Chapter 24 Knowing Ourselves Every time that we face our fears,
We move one step closer to ourselves.
As we bravely confront and act upon our inner truths,
We prove to ourselves that our voice matters and that we can trust ourselves.
It is in this trusting that our true confidence emerges.
It is infinitely more empowering to boldly acknowledge our fears and weaknesses than to pretend they don't exist.
When we choose reality,
Such as the reality of our fear,
We can start learning from and integrating all of our emotions and emerge as stronger,
More whole individuals.
We often think that we need to achieve some external success before we can be happy or fulfilled,
But the truth is that no accomplishment can compare to the power and peace that we can reclaim by accepting all of our emotions.
As we start investigating our inner world,
We'll begin to notice that when we focus solely on outer pursuits,
Our egos tend to inflate and deflate as our successes come and go.
When life is good and things are going our way,
We typically feel happy and free.
When things aren't working out,
However,
Our spirits tend to sag and our confidence deflates.
Rather than taking the time to acknowledge our uncomfortable emotions and the wisdom they contain,
However,
We tend to keep striving to reach the goals we've laid out for ourselves.
And while there's nothing wrong,
Of course,
With setting goals and working to attain them,
We often overlook the lessons that life and our setbacks are trying to teach us,
Lessons that might help us even more clearly recognize our true path and purpose.
We often lose sight of our own humanness in an attempt to be more than human.
Weakness,
Anger,
And fear,
And the insights they can provide,
Are profoundly undervalued in our society and the world at large.
We're so prone to want to run from or cover up our scary emotions when we suffer a loss or disappointment in our lives.
If we look closely,
However,
It's often our greatest gift to meet with failure or be exposed in some painful way.
To have to truly face our own vulnerability and embrace our fears is an opportunity to discover the most important type of knowledge we might ever hope to attain,
Self-knowledge.
And we are all given the opportunity to learn from life and to grow within ourselves in these ways.
No one can hide this or take it from us.
The strength,
Wisdom,
And self-love that this type of self-inquiry can generate can't be bought in any store or received from anyone else.
The only place that we can find it is within ourselves.
As we continue exploring our inner world and digesting our own illusions,
A clarity will emerge from within and we'll be drawn closer and closer to our true path.
We will lose sight of the distractions of our past and will begin to see our previous accomplishments perhaps more as preparations for this inner journey than as victories unto themselves.
We will also automatically learn to embrace change,
To depend on it as we do our breath.
Change will become the gasoline for the truth-seeking vehicle that we are.
We will also find,
Perhaps,
That unless we continue to walk through the valleys and seemingly endless mountain peaks of our inner fears and desires,
We will hear our soul cry.
For once tasted,
Freedom becomes a goal unto itself,
A mission for life,
And a reason to live.
As we keep progressing on our inner path,
We may also begin to realize how foolish we've been,
How egotistical and afraid and unable to acknowledge it.
As we continue accepting and integrating all of our emotions,
However,
We'll start to remove our disguises and emerge as unique individuals who are less affected by society's influences.
Yet,
We may conversely also feel more a part of our world than ever and see more clearly how we can help heal it.
We will also begin to more clearly realize,
In ways that we can never hope to fully explain or understand,
How all of our experiences and interactions are perfectly designed opportunities to help us grow in awareness.
We will also start to more deeply appreciate the majesty of our existence and the beauty of our world,
And we will more clearly understand our purpose in life and in the lives of others.
We will also start to finally realize that we are enough and will recognize all of the trappings of society that we have long used to hide from ourselves as simply vain attempts to control something that is in fact controlling us,
Life.
Many of us have seemingly forgotten how to be at peace with ourselves and others,
And unless we choose to turn our hungry minds inward,
We'll remain in an uncomfortable state of longing for the acceptance and love that ultimately only we can provide ourselves.
We have to begin embracing all of our emotions and start finding the courage to listen to our hearts so that we can effect change in truthful directions.
This is our moral responsibility to ourselves and our world.
This is change not for change's sake,
But for the need to breathe clean air into our polluted bodies and minds.
This is a quest for the truth so that we might once again be free of the need to please and the need to hate.
This is about living a life fulfilled because we have chosen to be lived by life.
This is about not controlling life,
But learning to let it guide us and teach us,
To help us,
Not hurt us.
Only we can hurt ourselves by remaining in resistance and discomfort.
Only we can unconsciously stay in reaction mode,
Letting life and other people push us and pull us like puppets on strings.
By not letting ourselves feel our fears and accept our weaknesses,
We become like rigid oil platforms,
Unable to withstand the torrential storms of life.
Desperately grasping for crude forms of pleasure,
We fail to see the real source of richness that lies deep within us.
We seem to think that pretending we're not scared will keep us strong.
We forget,
However,
That acknowledging our inner storms is what enables us to let more sunshine into our lives.
When we can admit that we're fearful at times,
We can begin to find our true strength.
If we're unwilling to do this,
However,
And continue to stand on yielding against the inevitable inner storms of life,
We will miss out on the lessons they're trying to provide us and continually get a little more blown off course,
Slowly being swept ever deeper into a world of false dreams and imagined satisfaction.
And as a result,
We can forget where we came from and lose sight of our inner compass that can get us safely back home.
Yet even as we do begin acknowledging the reality of our emotions and start making our way back home to a place of greater inner peace,
Fulfillment,
And connection with ourselves,
It's important to remember that this return journey will not always be easy.
Yes,
It will get easier eventually,
But for a long time you may feel more confused and alone than ever,
No longer safe in the mirage of your dreams,
Slowly awakening to the reality of your inner world.
You may suddenly begin to wish that you'd never taken that first look inside,
That you'd never prayed to God to show you the truth,
That you'd never read this book.
But please trust that by acknowledging and bringing attention to your inner pain,
Your wounds will eventually heal.
Yet,
Just as a child would rather go play outside with their friends than admit they were sick,
We have to be aware of our mind's desire to lead us once again off of our true course and back to the land of imagined fulfillment outside of us.
We need to remain strong and have faith that our wounds will heal,
And to heal them,
We must give constant and daily attention to them,
Soothing them with our love,
Patience,
And acceptance.
It's important to understand that this inner journey is one which never truly ends,
Although it does become easier the more that we continue on it.
And as we begin this journey back into ourselves,
We'll discover that the path to freedom is lit with candles of truth and flames of exuberance from within.
This process of self-realization takes a while to get the hang of,
But once we become adept at experiencing an outside event and then looking inward to determine what we're feeling and why we're feeling it,
We'll become proficient at responding to life and all of its lessons with greater wisdom,
Acceptance,
And patience.
As we continue to search for our personal truths and embrace our deepest fears and desires,
We'll move toward greater inner peace and clarity.
As we begin living with greater self-awareness,
Our lives will be filled with a deeper sense of purpose and accomplishment.
We'll start to experience more gratitude,
And we'll focus less on what we don't have and more on what we do.
We'll also begin to understand why this inner journey is the most important and difficult undertaking that any human being can attempt.
Whenever we try to cover up our uncomfortable emotions by acting overly positive,
We are,
On some level,
Ignoring reality and losing an opportunity to connect more deeply with ourselves and with life.
This disconnect will continue until we can begin accepting all of our experiences and those very things that can make us more whole are weakness,
Fear,
And pain.
It's much more foolhardy to say,
I'm okay when we actually aren't,
Than it is to look within and admit that we're hurting in ways that we perhaps do not want to acknowledge.
When we choose the reality of a situation over how we would prefer it to be,
We take bold steps toward embracing life on its own terms.
As we start to accept our experience in any moment,
Be it something we would have previously labeled good or something we would have labeled bad,
We can begin to more fully accept ourselves as well.
Often,
We are led into areas of personal weakness so that we can ultimately emerge more whole with a greater degree of acceptance and trust of ourselves and life.
We are presented with challenges so that we can face them with our inner light of truth and emerge stronger,
Wiser,
And more at peace.
If life were easy,
We would be so small.
It is the mountains that we must climb that strengthen us.
It is looking within ourselves and following our inner compass that teaches us to trust ourselves and our instincts.
And to trust that God is always with us,
Always watching and encouraging us on in our struggle to be whole,
In our struggle for self-acceptance,
Peace,
And empowerment.
And yet why is God doing this?
Why is she doing everything at all times to keep us on an ever-broadening path of truth and awareness?
Why is she helping us?
As we begin exploring our inner world,
We will begin to realize that God is providing us with all of our experiences so that we can accept and learn from them and heal ourselves and grow in self-awareness and wisdom,
So that we can become ever more insightful,
Compassionate,
And empowered individuals with a clearer sense of who we truly are and how we might express our unique gifts to the world.
Once we begin investigating our inner world and trusting our inner voice,
We can start following it and allow our inner compass to lead us in directions that feel more heartfelt.
If we're not able to access our inner compass,
However,
We might find ourselves off track,
Following footsteps that are not necessarily ours to follow.
For example,
Let's say your dad,
Your grandpa,
And your great-grandpa were all lawyers,
And since you were knee-high,
You've been subtly,
Or maybe not so subtly,
Urged to follow in their paths.
If you didn't know any better,
I.
E.
If you didn't know yourself,
You might just follow their lead and go on to become a lawyer without ever questioning the validity of your decision.
Or maybe you would do anything else just to spite them and show them that you weren't going to be like them.
What it really comes down to,
Though,
Is that the only way to know whether you are truly a lawyer at heart is to know your own heart.
You see,
The whole purpose of this know-yourself thing is for you to know yourself.
It is kind of like this.
If a horse thought it was a cow because its uncle,
Dad,
And brothers thought that they were cows,
Old MacDonald would have a pretty mixed-up farm,
Wouldn't he?
Well,
God is sort of like Old MacDonald,
And she wants her farm in order.
She wants her horses neighing,
Her ducks quacking,
And her cows mooing.
And she wants her singers singing,
Her writers writing,
Her painters painting,
And her healers healing.
And the only way that she is ever going to get that is if we all figure out our parts.
When we see someone that flows at what they do,
That is a natural,
We are all in awe of their talents.
Well,
The truth is that we are all naturals,
But perhaps we aren't exactly sure at what.
We all have the potential to share our personal gifts with the world,
But perhaps we aren't even quite sure what they are.
And yet,
We wonder how we end up in jobs that leave us bored and uninspired,
And we begin to hate our life and all of its drudgery.
The spark is gone,
And we're out of gas,
And we're only in our 40s,
Or maybe even our 20s.
How did I get so sidetracked,
We wonder?
Why do I feel so hopelessly lost?
Well,
Perhaps we might consider that we've never even truly had our eyes open.
Perhaps we've mistaken our achievements and our acquisitions for who we thought we really were and are just now beginning to realize that we're a whole lot more.
Perhaps we're ready to wake up to our inner reality and to our potential as unique individuals.
Perhaps we're ready to stop dreaming and to start living,
To let life guide us back to ourselves and a more authentic and fulfilling life,
In this and every moment.
