Who Are You Without Your Stories?

In this Lovestream recording we explore the stories we tell ourselves. We all live inside narratives about who we are, how life should unfold, what success looks like, and what love is supposed to feel like. These stories shape our identity and often our suffering. In this livestream, we explore what happens when we gently loosen our grip on the narratives we’ve inherited and rehearsed. Who are you beneath the roles, the expectations, the shame, the “shoulds”? This is not about erasing your past. It’s about discovering what remains when you stop defending a storyline and begin experiencing life directly. If the story dropped, what would be left? Presence. Aliveness. Freedom.

Transcript

Our topic today for this Dharma talk is Who are you without your story? Who would you be if the story about your life just fell away? Who would you be if you just met yourself in this moment, In this breath, Simply as you are? With this body, With this life, With this world, Just as it is. What could that look like? It's a profound question, My friends, Because more often than not, We don't do that. More often than not, We live our lives through our stories. The stories of who I believe myself to be. I believe myself to be a good mother. I believe myself to be a good partner, A good professional, Maybe a good friend or good sibling, Or maybe I believe myself to be a perfectionist. Maybe I believe I'm a controller. Maybe I have a story about what success should look like. Maybe I have a story about what my life should look like but doesn't. Maybe I have some stories about shame and how I hold shame in my life. These are all stories that we tell ourselves. They're narratives that are constructed by the mind, Like a really good Netflix special. Life according to me. I have a story that I rehearse and interpret different events in my life to create a narrative. This is what I believe about me, And this is what I believe myself, Who I believe myself to be, And this is how I believe life should be. These are all stories my friends. They're not reality. They're simply stories the mind tells. Some of them are important stories because they come as protective strategies. So we tell ourselves these stories because sometime in the past when we were young we needed this story to survive. But as we grow up, As we enter this journey of self discovery, We realize that, Oh wait a minute, Hold on, Maybe this story no longer serves me. Maybe I no longer need to see myself as the controller or the perfectionist or the good girl or the good boy or the one who was abandoned or the one who is lonely. Start to connect with what are your stories. What are the stories that you are telling yourself? All my words need to be brought as boomerangs, Boop, Throw the boomerang right back at yourself, Right back into yourself so that you can begin this conversation with yourself. Start to explore what are the stories that I tell myself about me. So the stories themselves, The stories that we tell ourselves about ourselves and about life and about other people, The stories themselves are not really a big problem. They were created from the ego mind. They were created from the part of ourselves that wanted to keep ourselves safe. So the story self is actually a protective strategy. But the issue comes in when these stories create suffering, When they create separation in relationships, When they create upset arguments and when they create suffering and dissatisfaction for our own selves. Then these stories are no longer serving us. So what we want to do is we want to identify what is a story I keep telling myself and then we want to see does it create suffering or happiness? Does it serve me or does it not serve me? If it serves me, Stick with it. Keep your stories that serve you. Keep the stories that support you. But if it doesn't serve you, If it creates suffering, To believe that you're alone, Always alone, To believe that you need to control, Grip life, Control people, Control circumstance, Control the world. If believing that creates angst, Anxiety, Upset for you, Then let's look at that and let's look at how we can drop it. So I mentioned that the ego creates the stories. So what's the ego? We talked so much about this ego sense of self. What is this ego? Who is this ego? The ego is that part of me that tries to create the sense of me. So it's my identities, My history, Everything that's happened to me, All the stories that I tell myself, That I have a mother wound, That I wasn't a good enough mother, That my mother didn't mother me great so that I became a not good mother, That I am a healer, That I hold shame for certain experiences, All the wounds, All the achievements, All of the successes, The image that I put forth into the world, All of these things are rooted in our ego self. And so this part of me, This part of my mind, This ego, Its main job is to protect me and to give me a sense of who I am. And that's why the most well-known spiritual question when we begin on this path of self-discovery and spirituality is, Who am I? Because we're looking to dissolve the ego. We're looking to see the ego for what it is and then realize that it's not real. It's an illusory sense of self. It's a mind construct. And this ego is built from the moment we start having language. When we're two years old, Three years old, We start learning I, Me, Mine, You separation. We're told you're a pretty girl, You're a smart boy, You're a smart girl, You're a funny boy. And we start formulating these identities for ourselves, Mostly based on the people who raise us, Our close community. And that's where we get this sense of self. And we define ourselves. I'm funny, I'm smart, I'm intelligent, I'm nice, I'm compassionate, I'm rude, I'm unlikable, I'm unlovable, I'm not enough. All of these stories are stories that the ego makes up. And the ego's number one job is to create some sort of safety so that we feel like we belong to whatever group, Whatever environment we're living in, Family, School, Religion, Society. And the ego also wants predictability. It wants to know that I am this person, I am this self, And you are other, And I can define the boundaries of this self. That's what the ego wants to know. So it keeps layering and layering and layering definitions of who I believe myself to be. Those, My friends, Are the stories I'm speaking of. Those are the narratives. So you might say, Well, Why does the ego create these stories? The ego creates these stories because it cannot tolerate uncertainty. It wants predictability. That's the opposite of uncertainty. So the ego creates these narratives in order to make sense of life, Of this complex existence, In order to make sense of the people who raise us, Our families, That we may not understand when we're children. The ego creates these stories in an attempt to feel a secure sense of belonging by maintaining an identity. Well, If I'm the smart one, I'm going to be needed by the clan, The family. The ego creates these narratives to justify certain behaviors, Justifying that I'm controlling by saying, Yes, But this person is not capable of doing things on their own, So I need to help them, Right, Under the guise of helping them, By controlling. These stories help us to avoid shame, Experiences where we've felt shame, And it's too painful to meet it. So when we have some raw experience, Something happens to us, Immediately the ego jumps in and tries to make sense of it. And by doing that, It creates an identity. And these identities become beliefs. So maybe I'm someone who believes that crappy things always happen to me. Why does it always happen to me? Because I'm just not worthy of having a good life. Maybe that's a belief you carry. These are core narratives that we develop in childhood and carry for decades, Until this moment, Until we meet a Dr. Tammy Sol Surgeon having a Dharma talk on Insight Timer, Challenging us in our narratives, Challenging us to ask the question, What is my story? What is one story that you're telling yourself about yourself, About your life, That creates pain for you? I'm not good enough, Not smart enough, I'm not lovable, I'll never have the love I need in the way I need it. I'm not successful enough. I can't let anyone see me fail, Right? The perfectionist. I know that one well. I'll be doing a love stream on perfectionist and inner critic as well. No one can see me fail. So there's this secrecy narrative that protects the image at all costs. This is one I lived with for many, Many years. I'm writing my memoir now, So much more to come, Lots more details in the memoir. But this is a narrative that I experienced personally. Nobody wants to give a scalpel to someone who is an emotional mess. So imagine, What do you do when you're a surgeon and you're going through stuff, Heavy stuff in your life, As I was about 20 years ago, And you have to maintain the identity, The facade, The smart one, The in control one, The capable one. Of course, Yes, I was very capable and offered amazing surgeries to a lot of people, But I had to live within this armored facade. I couldn't start telling my patients about how painful my divorce is, Or how my child's depression was just crushing me on the inside, Or how my best friend was dying from cancer and I was the only one supporting her. That wasn't the place. I had to maintain the facade, So the ego builds up these stories. I'm strong. I can do this. But all in all, It's a facade. It's not real, Because we're also human, And we also suffer, And we need to learn how to suffer well. That's one of the teachings from Thich Nhat Hanh. Zen master Thich Nhat Hanh said that once we know how to suffer well, We suffer a lot less, Because we know how to meet our suffering. I can do a love stream on that one also, How to suffer well. It's a skill. It's a tool that nobody teaches us. There is going to be pain in this life. Just because we're on a spiritual path, Those of you that are, Doesn't mean that pain and suffering and difficulties are not going to come. But knowing how to suffer, Knowing what to do with it, And how to meet it head-on, How to meet reality, Is a game-changer. It transforms our lives, Truly. So it's not that all of a sudden life is all unicorns and roses. I like to say life happens. How do I meet it? Life keeps happening, Whether you're on a spiritual path or not. But how do you show up? How do I show up to the mess, To the suffering? So yes, We'll plan a love stream on how to suffer well. But let's get back to our topic of our stories, And the stories we tell ourselves. So here's a structure that all of these ego-based stories have, Because you might be thinking to yourself, But I'm not sure, Is this a story that I'm telling, Or is it not a story? So here's a really easy way to know if you're telling yourself a story or not. If this is a narrative that you keep playing and replaying. First of all, Like every story, There's a central character. Guess who the central character is? Me! Yes! In every single one of these narratives, These stories, These false beliefs that we hold on to, The central character is always me. It's all about me. In addition, As part of the structure of these ego-based stories, There's always some threat. There's a threat to the sense of self. So there's maybe a threat of feeling rejected. Maybe there's a threat of failing. Maybe there's a threat of not being loved. Maybe there's a threat of loss, Right? So there's a central character, Moi. There's a threat of something that is scary and feels uncomfortable. And then there's a defense strategy that the ego brings in. That's when the stories come in. And the defense strategy might be tighter control. Well, If only I control this thing more, Then I'll be loved. Or, If only I'm just more precise and more perfect in my way of navigating, Then I'll be accepted. Or the defense strategy can be the opposite. It can be a dissociation and a withdrawal or an avoidance. You know what? If I just stop talking and I keep my emotions to myself, I'll be the quiet one. Another identity. I'm always the quiet one. I just don't share what's on my mind. So we have a central character, Moi. We have a threat of something being lost. And then there's a defense strategy that begins to formulate. And when we do those things, What we get as a conclusion is an identity. A conclusion about ourselves as an identity. I'm the perfect one. I'm the one who controls. I'm the one who avoids. I'm the shy one. I'm the quiet one. I'm the one who overachieves. I'm the one who needs to think and figure everything out. Right? So there's some conclusion about my identity, About who I am. And the ego doesn't just create these stories, These narratives, But it also really clings to them. Why does the ego cling to these narratives? The reason is that without these stories, Who am I? Who am I without my stories? It can be a scary place to be if I'm just this breath. So take an example. Let's say somebody criticizes you, Says something unpleasant, Not nice. Let's say at work. You were working and your boss criticized you. So the ego says, Oh gosh, I'm obviously incompetent. I'm just not competent. I'm not good enough at this thing. And then the defensive defenses start coming in. I need to work harder. I need to be flawless. I need to show up early. I need to hide my vulnerabilities. I need to hide how I'm really feeling and just really work harder. And this story about me being incompetent reinforces my identity about being incompetent and then has me diving into these beliefs that if only I work harder and I'm flawless and I hide all of my emotions and my vulnerabilities, Then, Only then, I'll be okay. So you can see how the stories, These narratives, Reinforce our identity and then our identity reinforces the ego. So it's an endless loop. And since the ego is so afraid of not knowing who this is, It prefers having painful identities that feels like it's keeping us safe rather than feel a groundlessness. Let me repeat that. Our ego sense of self, That part of us that holds on to all of our stories. I'm this. I'm that. I'm not this. I'm not that. I'm not smart enough. I'm not lovable enough. Nobody will ever understand me. All of those stories, The ego prefers holding on to those painful identities because it feels safer than the groundlessness of dropping those stories. So the ego believes I'm the successful one or I'm the abandoned one or I'm the strong one or I'm the one that's always rejected. Whatever your story is, What's your flavor, My friend? Dig in. Dig in. Scratch the surface. Let's go deep. What is your story that you tell yourself about yourself? The ego would rather be a familiar character inside of a painful story than be no character at all because it fears annihilation. If we drop the stories to the ego, This feels like annihilation. Wait a minute, But who am I? I know that I'm smart and I know that I'm a good mother and I know that I'm a healer, A soul surgeon and I know that I have perfectionistic tendencies and tendencies for control and I have this inner critic keeping me in check. I know all that to be true. What happens if I just drop all of that and I meet the uncertainty of not knowing who I am and I meet the vulnerability of not knowing who I am and I realize that there is no fixed me, No fixed self image here. I realize that I am just, As I like to say, A conglomeration of processes. I am just consciousness living in a body and life is living through me and I meet life through my senses, Hearing, Seeing, Smelling, Tasting, Touching and thinking. Thinking is one of our senses. So it's terrifying for the ego to drop the story but what happens when we do drop the story, When we practice catching ourselves on the stories and then dropping the stories, What happens is a space opens up and our sensory world, Our sensations, Replace the narrative. So we begin to sense life rather than live it through this limited ego sense of self, Through these limited belief systems and then we live in more presence rather than performance. I don't need to perform anymore. I don't need to convince you that I'm the smart one. It's okay. Whatever you believe is okay and I allow life to simply be as it is, Meeting reality rather than living from the stories in my mind. Okay my friends, Let's keep going with our topic just to kind of wrap it up. So up until now we understand that this ego sense of self this illusory construct tries to create an identity, Creates lots of stories and narratives about who I am which keeps us very small and constricted because if I know who I am there's not that much room for other stuff to come up, Right? If I know that I'm a perfectionist then there's no space for me to not be perfectionist, To mess up. If I know that I'm always the one who over achieves and does everything to the max then there's no space for me to be the opposite of that, To be the one that didn't complete that course or didn't get that diploma for whatever reason. So the stories keep us very very narrow, Very closed in but they are a form of survival. But here's the good news my friends, When we begin to identify our individual stories and they're going to be different for each one of us. Some of them might be the same but they're going to be walked through our individual life experience, Our stories. But the good news is when we discover these stories and we realize that they're simply trying to protect us and yet they're keeping us in this cage, This prison, We realize that we're not this character that we've been playing in this movie. And we realize through deep contemplation and meditation that we are the awareness, The consciousness, Pure awareness in which this character called me appears. When we realize this we realize that we already are safe and we don't need to defend anybody. There's no me here to defend. Awareness doesn't need stories. Awareness is whole and perfect. It's all-encompassing. So all of this grief and shame and powerlessness and uncertainty that the ego can feel dissolves in awareness. Awareness is who we truly are. I love this analogy that I heard from Rupert Spira, Beautiful spiritual teacher, And he says that awareness is like the screen on which the movie is being projected. So think about your life as a movie and the movie you're sitting in the movies eating popcorn watching the movie of your life being projected on a screen. So the movie is showing everything that happens in life. There's birth and death and there's love and hate and there's happiness and sadness and there's grief and suffering and joy and the full spectrum, The full catastrophe as I said of life experience. So imagine you're sitting there eating your popcorn watching the movie of your life. If you believe that you are the characters on the screen, If you believe that you're the one falling in love and then falling out of love and then getting hurt and then going back and then being friends with this person then you're no longer friends and then failing and then succeeding. If you believe you are that character oh my gosh you're on an emotional roller coaster. It's hard it's exhausting but when you realize that you are the screen on which the movie is being projected ask yourself is that screen ever changing? Let's say somebody is bleeding in the movie you're watching the movie and somebody's bleeding is the screen bleeding just because someone is bleeding in the movie of your life? No, The screen is unchanged. Let's say somebody has a heartbreak in the movie and they're crying and they're upset and they have a heartbreak. Is the screen heartbroken? No, The screen on which the movie is being projected is perfectly whole and complete. So this is one of the most perfect analogies I found to understand from a cognitive perspective and intellectual perspective until it becomes embodied and lands more deeply through meditative practice. A way to understand life experience, Life happening and this little me that life is happening to is the character in the movie but the screen which is pure awareness is unchanged by that. So you might ask me my friends well where is this awareness? I want to live as the screen I want to live as this pure and whole and complete sense of me. I don't want to live as that character in the movie that is going on an emotional rollercoaster crying and laughing and all over the place. And I have good news for you my friends. The awareness, The consciousness which is really unnameable but we give it a name just to be able to converse here and to share. This pure awareness is always here and you can tap into it with one breath as you leave the thought stream of the mind of this character that you're playing and you simply touch into the eternal now. Just this breath. Do it with me my friends. One breath meditation. I want to support you in this and touching into this pure awareness. We're gonna do another deep breath deep inhale. We're gonna do a long exhale and at the bottom of the exhale just before that next inhale I want you to stop. Just stop. Stop everything. Stop trying to understand. Stop trying to listen to my words. Stop trying to get it. Stop thinking. Just stop. Just be present in that little pause between the end of the exhale before the body breathes again. Let's do it together. Beautiful. Let's do one more. Now just notice how you're feeling in your body. Not in your thoughts. Not in your mind. Just notice how your body is feeling. In this moment just notice. It's up to you my friends. It's up to each and every one of us. This is your life. Your one wild and precious life. How are you going to live it? From this moment. From this moment on. For as many breaths as you have left. You know if you're let's assume average if we're fortunate enough average lifespan let's say is 80 years just to make it simple with the math as an average of course there's much longer etc and there's much shorter but if you're 30 years old and you're here listening to this then you have 50 more summers. If you're 40 years old you have 40 more summers to live. If you're 50 years old you have 30 more summers. If you're 60 years old you have 20 more summers to live. And if you're 70 years old you have 10 more summers. Not to say this is an absolute. I'm just focusing to help us see the preciousness of this human life. The preciousness. Let's not waste any more time. Let's find out what is our intention. In this moment because we're alive and as long as there's breath as long as we're alive we can come back to our intention and we can shift and change our intentions as well because my intentions now at 58 is not what my intentions were at 28 or 38 or even 48. But if I don't meet myself in these intentions life just moves by. So in order to loosen the grip on our stories we don't need to erase the past we don't need to bypass our traumas and our pain we simply need to pause the narrative return to the body feel the sensations that are here that moment without the commentary of the mind. So we simply notice what's the current stress that's going on here what's a story that I'm telling about it can I drop the interpretation and can I just stay with the sensations in the body we can do that as a guided meditation in a moment and usually the sensations and space begin to open up. Aliveness, Vulnerability and we get to see who we are without that story. When we drop the story what remains? What remains is pure awareness in which the stories are happening. What remains is presence. What remains is breath. What remains is bodily sensations and what remains is consciousness itself. This is how we live intimately with life intimately rather than narrating life we live in life as life as awareness and that is called freedom. Freedom from the prison of the mind. Awareness is freedom aliveness is freedom presence is freedom living knowing that there is no solid me no solid self is freedom. And this is a practice my friends simple not easy. So let me read our closing poem from Rumi the 13th century spiritual poet and the poem is called The Breeze at Dawn. The breeze at dawn has secrets to tell you don't go back to sleep. You must ask for what you really want don't go back to sleep. People are going back and forth across the door sill where the two worlds touch. The door is round and open don't go back to sleep. Let me share the merit that whatever benefit might have come to us today from listening from being present may it benefit not only ourselves but be of benefit to everyone we encounter and may it aid in the healing and transformation of our world Om Shanti Shanti Shanti. Peace in your heart. Peace in your mind. Peace in your body. Peace in our world. Thank you my friends. Thank you for your presence. Thank you for your loving hearts making this a love stream. Thank you for your donations. If you feel a generous heart you are invited to send green energy green love anytime. Thank you for being here. And thank you for being simply being. And remember my friends don't go back to sleep. Bye for now.