value of people and not things.” This is a typical message in so many posts on social media, in articles and in some books. Does this mean that if you are rich you cannot know the value of people?

These kinds of messages lead or contribute to a belief system inherent in so many of us – that life is about trade offs. If the relationships in my life are abundant and loving then it is okay that I have not attracted resources to myself – because if I had more money then I might lose the relationships or the love I have. And that is more important so it is okay to be poor or struggle financially.

Being happy is good. Being rich is bad. If you are rich you are not happy. It is okay to be “rich” in love. “Money doesn’t buy happiness.” But sufficient money sure does make life more bearable and even more enjoyable. It offers more choice. Is this not a place most of us would like to be in – a place of more choice? Choice can be intentional with a little or a lot of resources at our disposal.

Instead of focusing attention on what is on our path, what we can do to enrich the totality of our lives, we look to people who have more than we do – more money, more power, more choice. We make a few assumptions about them – how they misuse their power or their money or their choices. Have you ever heard or used the expression, “they have more money than brains”?

It is easy to look at high profile people or situations – the banking systems, Walmart, Donald Trump and more – to point to greed we do not want to participate in. How can they live with themselves, we wonder. Then, we decide we don’t want to be like them anyway. Better to be poor, without power, without choice. Really? Most of us do not think about it so starkly. It becomes an unconscious, un-articulated justification for staying put, for perpetuating the familiar zone, for rationalizing the irrational choices or non-choices we make.

Better to be the way I am, to continue the situation I’m in, then to become like the image of greed and irresponsibility I have created in my mind and assigned to real people I see or know who I believe have taken advantage of others, misused their power or their money. Better to be spiritual and pious than rich and corrupt. One or the other, not both. It is insanity, this belief system.

As Abraham-Hicks says, “Your life is meant to be joyful.” Is your life joyful when you perpetuate struggle in your life? Is it joyful when you judge others by your impressions of their failings? It is joyful when you regret a past you cannot change at the expense of a future you can? Is it joyful when you desperately wish for things to be different but don’t act to make them different?

What is the inquiry you need to be in to surface your own limiting beliefs and begin the process of releasing them? Where do you need to turn your attention and your thoughts to access appreciation and gratitude to make your daily life more joyful? What steps do you need to focus on to bring more abundance into your life – not just in one aspect, but holistically? How can your release the either-or dichotomies we are so often invited into to embrace both/and?

Do not suffer fools gladly (especially yourself) and Go Get ‘Em!

My Passive-Aggressive Relationship with the Law of Attraction and Some Simple Steps

June 27, 2015June 29, 20158 Comments

It is safe to say that the Law of Attraction was not on my radar prior to my life crashing and burning around me when I was in my mid-thirties. Up to the point of dramatically losing my job and my first marriage falling apart, I was blissfully unaware, and some days I still wish I was.

When it did come into my awareness through Alan Cohen’s book, The Dragon Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, it was a tremendous relief, almost a lifesaver, at a very dark and paralyzing time in my life when my only way of dealing with each day was to look only at what was right in front of me, not the next day and certainly not the next week. Essentially the message I received was: if I attract the circumstances of my life to me, and I had powerfully attracted destructive forces, then I had equally the power to attract good into my life. And that was a hopeful promise and expectation. It meant my life didn’t have to be all bad. That this day and circumstance did not need to be a predictor of my future. Hallelujah!

Since then, for almost two decades, my relationship with the law of attraction could probably be described as passive-aggressive and fraught with pitfalls along the way.

The basic premise is, set your intention, write it out, visualize it and then let it go. Cool, simple, easy. Until it isn’t cool, simple or easy. Especially when those big dreams of enough money, enough opportunity, enough love and enough success don’t materialize. Are they right around the corner or miles and miles away? Do I stay with it or give up on it and how do I know the difference?

I have experienced myself, and witnessed others, move from hopeful anticipation that this stuff really does work to painful desperation in their visualizations (“I trust, really I do, but how much longer do I need to wait?”). Some books and authors, The Secret being one of them, would have you believe it is as simple as visualizing – forget the how, just know what you want. It’s not what you do, it’s your state of mind, your energetic field, the vibes you give out.

Then we look around to see what other people are doing, judge ourselves for not measuring up and, in our jealousy of believing they are achieving something that eludes us, judge them for not being perfect enough, for being inauthentic or for abandoning their values in the pursuit of success – all projection, by the way, since rarely do we have enough knowledge of them or their path to truly know their intentions, their values or whether they are being authentic or inauthentic.

I am not totally disillusioned with the law of attraction but I have been in deep inquiry about what works, when it works and why it matters – to me anyway. While it is not as simplistic as thinking happy thoughts and life will be happy and full of success, there are a few simple guides I am learning to adhere to as my passive-aggressive relationship with the law of attraction becomes more moderate (and seemingly more successful).

Self Talk

It is true that it is as simple as: our self talk influences how we feel and essentially our basic health. Aside from all the of the promises offered by the law of attraction, when our self talk is positive rather than frustrated, anxious or worried, our anti-aging hormone goes up, our immune system hormone goes up and cortisol (nicknamed the stress hormone) goes down. When we are more at peace with ourselves, it shows on the outside, others notice and are attracted to us. We make better decisions. We have more energy. We treat ourselves and others better and they treat us better – because in this process we also fuel healthy boundaries. Win-wins all the way around.

Setting Intention and Acting

It is still true, as Yogi Berra said, that if you don’t know where you are going, any road will take you there.

And the truth is, if we are not consciously setting intention, the pathways are just being filled up for us – by circumstances, by other people, by non- or in-decision. What is it you want for yourself and for your life? Grow your clarity on this, imagine the end result and let it go. But don’t stay home on your mediation cushion or on your couch waiting for the miracles to start rolling in. Begin to do what you can to move in the direction of the intentions you set. One of my favourite teachers in this respect is Mike Dooley and his messages from The Universe. Love, love, love the beautiful balance of dream, dream, dream, remember you are a forever being and everything will be fine and ACT. Do what you can, when you can, from where you are or nothing will happen. And acting in accordance with your intention takes your attention off whatever it is you think isn’t manifesting in this moment.

What I have witnessed over and over in my life is that clarity of intention does bring results. Sometimes in immediate timing like when my second marriage ended and the assets were finally being separated and I was moving into my own place. The house was prepped, physically and energetically (I would meditate outside, walk around the house, say my goodbyes and invite welcoming energy), put on the market and, against all odds, it sold in 24 hours. My new home had come on the market just before that – ready and waiting for me. In three weeks, I was in a physical locality that represented sanctuary, joy, movement and home for me.

Me and my sweetie

Sometimes it takes awhile and a few tries. Prior to my second marriage, I began to imagine what my ideal relationship might look and feel like. It was supposed to be my second marriage. It wasn’t. I let go of the idea, quite content to be joyful alone. And then love tapped me on the shoulder in the most unexpected, improbable and gentlest of ways and the relationship I imagined plus more showed up. It is not what I expected it to look like or how, but it is a gift I cherish every day.

Who Cares What Other People Are or Are Not Doing; What Am I Doing?

Focusing on what other people are doing or not doing, imagining how successful other people are, worried that there is “not enough” for everybody so I won’t get “my share” are all counter-productive distractions that do not reflect healthy self talk but is the purview of your “itty-bitty-shitty committee”. While your attention is in minding someone else’s business instead of your own, opportunities pass you by. What is yours to do? Do that. Pursue it with singular focus – while keeping your peripheral vision active to catch those things that activate, fuel and will manifest your own visions and intentions. Keep your head down, your eyes focused on your own destiny, your actions aligned with your intention and more of what you want will come your way.

Appreciation and Gratitude For What Works and for “Your People”

Pause. Breathe. Look around. Who is there with you, supporting you, respecting you, valuing you, working with you in the movement toward your intentions? Deep gratitude to these people. They matter. And, notice how far you’ve come from time to time so you can begin to believe that more is possible, your vision is attainable and maybe more than you ever imagined.

Review Your Own Relationship with the Law of Attraction

Read a lot of stuff on the law of attraction. I have. Sort through what resonates for you. I like a lot of what Abraham-Hicks offers. And Napolean Hill‘s Think and Grow Rich is a classic. One of my favourites is Florence Scovell-Shinn. She wrote this little 100 page book: The Game of Life and How to Play It, which for a time, practically became a bible for me. I still use affirmations from her work and it was a simple one that made me feel like I finally actually understood prayer for maybe the first time in my life. “Following the path of love, all things are added; for God is love and God is supply.” Or you could substitute ‘Source’ or ‘creator’ or ‘Allah’ or whatever works for you for God. Because it is whatever works for you not what I think it should or shouldn’t be or even what works for me.

Limiting Beliefs

Examine your limiting beliefs (which I intend to be my next post). Focus on what matters. Do not suffer fools gladly (including yourself) and Go Get ‘Em!

Love at First Sight

June 21, 2015June 21, 201511 Comments

My dad, Hector Jourdain, and me during a toast at a mine celebration of my parents’ 50th Wedding Anniversary.

On January 11, 2008, the day of my parents’ 50th Wedding Anniversary, I turned to my father to ask him to tell me the truth. “I’ve received emails this week from two women who seem to think I might be their sister.” I was 46 years old and never suspected I might be adopted.

I already knew the answer before I posed the query. And I could see it in his face before I finished talking. There was, what seemed like, a long pause and finally he said to me, “Well, that’s another long story.”

A long story, yes. And it began with a very simple and clear declaration I might not have heard otherwise, “It was love at first sight!” he told me. Love at first sight. I always knew that my father and I had a special connection. And I always knew that he loved me/loves me as unconditionally as it is possible to love a child, although it hasn’t always been an easy path or relationship, but showing up most significantly, most unconditionally, in the times I have been most challenged – in job loss and divorces.

In the early moments following that conversation about what had been a family secret, dad was worried that my knowing would change our relationship. But, as I told him, we had a lot of history together so I didn’t see any reason it would change. And, I knew both my parents loved me and only wanted the best for me. The journey was undertaken in the spirit of openheartedness.

Dad is now 82 years old. Much to my surprise, not only did he outlive my mother, he became her personal care giver before she went into long term care with dementia – the same year as their 50th wedding anniversary. She died in 2012. Dad still lives home, alone, in the house they shared for many years.

Mom and dad in 2007 for his birthday with a 4 year old Shasta helping out.

He has had, over the years, a myriad of health issues that makes it a miracle he is still alive. He had his first open heart by-pass surgery when he was 45 years old. His second one about 30 years later and it took him almost 2 weeks to wake up from that surgery, partly because, in the end, it was emergency surgery and partly because he was exhausted from taking care of my mother. Then there was the time he became delirious with dehydration during the final week of radiation therapy for prostate cancer and it was the synchronicity of a call to him by my brother that resulted in contacting family friends who immediately took him to the ER, just short of having his organs shut down because of the dehydration. In the hospital so long, his legs weakened and he was in a wheelchair. Even his family physician thought he wouldn’t walk again. That was a few years ago now. Then, he was diagnosed with lung disease and told he would be on oxygen for the rest of his days. A few months later the oxygen was taken out of his home because he was doing fine. (And that’s just a snapshot of his health issues over the years.)

Quality workmanship – one of dad’s projects.

This past winter, a hard one here in Nova Scotia, he was out with his snowblower clearing his driveway. Over the last couple of years he renovated his upstairs bathroom to put in a shower. And he built a row boat in his basement. He still has marine engines in his garage that he works on from time to time and he has a long list of projects to tend to. He complains that it takes him longer to do anything, but he has time and he has motivation. And he’s taken a few road trips to Quebec – his home province – to visit with my cousin (who graciously hosts him in her home) in the last couple of years. These things – things to look forward to, to get out of bed for – they keep him not just alive, but living. And just recently, he bought his first tablet and got internet at his home (thanks to some persuasion from my cousin Jacqueline) and this Father’s Day I will try to help him sort it all out. Wish us luck.

In Rimouski, Quebec – dad, me, my cousins Julie and Jacqueline (who we stayed with) and Julie’s husband. 2013 Road Trip

I’m proud of my dad. I’ve learned, am learning, a lot from him. About quality workmanship. About independence. About sheer will power. About love. About just keeping on keeping on. And, I’m glad it was love at first sight or who knows where I would be today.

Dad, Shasta and Spencer, watching me cook. April 2015

Expanded Consciousness – It’s So Simple Really

June 13, 2015June 13, 20157 Comments

What are you waiting for?

From a very young age, I have always believed in the super-natural – things “attributed to some force beyond scientific understanding or the laws of nature” or beyond our own limited “understanding” as human beings – limits, by the way, we have placed on ourselves.

When I was growing up and even as a young adult, I used to think it was something only very special or very gifted people could access and I was in awe of them. Now I think of it as “expanded consciousness” and I know that every single one of us has the capacity and ability to access it. Not just in special places or special states of being, but anywhere and everywhere, when we choose to. But we doubt ourselves and our experiences. We invalidate our experiences, saying “it wasn’t real, it was my imagination, I’m making it up.” It is part of the stranger within that goes unacknowledged, un-embraced. For many of us, this was what we heard growing up. Our connection to expanded consciousness, to source, was “beaten” out of us and replaced with the kinds of messages we now hear in our own minds when we encounter our own expansiveness.

We learned how to fit in with our families, friends and institutions (school, church) – our Worldview influences. Yet, for some of us, there was a niggling sense that something was missing, not explained or not quite aligned. Questions you couldn’t ask, observations you couldn’t make, and the door to expanded consciousness slowly – or abruptly – slammed shut.

This niggling sense does not go away though. Maybe it is just easier at first to imagine that only really gifted people have access to expanded consciousness. That way we can live vicariously through someone else’s experience rather than venture into a place we have been told doesn’t exist, that we have learned to shut off for ourselves.

My first encounter with spirit guides was when someone else told me about one of mine. When I was told I could develop my own “intuitive” capacity, I couldn’t. I got nothing. No information. No connection. No visions. And I certainly didn’t trust any information that might have come, certain I was making it up – with that certainty shutting down access to information.

Slowly, slowly, over years, I began to learn to trust my own experience, my own “visions”. There were periods of awakening, periods of “practice” of being in touch with my own expanded consciousness – which meant periods of regular connection to non-physical entities like spirit guides (mine and others) and there were/are greater periods of non-practice equivalent to shutting down connection, access to information and flow.

Yet, it is so simple. It is a matter, for me, of shifting awareness, asking the question, opening to my heart and my knowing, inviting the experience and the connection. So very simple.

So I ask myself this question, “What am I waiting for?” I don’t know the answer at the moment but these days, I am living the question, “What AM I waiting for?” Living the question will reveal the myriad of – or the one – response, which is true for me. Are you also waiting? What are you waiting for?

My youngest son and I making drums in 2009 – part of the compelling journey.

Drumming and the Soul

February 11, 20159 Comments

In 2000, I experienced my first drumming circle. At the time, it was a brief, but profound experience and even then I couldn’t imagine how profound it was, would be, as it reverberated through the next decade of my journey and beyond. It was so profound that my book, Embracing the Stranger in Me: A Journey to Openheartedness, begins with a description of the drumming circle.

I did not deliberately seek out the depth of spiritual journey that showed up – at least not all the time – although the spiritual journey was persistent in seeking me out. At times it felt like I had no choice but to respond, to follow the nudges and to give in to what kept wanting to show up. This journey for me was an opening to gifts and talents I did not think possible for me or available to me. I had imagined only “special”, “deeply gifted” and “powerful” people would have access to these kinds of gifts. The realization over time is that we all have access, we all have gifts. Most of us just need to find our way through the persistent story telling that tells us otherwise, that tells us that these experiences are not real, that we are making them up. The mind does not know the difference between what we imagine and what is real – which is why visualization is so powerful.

In this audio clip from an interview I did with Terry Paul Choyce, she asks great questions about my soul journey and I share snippets of my experiences and understandings that have emerged through this part of my life journey.

My favourite picture from when my son and I made our own drums in 2009.

The Revelation of a Family Secret

February 7, 20155 Comments

In 2008, at the age of 46, I found out I had been adopted. Other than when I was a teenager and wished from time to time that I had been adopted (didn’t most of us have fantasies about that?), I had no idea. It was one of the most incomprehensible moments in my life and a glimpse into the stranger in me. In this 5 minute interview clip with Terry Paul Choyce, I share what it was like to have this family secret revealed to me.

Gratitudes to Spencer Dwyer who created the musical intro especially for the interview clips and who also edited the original interview to produce bite size chunks. Gratitude also to Terry Paul Choyce for the interview itself on her Interconnections radio show ast CKDU.

Taking Whole: Building Authenticity With the Johari Window

November 11, 201415 Comments

Good leaders are often recognized for their qualities of genuineness and authenticity.

Authenticity is the quality of being real or true. The public perception of an authentic person is the same or very close to the “real” person – who they are in private or with those close to them. In the language of our Worldview Intelligence work we call this “taking whole“.

People who are authentic are comfortable with who they are, what they discover about themselves, their worldview and what shaped it, and they have a willingness to continually grow who they are. They know a lot about themselves and they are comfortable expressing who they are to others. They are also able to embody chaordic leadership or chaordic confidence which is growing increasingly important in today’s complex times and when we seek engagement of multiple voices to address the questions and issues at hand.

The Johari Window is a framework that allows us to practice better understanding of self and thus provides a means for any individual to evolve their own authenticity. The Johari Window was developed by Joseph Luft and Harry Ingham and was first used in 1955. It is as effective today in developing a broader self understanding as it was then.

The dimensions of the Johari Window are representative of an individual’s whole personality or psyche. The dimensions are: what I know and what I don’t know, what others know and don’t know. They are illustrated in the following matrix:

What is known to us that we show other people is Open. These are aspects of ourselves that we are consciously aware of and willing to freely share with others, thus these aspects are also known to others.

The second aspect is what we know about ourselves that we keep Hidden from other people. There will probably always be things we do not disclose to other people. Disclosure in and of itself is not the issue. The question is why are you not disclosing and how much energy is contained in keeping these things hidden from other people?

It is impossible to be truly authentic if we fear other people knowing certain things about ourselves. We have all made decisions, choices or taken action in our lives that we regretted, are embarrassed about or just wish we hadn’t done. It is part of human nature, part of the growth process. Sometimes we don’t want other people to know because we are afraid they will think less of us – possibly because we think less of ourselves. It could be because we have identified ourselves with what we perceive to be a failure instead of recognizing that failure is an action from which we can receive feedback, as discussed in The Wisdom of Failure article.

Sometimes we keep things hidden because we feel like an imposter, or maybe we feel shame about something we did or something that happened to us. Other people tell us what a great job we are doing and yet we feel like we do not deserver the praise or accolades. We keep our fears and uncertainties to ourselves.

When we keep things hidden because of our fears, this takes energy. As long as it takes energy, it detracts from our ability to be truly authentic. If we don’t disclose things about ourselves, simply because they don’t seem relevant anymore, then this doesn’t have the same quality as those things we are afraid to disclose. It does not consume the same energy. In the right circumstances or for the right reasons, we may disclose these things about ourselves and feel perfectly comfortable doing so.

It is not whether things are hidden or not that is problematic, it is the amount of energy they consume in staying hidden and whether fear of disclosure is the motivator for keeping them hidden. Once I began to learn the story of my birth mother, after finding out later in life that I had been adopted, I understood fear was a big motivator in her life. She was afraid of being found out so she kept many of her stories hidden, not to see the light of day until after she died. She did not disclose her past, that she was married or that she had children and she lived every day in a new constructed life in fear of being found out. So much so, she never told her own adopted daughter when her birthday was. “Fear and worry are the interest paid on trouble that never comes. They shut the door on what more is possible – love, forgiveness, ease and the rewriting of stories of our lives that could instead be lived with grace and empowerment.” – Embracing the Stranger in Me: A Journey to Openheartedness, p 208

A third aspect is Blind. This is what we don’t see or know about ourselves, but others see. This includes what we imagine to be true of ourselves that others don’t see. For instance, we may imagine ourselves to be a great leader, but if you ask people around us, they may not see evidence of this.

The blind category may include things we genuinely don’t see about ourselves and there may be things we are somewhat aware of but don’t acknowledge or don’t want to see. Just before my first divorce, I was going through a very difficult time in my life and was very unhappy. I covered it up by being very busy. I didn’t know how unhappy I was, I was afraid to see it. Some of the people around me were aware of it, however they were unable to broach it with me because I was not ready to hear it. Later, when I was ready, I was shocked to hear how many people could see so clearly what I could not or would not see for myself.

Asking others for feedback is a sure way to shrink our blind aspect. We can do this informally by asking friends, family members or work colleagues we trust. We can do it formally in our work or learning environments through the use of feedback mechanisms like 360s.

The final aspect is Unknown. This is what we don’t know about ourselves and what others also don’t know about us. Because it is unknown, it is impossible to know exactly how big it is but we do tend to shrink it over time, especially if we are consciously on the path of growth and self awareness.

This information resides in our unconscious. Sometimes it is revealed to us by something that happens, sparked by events or situations, outcomes from choices. It could arrive with a new Aha! It could be uncovered through work we do on any of the other three aspects. By revealing a bit of ourselves to others, we open up a discussion that may provoke some other information to come to light. By taking in what other people are willing to share about what they see, we may also trigger some learnings in the unknown quadrant.

One other way to discover the unknown is through the mirror principle. The mirror principle is a tough concept for most of us to understand when we first hear it. It basically says that whenever we have a strong reaction to someone – positive or negative – it is because they are mirroring something back to us about us. We are like them in some way. This is fine for most people when the reflection is positive. It is much more challenging when we consider the reflection to be negative. The mirror principle gives us some of the most valuable information about ourselves if we are open to receiving it.

One area of my life that had been completely unknown to me and many around me for decades, is my gift to see spirit and work with energy, which I write about in Embracing the Stranger in Me: A Journey to Openheartedness. Although I have always believed in energy, spirit, reincarnation and the existence of other life forms, I always thought only very talented and gifted people could access that information, not everyday people like me. When I was first told of my gifts and even when I first experienced them I rejected the information as not being plausible. As I grew to accept and be more curious about these gifts it began to shrink the Unknown aspect of the Johari window and invited me into a deeper exploration of things I did not know about myself. As I began to speak and write about this aspect of who I am, it shrunk this window more and grew the Open window.

The four aspects of the Johari Window are fluid. They are not generally of the exact same size and shape. The more authentic you are, the larger the Open aspect and the more likely you are to continually find ways to expand it. Generally this is done through a process of disclosure and feedback, curiosity and learning. Not only do you become more authentic as you expand your Open aspect, you release energy that can then be used to your benefit and you create more peace and contentment for yourself. It is worth the risk to learn to be more open.

Shame: Releasing Its Hold

October 25, 201413 Comments

I have been reflecting on shame for a couple of months now, how it sneaks up on you, robs you of your vitality, robs you of your voice. How it feels almost impossible to reveal but liberating even just when you can begin to understand that it is at work.

Most of us, if not all of us, have experienced shame at some point in our lives. The work of shame is so powerful that it can shut you down, deplete you of your energy, make you want to hide. It works in partnership with the voice of your internal judge so the whole experience is amplified. Sometimes it feels as though there is an antennae on your head, sending out signals that you are a person who has failed, that here is someone who wasn’t smart enough to figure out something, someone who misjudged a situation, someone who totally bombed. It is particularly bad when the situation you misjudged, misinterpreted, misread, mismanaged is something you generally do quite well and may, in fact, earn your living by it.

This happened to me awhile ago now, in a public way with a client. That’s when I drafted this post and it has taken me this long to finish it and post it. It was the client’s end of the year employee appreciation day and dinner. They wanted to build on some of the past work and amazing speakers they have brought in. After a few conversations and meetings with the leadership team, that were full of promise, we decided to do something different for them – an appreciative inquiry to engage their large group in conversation with each other and in discovery of what they already do well to apply in other ways.

Aside from the wireless mic dropping on the floor and breaking open, it all seemed to be going well. People seemed engaged and in conversation with each other. We did a rapid fire harvest. I ended with a lovely poem and added in Rule 6a and 6b – don’t take yourself so fucking seriously, don’t take other people so fucking seriously. The CEO was speechless at the end but, in the moment, I didn’t understand why.

A bit later, someone else on the leadership team shared with me how severely the organization looks down on the use of profanity, even though it was meant in a lighthearted way, and I immediately felt bad. And not just bad. The voice of my internal judge was activated and it gave me a very hard time – I should have known better, this is what I do – hold space for other people, sense into the dynamics of a group – how could I possibly have so misjudged the client dynamic – a new client that had started off with such a high degree of possibility.

Although I apologized to the client instantly, I became aware I could not find it within myself to talk about what happened – to anyone, not even my closest friends, not even my partner who is incredibly supportive of me in work and life. That’s when I realized I was ashamed. Deeply ashamed. Shame shut me down and made me miserable – for days, weeks, even months. It was reinforced and amplified when I got the feedback from the group, forewarned it was a “mixed bag”. While that was true, it was easily the harshest feedback I have ever received from a group in all the years I have been in this work. So, it was doubly, triply hard because I really should have known better.

All the little and larger things in my awareness that have not gone right or have not flowed over the last months and maybe even years were activated and then compounded upon themselves. Until I finally, finally found the words to share my experience, my shame, my personal self-disappointment, first with my partner, who just listened, who supported me, who did not try to downplay my own responses (whether they were out of proportion or not), did not try to make it better or to dismiss it and did not judge me; and then with other friends who are also colleagues in my business field.

It still feels bad when I think of that moment, when I cannot understand how I so clearly misjudged the moment, but the shame of it is no longer defining me, shutting me down or playing itself out larger than life, compounded by building on any other unresolved incidences of shame that might exist in my history – known and unknown, aware and unaware. The most important thing is that it illuminated the power of shame to close me off and I know I am not alone – which is why I chose to write about shame.

I realize this shame is minor compared to the shame some other people assume or carry, unwarranted shame where they blame themselves for someone else’s actions like in cases of abuse, sexual assault, abandonment or other issues. Shame that keeps people in relationships that are not healthy, do not function well; shame that keeps people from reaching out for help because they are ashamed at finding themselves in the situation to begin with, because they blame themselves so completely they shut out sources of support. Shame that buries our stories until they become deep dark secrets instead of stories that naturally shape our lives and help us know who we are.

Brene Brown offers some powerful research on shame, its origins and its impact, sharing her own personal stories of shame and vulnerability, paving the way for so many others of us to share our own stories of shame and vulnerability so we can embrace all aspects of the stranger within, for each of us in our journey to openheartedness.

Who do you know who you might be willing to share a shame story with, or where might you seek professional support to do so, to release the hold of secrets and shame and shift the shape of how you show up in the world, to claim greater resiliency, your power and your path?

Exposing Self: A Risk in the Journey to Openheartedness

October 10, 201414 Comments

One of the beautiful things about having written and published Embracing the Stranger in Me: A Journey to Openheartedness, is the exchange I get to have with readers deep in their own journey. This post is a result of a question from a reader.

The Question

I have a whole other career inside of me that I have not exposed fully in this lifetime. Words of love and wisdom on how to get over the fear of revealing I am love? I have been abused, hurt, rejected, prejudged, all of the above…and through it all my intent is always how can I help…what can I do? I have found balance with my intent…now spirit is really telling me to move on and work though this fear.

The Response

The question you pose is a question of journey. It is the biggest question we hold as we begin to know we are on the path to allowing ourselves to be revealed. How do we give the best of ourselves without giving ourselves away, without opening the invitation to be judged, to be attacked? This is where the outer journey meets the inner journey. What is the work we need to do in and for ourselves, how do we host ourselves, in order to shine brightly in the world?

How do you learn to love yourself, not judge yourself? To be compassionate for yourself and your journey – not in a way that lets you off the hook for what you need to do but in a way that allows you to more fully explore all that needs to be explored?

Hold these questions for yourself from a place of curiosity, compassion and love. Notice the responses in you to these questions: where am I judging myself? Where I am hurting myself? What parts of me am I rejecting? What am I seeking from someone else that I have not yet found, or found in a lasting way?

What you encounter in the outer world often activates something in your inner world – your own voice of judgment or our own inner critic.

Your emotions are your guidance system. Learn to access and understand them to discover what the message is they are trying to transmit to you, how they are trying to guide you. Ask yourself: what am I experiencing in this moment? Where is it activated in my body? What is it trying to tell me/help me learn? What is it that is really bothering me? What am I really reacting to? Be in an inquiry to go deeper.

Here is some writing over on the Shape Shift Blog on what I’ve been learning that might also be helpful about your emotions as your guidance system.

And, take little risks at first, not big ones that feel like they are exposing you. You don’t need to jump in all at once – you can do it bit by bit. Start with people you feel safer with. Begin a dialog to get to deeper understanding. Seek wise counsel in the ways it wants to show up. Sometimes that might be through a friend, sometimes through a coach, sometimes through writing or experience that shows up in just the right moment. Nurture a reflective practice so you may be in some regular observance of your own experience.

You are love, not fear. Go quiet and listen to the whispers within. Fear is ego. It is wanting to keep you safe. You can acknowledge it, thank it and explore the ways of moving into your courage, strength and power that allows you to show more and more of who you truly are.

And, we never get it perfect. We are always in our learning. Love to you in this exploration and in your openhearted journey.