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.

Unconditional Love – A Daily Practice

May 9, 2015May 9, 201512 Comments

To give and not expect return, that is what lies at the heart of love. ~ Oscar Wilde

“To give and not expect return.” How many of us know how to love like that? How many of us have been loved like that? We are imperfect beings in an imperfect world. We may think we love unconditionally but anytime we are disappointed by the words or actions of one we love, we may not be loving as unconditionally as we like to think.

I have been reflecting on this because it is almost Mother’s Day and there are so many posts and images that speak of a mother’s unconditional love – as though all mother’s love unconditionally, all the time. If we are lucky, we experience moments of unconditional love from our parents, as parents, as partners in a relationship, with friends we hold dear. Rarely are we loved completely unconditionally all the time; rarely do we love unconditionally all the time.

We are born with unconditional love and complete trust. As babies, we learn very quickly what behaviours and actions get rewarded and what don’t. It is a matter of survival to adapt to the expectations and conditions of people around us.

“We know our soul qualities when we are very young, before we learn concepts of right and wrong, good and evil. We know our soul qualities before we build constructs around ourselves that we fool ourselves into believing are truth and essential to survival. We shape life to fit in and shape ourselves in trying to make other people happy.” Embracing the Stranger in Me: A Journey to Openheartedness (p. 13)

Loving unconditionally is a practice that starts with loving self unconditionally. The more you can be in a place of loving yourself unconditionally, the more you open up the portals to receive love unconditionally. Can you love another person fully, without judgment about who they are, what they say or how they act? Then you offer unconditional love.

I have been learning about unconditional love through recognizing the times I have been “loved” with conditions – conditions that often asked me to be someone I am not, to be there for another person at the expense of myself. These relationships showed me who I was not and where I was not loving or accepting myself.

I have been learning about unconditional love through my cats who also come into the world loving and trusting unconditionally. They remind me of the simplicity of life.

I have been learning about unconditional love through my children, the hopes and dreams I have for them to be successful in life. When we examine what that means, often we have an idea of what success means and looks like and it carries expectations or conditions we are not always aware that we are carrying. Letting go of the expectations and personal hopes for our children’s lives is an act of love. We also hold hopes and expectations for our parents and our siblings and how we want them to be in life and in relationship with us. Letting our expectations and our judgments go is an act of love that opens the way for unconditional love. And I say this in full awareness that there are some relationships that are so toxic there is no opportunity to heal them inside the relationship – just the opportunity to heal within yourself by loving and trusting yourself unconditionally.

And I have been learning about unconditional love through my relationship with my partner and our love for each other. It is as close to unconditional as any partnership can be, infused with mutual love, honour, integrity and respect. And it is a daily practice.

Unconditional love. We get there through awareness, intentionality and practice. Daily practice.

Untangling the Messiness of Transitions

May 2, 20157 Comments

My mother died on February 8, 2012. That night, as I drove from Lunenburg to Halifax by the light of the full moon, I felt her dancing spirit, free of the confines of a deteriorated physical body and I felt joyous and euphoric, recognizing the beauty and tragedy of transition all alive at the same time in the same moment. ~ Embracing the Stranger in Me: A Journey to Openheartedness

Last night I awoke to the light of another full moon and I had a flash of insight. Full moons signal times of completion. In my life and my family right now we have been experiencing a number of life transitions and I am celebrating the five year anniversary of a significant life transition. Some of the transitions are easily named and obvious, some lie in the more intangible spaces and are not so easily named.

In the last few weeks, having been at home for an extended period of time (for me), I have been experiencing a whole gamut of emotions and they are all tangled together in the messiness of transitions. Celebrating and reminiscing. Joy and grief. Delight and general malaise. Acknowledging life and loss.

In my family, we are celebrating graduations, new jobs, new cars, moves and the animated energy of new pets. We are also grieving the loss of a beloved pet a few months ago and I am grieving changes in my household as a result of one move while celebrating the next steps in my son’s life just as much as I am appreciating the alone time for reflection and my own rhythm of life’s patterns.

It is the five year anniversary of moving into my house, post divorce. Five years provides a significant marker for reflection on all that has transpired in that time – new growth, what was achieved, what was not achieved, the joy of finding my way, my voice, my life and the disappointments of not realizing all I dreamt possible in this time while feeling immense gratitude for the unexpected gifts that showed up, particularly my new partner with whom I am in an intentional, whole hearted, cross border, life and work journey. With new and inspiring visions for our work together.

In this moment, there is a transition working its way through me yet again. It is intangible, energetic, spiritual. It is another aspect of my soul journey manifesting itself in physical form. There are not adequate words to capture the essence of the moment and sometimes words are not what is needed. While this is going on I am struggling with my current body image as I reinstitute my fitness regime that has been sadly lacking over the last few months of interrupted patterns.

Mary Ritcey Jourdain, 1970s

And, I find myself missing my mother – unexpectedly and deeply. This might not be the “right” thing to say, but mostly I don’t miss her much. We are connected in spirit and in soul journey. She is in the next stage of her soul journey and I am cool with that. Partly sparked by family friends posting pictures from another moment in her life when she was young. Partly sparked by upcoming consulting work for a long term care facility – not the one my mother was in for four years, but sparking memory just the same. Partly sparked by mother/daughter Mother’s Day promotions and my mother’s birthday being in the month of May. You never know when these moments will hit.

All of these things (and maybe more) are tangled together in this moment of new and old transitions. I am grateful for the full range of emotional experiences because our emotions are our guidance system. The contrast of emotions helps us know we are alive, helps me know I am alive. Each moment is temporary. This too shall pass. The sight of the full moon last night reminded me about completions. I am ready to cross the threshold that is waiting now. To welcome what wants to flow while honouring all that has transpired in the multitude of transitions all alive in this moment.

Dementia and Death Illuminates Choice to Tell Stories Through Soul Journey Lens

April 12, 2015April 14, 20158 Comments

My mother with the beauty of youth.

My mother with her mother in 1990 (the year my first son was born)

We make meaning of our lives through the stories we tell. We can tell those stories through the lens of human tragedy or the lens of soul journey. I learned what this means through my mother’s journey with dementia and in long term care. I share a bit about that in this 2014 interview with Terry Choyce:

Compelling Journey: Responding to the Call of Life

February 21, 20159 Comments

Gold Lake, Colorado

Sometimes, things are so compelling we have no choice but to respond, for not responding is akin to crazy making. In 2009, I had my most convincing experience of acting on my intuitive knowing when I decided to go to Gold Lake, Colorado, ostensibly for an Art of Hosting training, hosted by beloved colleagues, but really to deepen into my journey to openheartedness in ways I couldn’t possibly have comprehended.

In this interview clip I connect the dots between several points in my journey, including a period of intense conflict that was also a time of healing, a compelling urge to travel to Gold Lake, Colorado for reasons beyond rational sense and a growing awareness of the power of storytelling to make sense of our lives.

The clip is about seven minutes. Enjoy.

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.

Observing the Passing of An Authentic Man – Rob van Soest

January 18, 20152 Comments

At 6’4″, with a direct, no nonsense approach, Rob van Soest did not suffer fools lightly. Which made him a surprising mix of intimidating, daunting, trustworthy and likeable. You knew where you stood with him. He was clear about his values and lived them. With an often gruff exterior, he was a a kind, caring and loving man who stood by what he knew were the right things to do and the people he cared about, especially his wife, Deb van Soest. The evening of January 15, 2015, he left a big hole in the hearts, minds and souls of so many as he transitioned back into spirit to continue his own soul journey, supporting, cherishing, loving from a different dimension. He was just 65 years old.

Rob van Soest, 1950-2015

I first met Rob in March 2008 when I went to his home in St. Paul, Alberta to meet his wife, Deb – my sister – in person for the first time since we were children. I was arriving as he was leaving – on his way to work on a post-retirement contract in Fort McMurray where he and Deb had each lived for about thirty years. They worked for the same company which is how they met and they retired together to spend time at their home in St. Paul, to travel together and to spend time with family and friends who mattered.

Since retiring, Rob was in demand for contract work. Employers trusted him, knew his sense of integrity and knew he would get the job done well. Rob enjoyed the contract work because he was beholden to no one, could speak his mind openly and clearly and take or leave the work depending on the circumstances. If he thought it would compromise his integrity, he would not commit to do the work. He and Deb had many and deep conversations about the path he and they wanted to walk.

He was, of course, curious about me and how it would be for Deb to meet me and be with me for a few days and discreet enough to give time and space to the new – renewed – discovery of relationship. By the way Deb talked about him and their relationship and some of their many stories of family over the years – between them they have ten kids – it was clear they had a solid, loving, respectful, mutual relationship.

When I met them, Rob and Deb were living on their property in St. Paul – remote, woods and fields where the dogs could run and they could go 4 wheeling or snow-mobiling by themselves or with visitors, like kids or grandkids, friends or like me and my son Shasta when we visited – which we did together twice. Rob had rules for the operation of 4 wheelers and snow mobiles, for fires, for guns. His rules were for safety. The kids and grandkids obeyed the rules. As long as they did, it was all great. If they broke the rules, there were consequences and not a single person doubted that would be the case. He commanded respect and received it because he gave it.

Roaming the property – with Shasta and me and their two dogs. First time Shasta went 4 wheeling was under Rob’s guidance.

Shasta and I first visited there in 2010. He was eight years old. With a three hour time difference, I was a bit concerned about him waking too early and waking the household – not wanting him – or me – to get on Rob’s bad side. I was surprised in the morning when I woke up and Shasta was being very, very quiet. I commented on how quiet he was being. That’s when he told me that if he wasn’t quiet, Rob had threatened to throw him in the beaver pond. I looked at him quizzically and said, “Rob wouldn’t do that.” What I didn’t realize was that Rob’s grandson who was also visiting at the time and was in his teens, corroborated Rob’s threat. He looked at Shasta in all seriousness and said, “That’s where my brothers are.” I could tell that Shasta was trying to reconcile in his eight year old brain his sense of Rob and Rob’s integrity with this threat and clearly Rob was not beyond pulling a good prank on someone.

On their deck – a regular occurrence – with one of their dogs – overlooks a beautiful back yard, the fire pit and the beaver pond.

I also remember standing on the deck with Rob, watching Shasta occupy himself by running from the fire pit down by the beaver pond up behind the house to get a piece of wood and run it back to the fire pit when Rob would just as easily have brought the wagon up behind a four wheeler to load it up and take it down. Rob and I both shrugged as we watched him do a little dance every time he headed back up.

I am grateful that Shasta and I (and my other two boys as well) have memories of this extraordinary man and I mourn the fact that I did not have more time to know and experience him and that my life partner and Rob did not have a chance to meet. They would have liked each other. And then I know there are others who had the privilege to know him and journey with him for much longer and who will miss him deeply.

Rob and Deb with two of the grandchildren – mutual adoration.

The quality of Rob and Deb’s relationship – of strong communication, openness, mutual support – is a quality I now experience with my own partner who I did not know at the time Deb and I first met. While the four of us won’t have the opportunity to meet, raise a glass together or spend time together, their relationship is an inspiration and an aspiration for me. Love them both. Might even raise a glass of good Alberta Whiskey in honour of a man who blazed a true path.

Rob and Deb – the joy of their relationship evident in this photo

Redefining “Til Death Do Us Part”

October 18, 201411 Comments

By now you have probably seen the photo (like the one here) of a very old couple with some version of the following question and response inscribed across it: “How did you manage to stay together for 65 years?” “We were born in a time when if something was broken we would fix it.”

There is so much implied in this statement. That all those couples that managed to stay together for all those years actually had good marriages, “fixing” whatever didn’t work. That for those of us who didn’t manage to “fix” our marriages that we never tried or that we didn’t try hard enough, left on a whim. It assumes there was something fixable or worth fixing. That we failed, maybe even that we were failures. I certainly know enough people, including me at one time, who took failure on as part of self-identity.

I don’t know many people who have left a marriage or other long standing relationship on a whim, without a great deal of reflection, pain or agony. Without understanding that an individual’s or couple’s decision has far reaching ramifications for their children, their parents, for other extended family, for friendships, for all the financial and asset unraveling, to legal procedures and more. It is not a simple thing to leave a marriage. Not the first time. Not even the second time for those of us who have been through it twice. (Can’t speak for more than twice but I’m sure others could.)

Every time I see that particular image, it gives me a quirky little pause. Lots of thoughts register. So much is implied, intentionally or not. Mostly I think about appliances and gadgets like televisions and radios that used to last “forever” and could be fixed that now seem to be designed for obsolescence, fixing them often costing more than replacing them. But marriages are not appliances. And the word “fix” always seems to need quotation marks as I think about it the context of relationship.

I find myself wondering, “Really? People ‘fixed’ broken marriages “back then”? All of those couples that made it to 30 years, 40 years, 50 years, longer?” I’m sure some of them did and I’m sure many of them didn’t actually “fix” their marriage but they found ways to stay in it – healthy or otherwise. How many of them lived in pain and hurt that was never addressed? Learned to co-exist because divorce would be a failure worse than death? Stayed together because of obligation or religion? Died inside and lived as hollowed out shells of former selves because it was the only way to stay?

Many of us have a keen sense and eye for the state of relationships. It is pretty easy to tell when couples are happy together, connected, loving each other, supporting each other, when they are working it out, appreciating each other or co-existing, living separate lives under the same roof, sleeping in separate rooms or when they are not happy, not working it out, hating each other, dying inside. The energetics and dynamics of physical interaction conveys loud and clear the state of the union, even to untrained eyes. Whether individuals speak about a significant other or not when they are in relationship also speaks volumes and what they say about their significant other is another indicator.

While one person can influence whether a relationship works or not or how it works, it really takes two people to want to be in the work of relationship together for healthy relationship to thrive. Healthy relationship needs healthy individuals. If one person or both have to “disappear” to keep the relationship together, is that “fixing” it? The dynamic give and take of relationship is hard work. Not all relationships are “fixable”.

Twice divorced, I’ve given a lot of thought to marriage and relationship. Had I known more in my first marriage, maybe it could have been “fixable”. By the time I allowed myself to see how bad it was, how unhappy it was, it was beyond repair. I thought my second marriage would be a dream and it was more challenging than I could have anticipated. And this one, this second marriage, I, and we, tried hard to “fix”. But for many reasons it was not fixable and the “cost” of staying together was rising as time went by.

We discovered we were each being invited into our own individual reflection and journey, which in the end did not bring us together but showed us the need to go our separate ways. We became aware that our relationship had come to a place of completion, that we had learned with each other some things we might not have learned otherwise. For me it was embracing the stranger in me – embracing all those elements of myself – the ones that wanted to make me small and the ones that wanted me to fly – to come to wholeness; to open my heart fully through strength and vulnerability and to find compassion for myself and for others in the journey; which is an ongoing daily practice.

With continued reflection and in conversation with friends also going through separation and divorce, I began to ponder the notion of vows and particularly the vow of “til death do us part”. I wondered about death taking forms other than physical death – like death of relationship, death of marriage, death of aspects of ourselves. And I wondered if the vow is not actually “until completion” instead of “until death”? Which then raised the possibility for me that completion might be something that happens in one lifetime – in minutes, over months or years or until physical death. And maybe it could also be something that crosses lifetimes – that some relationships and some patterns are not completed in one lifetime. Perhaps some of the things we are completing now are from previous lifetimes and some of the things we are in at the moment might not be completed until another life time – if you believe we have other life times. A long time ago a soul friend of mine offered to me one of the most heart wrenching but true things I had ever heard, “Kathy, some things are not meant to be completed in this life time.” And, it would seem, some things are.

I am not anti-marriage. I celebrate and see great hope in enduring couples that clearly have a healthy, loving, mutual relationship. And I am sad every time a relationship ends, even when it is clear that it needs to. And I bow to the journey of those who stay in marriages, able to make things work out with varying degrees of success and challenge; and to those who do make great sacrifice, if that is their path – who am I to judge?

These are the cycles of life, of relationship, of marriage. Would it have been that I could have been married for 30 years or 50 years, but not at the cost of dying a little every day, of losing myself, of never really living life to the fullest in the way my soul kept – keeps – calling me to. I followed the path that called me into difficult life choices because this was the path that called me to integration and calls me into living in the fullest authenticity I know how to live every day to varying degrees of success – in this moment and the next and the next.

You Are Not the Story Someone Else Wants to Tell About You

October 4, 2014August 25, 201518 Comments

Stories. They are how we make meaning of the world. What happens in your life shapes who you are. The stories you tell about your experiences, the interpretative lens you put on the experience, shapes you more. Sometimes it is hard enough to remember that you are not your stories. It gets even more complicated when other people tell stories about you, to you and maybe to others, well intentioned or not, that they want you to believe, that may or may not reflect your own experience of who you believe or know yourself to be.

And it is, if you take a moment to think about it, surprising how many people have a need to tell a story about you or about other people. (Oh, and you do it too, just in case you thought this is all about “other” people. If you are honest with yourself, you will acknowledge you also tell stories about who other people are that you want to believe or you want them to believe – good, bad or indifferent.) It is a dynamic process of being in relationship – from intimate relationship to “I don’t even know that person but I’ve read what they’ve written or I’ve heard about them”.

Case in point, how much do we project onto celebrities without really knowing anything about them other than what the media, paparazzi and twitter feed would have us believe? Or, rich people for that matter? Lots of judgment. Lots of projection. Lots of blame, as if other people having money or success somehow directly affects whether you do or not. It’s actually not about them. The sooner you stop focusing on what’s not in your sphere of influence and start refocusing on what is, the sooner you reclaim your power, your sense of self, abundance and flow in your life.

Part of the way you learn to distinguish the stories you are telling of yourself – or the stories you own or need to own as ours – is in relationship and interaction with others. Others provide a reflection back to you of where you are in your journey. But it can be difficult to distinguish when it is a reflection of your journey and when it is a projection of someone else’s view of you. And projections abound. The less sure you are of who you are the more likely you are to be influenced by the story someone else wants to tell about you.

When you are unsure of who you are, you are more likely to seek external validation, in fact, you are more likely to invite projection. This sometimes happens when you want to please others, meet their expectations of who they want you to be in relationship to them. Sometimes it happens when you do good work, are seen to be a good leader or get magnified to some super human status (to greater and lesser extents depending on how well known you are). Then you feel good, but it is fleeting. More often you disappoint others. Sometimes you argue with them about their view of you. Often you do not feel seen or supported. The irony is, in intimate relationship in particular, the opposite is also true – the other person also does not feel seen or heard.

It is always interesting when others disagree with you about you, insisting their view of you, their story of you is the right one and that you need to do something about it. (And, again, read that you also do this to others.) That may be true. The question is, what are you responding to? Someone else’s need for you to be different so you fit into their view of who they want you to be or your own need to walk a path of personal alignment or integrity which might invite you into your own journey of growth and change? You have a choice, although you are not always aware that you do, or even happy about it.

Messiness of entanglement. Is another person providing a reflection of who you are or a projection of who they think you should?

It can get really messy. Different people have different hopes and expectations of you in the midst of all their own struggles. Even one person’s expectations of you can shift and change, sometimes over a period of time and sometimes suddenly with no warning. Or not change at all, even though you do. It gets way more complicated when there are many people you are trying to please or appease. Either way, as long as you rely on others to validate your experience or your sense of who you are, you give away your power and the ground beneath your feet is really sand that sweeps away and upends you as the tide shifts – which it does continuously.

We all have people who wish we would live into and believe the story of us they carry in their own mind, their own interpretation of their experience of us, as they seek to understand their own identity in relation to us. When others need to believe a certain story of you it is likely that they themselves might not have a very good understanding of who they are. They might be giving their power away – even trying to give it to you and then, sometimes, blaming you for it. It is easier to look at others and assign blame to them for your business not growing, your abundance not flowing, your relationships not working, for you not being happy than it is to understand how you step into your own power.

It is alluring to want to believe other’s stories of you when they are stories of success. At the same time, if you do not see or own that success for yourself then you have dissonance within yourself that will rise to the surface in some way, often in self-sabotaging kinds of ways. It is more impossible when the story others want you to live into is how you disappointed them. But, you are not that story any more than you are the story of success that you do not own.

You can step into your own power and not take power from someone else. Are you willing to put your power on and own it instead of wondering when someone is going to come and take it away from you? Or wait forever for someone to give you permission for what is yours all along? You have a choice. You have many choices. You can choose to discover who you are in your own journey to openheartedness. You can choose to live into the stories of how you want to live. You can choose to be powerful in setting the course of your own life.