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How to Meditate: Meditation 101 for Beginners
10 Science-Backed Benefits of Meditation
What is Meditation?
How to Meditate: Meditation 101 for Beginners
10 Science-Backed Benefits of Meditation
What is Meditation?
Benefits of Mindfulness: Mindful Living Can Change Your Life
Mindfulness 101: A Beginner's Guide
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In this talk we discuss why there is a risk to being your true self in the world.
In today's episode, we are going to be
talking about the risk of being you.
More to come on that in a moment.
First, let's settle in with
the sound of the bells.
The risk of being you.
This is the title of Chapter Two
of my book, Stop Missing Your Life.
Part One of the book is titled
Why Presence Isn't Easy.
Within that part, there are two chapters.
Chapter One, Being Human Is Hard.
Chapter Two, The Risk of Being You.
Again, these aren't the most
positive uplifting sounding chapters,
but I wanted to start out from
the beginning, acknowledging all
the reasons why experiencing the
fullness of our lives isn't easy.
Right?
It's not so simple as reading a
nice article on mindfulness in
Time Magazine, or simply making
the intention to be present.
Being able to experience deep presence
and access the, the fullness of
our lives, the multitudes within
ourselves, the richness that comes
with being alive, that takes practice.
And it sometimes means
experiencing discomfort on the
way to where you want to go.
And that's why there is a risk to being
you, because we don't always know what
we're going to have to experience on the
journey of becoming more of ourselves
and also getting a lot of the things that
we want that are most meaningful to us.
The story I share at the beginning of
Chapter Two is about a woman who came on
my five day retreat in upstate New York.
And she wanted more than anything
to have more connection in her life,
but she also experienced a tremendous
amount of trauma in her life.
And in her words, she described
all of those traumas as creating
concrete slabs around her heart.
So here she was wanting deep
connection with other people, but
also feeling an inability to connect.
There was a lot of fear around that
connection because it was associated
with earlier in her life, periods where
she wanted that connection and was
supposed to get it from some of the
people that should have offered it the
most, specifically family, but didn't.
And so we learn over time how to protect
ourselves so we don't get hurt again.
And we might want love and connection
more than anything, but the last time
we reached out for that or tried to get
it, it came with rejection, pain, hurt.
So to defend ourselves, what do we do?
Maybe put concrete slabs around our
heart and it's a great defense mechanism.
On the one hand, it keeps us
safe, but as most of us have
experienced, it's not so easy.
We also no longer have access to the
things that we often are most looking for.
In this case, that connection with other
people, which requires a vulnerability,
an opening up, a willingness to be seen.
And although I can't go into the
full story of how this woman worked
through that on the retreat, mainly
because as most of you know, I have
some legal restrictions where I can't
talk about too much of the book.
What I can say is that that story is
about what was required for her to
soften those concrete slabs around
her heart and some of the initial
discomfort that she had to go through
in order for that softening to happen.
So, many of us have a sense of who we
want to become, or at least a general idea
of the person we're trying to grow into.
The things that we imagine in our life,
the quality of our relationships and
the quality of our relationship to
ourself, having full access to the range
of emotions that we can experience,
an openness and honesty with ourselves
and even embodying a, what we might
consider a quality of authenticity.
But a lot of that is hard because
we've had a lifetime of experiences
that have taught us what is safe
to experience and what is not safe.
And the quickest way to explore where
this conditioning impacts you and how
it has developed over time is to just
very clearly think about what are the
things you want, what are the things
you wish you could experience, have,
internally and in the external world.
And then when you think about
moving in that direction, what
sort of pain do you experience?
What comes up that feels like some
sort of wall to getting there?
Whether it's self doubt, literal
tension in the body, a sense of fear.
Whatever that discomfort is, is
the risk of being you that is
required to be felt to some extent
in order to move to the other side.
Now, of course, the book
goes much deeper into this.
And in fact, the whole book is about
developing the inner resources to be
able to hold the fullness of who you are.
But for now, what you can explore is
just where some of those walls might be.
Where does it feel like
a risk to being you?
And bring some awareness to that so that
it's not trapped in your subconscious.
That's the first step here.
So, thanks for staying with me on this.
I know sometimes these
topics can be uncomfortable.
So if you feel some activation in
your body and your mind just know
that that's normal, it's a very
natural part of the process of growth.
And we get activated for different
reasons, but it most often means that some
energy is stirring and that's usually a
good thing, or at least it excites me.
So thanks for your presence.
Take care.
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