Day 166: Be Brutally Honest With Me - Part 1

"CONSUMED By The Idea of Yourself" - Charcoal and Chalk Pastel on Paper, 11x14inch, by Andrew Gable

Recently, a friend asked me to be ‘more honest’ with them than I’d ‘ever been before’ regarding my recollection of details of a past event that they were sorting through. I agreed to this and gave my friend all of the information that I could remember in relation to the event. I assumed that the truth would assist my friend to sort out, understand, and work on solutions for problems that emerged from the past event – this was not the case though. My friend, instead became depressed, would not talk with me the next day, became angry with me, and ultimately decided to end the friendship. I experienced shock for several days because it did not go the way I thought it would go because in mind, I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that honesty brings people closer together, that honesty is the best policy, and that good people are honest and speak the truth no matter what the consequences are because honest truth will save you … it will set you free. So, here again, I automatically act on the belief system that I have integrated into and as me. Someone asks for honesty, I answer them honestly. I do not question it – I just go right into it! And I do this again and again and again even though my being honest NEVER produces the positive result that I imagine.

SELF-FORGIVENESS

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to agree to be brutally honest with a friend when I was aware that their mental state was unstable as indicated by their emotional, pleading, and desperate tone of voice and expression with words that indicated depression on the phone. I believed that if I gave my friend what they were asking for – a brutally honest account of events and personal experiences – that this would assist them to stabilize. Instead of actually assisting and supporting my friend by asking questions, hearing them, allowing myself to fully understand the situation, directing the points to discussion and within this, getting them to a place where they are clear and stable, I automatically responded to a friend’s request without considering how the outcome of my brutal honesty would actually result.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to assume that the honest truth would assist a friend to sort out, understand, and work on solution or problems – in my mind I saw us looking at the information in a practical way, sorting through it together, getting to really understanding why this particular event occurred in the first place, and share perspectives on possible solutions. Because I was running the scenario quickly through my mind and seeing only how everything would work out and be a ‘bonding experience’, I did not consider the reality of a friend in that moment who required my attention, assistance, and support with hearing, understanding, and directing from a point of what’s best for the friend rather than what I show myself is going to work out for ME in my mind.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to experience shock because a situation that I had worked out in my mind according to my beliefs about honesty, does not actually work in physical reality. Instead of seeing what I do, seeing the consequences, writing out my beliefs that I participate in, and self-correcting myself, I go into my mind to try to figure out ‘what am I doing or did wrong’ and ‘why am I not good enough’ as this distracts me from me showing myself that my beliefs are not real at all - my beliefs are blown to pieces in one moment – and I do not want to face the fact that what I believe about honesty is a lie.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that honesty brings people closer together, that honesty is the best policy, that good people are honest, and that good people speak the truth no matter what the consequences are because the God’s Honest Truth will save you and set you free. Regardless of the fact that I see over and over and over again that honesty and being honest is/does none of these things, I believe it – I want to believe it. I want to believe it because I experience a positive feeling of hope for myself and my fellow human beings. I want to give honesty this power and authority because if I do and if it works out then we’re all okay! I mean, that’s the agreement right? If we’re honest then there won’t be so many consequences if any at all. WRONG. And if I had allowed myself to see, remember, and be aware instead of keeping myself in this belief bubble about honesty, I would have seen that these beliefs about honesty are some of the biggest lies I’ve told myself.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to automatically act on the belief system that I have connected to Honesty – I do not slow down and go through the steps of asking myself questions nor do I direct myself in the best way – nope, I just go for it! If someone outside of me asks me for honesty, I tell them as much detail as I can remember which is often broken up so I go backwards and forwards on the timeline of events – which, as I look at it here is more like messy mind purging and less like clear communication of events. So, I do this mind-purge in addition to not directing a discussion to investigating and practicality – and I’ve never allowed myself to look at my behavior and changed it, no, I expect the person whom I’m in communication with to ‘take it as it is’ and ‘deal with it’. And meanwhile, my body is buzzing, I’m shaking, my chest is tight and my solar-plexus is in knots with fears and reactions because I’m not taking responsibility for myself, not respecting myself, and not being honest with myself.

Day 152: Bernard is Dead. Now What?

Bernard Poolman died on Sunday, August 11, 2013. Like many others, I experienced shock and I asked, “How could this happen?” I had been considering for several weeks what would happen if he did die and I concluded that it simply would not happen. I reasoned that he was in good physical condition, that he took care of his body, and that the world needs him. In my mind, I imagined that he would be with us here until we were certain that each being had a life worth living and that until that time, he would not rest. I imagined that some day, when we get this done, that he would be free - free to rest and maybe even free from the pain that he lived with. This was the initial point that emerged when I heard of Bernard's death and it was shocking because this was not how imagined it going! This is not the way it was supposed to be! As a group, we were going to have our happy ending, damnit! No, no, no!

After this, I allowed myself to go into my thoughts and I got caught up in my dramas for several hours. My DIP buddy was here for support and the group was writing out their processes of remaining stable which assisted me in stabilizing myself. About mid-day today I made the decision to not participate in the random thoughts that were coming up and the self-pity, self-judgment, regret, blame, and emotional reactions stopped. None of my reactions changed anything anyway - I'm still here, I'm still breathing, Bernard is still dead, and our world still messed up. So, now what?

I realize that Bernard was a point of support. He has walked the process of self-forgiveness that we are now walking so he could see where we're at and give practical perspective on where we could direct ourselves more effectively. It's clear that we've been shown all of the tools to give ourselves this level of support and when and as we face a point that requires another's perspective, we have each other and the Desteni Forum.

Bernard was really good at showing us responsible decisions. He's shown us the same points time-and-time again and in as many ways as possible. It is all here and documented in the Creations Journey To Life blog and his v-logs. Now we must walk the points presented and realize them for ourselves.

I realize that any other defined relationships that I connected to Bernard are points that I must bring back to and give to myself.

With these realizations, the answer to 'now what?' is: I stand. And here I state my commitment to the Desteni group, being a part of bringing to reality a world that is best for all, and continuing with my process of self-awareness.

So, thanks for the support, direction, and down-to-earth explanations Bernard. And thanks for the wake-up call! It was really cool having you here with us.

Day 121: How Could You Do This To Me? -- Self-Forgiveness

Traumatic Event 1 - Part 2

Day 120: How Could You Do This To Me?
In this blog, I am walking Day 121: Self-Forgiveness



I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to continue to play-out the memory of myself within a shocking/traumatic event to incite thoughts of betrayal and being unloved to which I react with experiencing myself again-and-again as hurt, vulnerable, and angry.  Additionally, I use this memory to prove that others cannot be trusted and that, when I am experiencing a traumatic, shocking, and/or stressful event, the only person countable for support and assistance is myself.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to tell myself that I deserve to be hurt, betrayed, and unloved because of my bad behavior - because I have been bad, I tell myself that I have brought these things onto myself and that if I had been good that I would have earned better treatment.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to try and force others into my definition of what a loving person is.  Within this, I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to try and force myself into my definition of what a loving person is.  I have not seen, realized, nor understood the great amount of conflict that I have created for myself by forcing myself and trying to force others into being something that is not real and that none of us are.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to expect an apology from outside of myself instead of bringing this point back to myself and forgiving myself for the extensive amount of trauma that I make myself re-live over-and-over-and-over again.  Instead of facing my memories and releasing these memories with writing and forgiveness, I choose to cling to my memories as a reminder of why others deserve my spite, my anger, and my aggression as well as to remind myself why I deserve to receive spite, anger, and aggression.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear letting go of the memories of myself within traumatic events because I fear that I will forget and that I will 'set myself up' to get hurt again.  Within and as this fear of loss, I have not seen, realized, nor understood that I am manifesting these fear within my mind where I continue to hurt myself time-and-time-and-time-again - so, this fear is in-fact useless, has not protected me, and has not changed anything in my living at all.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to imagine that another outside of myself can provide safety, care, and trust.  Because of this image/belief that I created, I have been on the constant look-out for another that I can depend on to provide this for me.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to desire for another to keep me safe, cared for, and show that others outside of myself can be trusted.  Within and as this desire, I have made decisions that are not in the best interest of anyone - including myself - and I have created undesirable consequences.  I have not allowed myself to see, realize, nor understand that the safety, caring, and trust that I'm looking for outside of myself are actually the points that I must bring/give to myself.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to try and separate myself from my memories and because of this separation, attempting to ignore, and running-away-from, I have not allowed myself to change my ways of living to establish my well-being, self-care, self-trust, and self-love.

Day 120: How Could You Do This To Me?

Traumatic Event 1

How Could You Do This To Me?

In this memory, I reacted to this event with shock that the actual event happened and I felt betrayed, hurt, unloved, vulnerable, distrustful and angry that I was left to sort it out on my own. I have carried this memory within me as an 'Unforgivable Act' where every time I recall the instance, I experience that same betrayal, hurt, vulnerability, distrust, anger, and remind myself that love is a lie.

Within this, I questioned myself over and over again: Did I deserve this? Did I bring this onto myself?  If I had been better, would this have not happened?

The answer to these questions is that it was my fault and that I must have brought it on to myself because I was Not Good. At the moment, I did not see myself as an innocent but at the same time, I did not see that it was 'right'.  I mean, how can someone say that they love me and then direct an Unforgivable Act at me? And worse, that person showed nor expressed any kind of remorse.

So, here is where I recall my first conflict between wanting to be loved by someone and hating them at the same time and to make things worse, I expected and waited for an apology that never came.

Before this event, I had a belief that I was safe, that I was cared for, that I could trust others, and that there would always be someone to help me - and I had had experiences to prove this.  After this event, I told myself that I was not safe, that I was not cared for, that I could not trust others, and that the only person that could help me was myself - and I had an experience to prove it.

I also see that I have tried to separate myself from this memory as when I look back I am an observer that sees myself curled up, staying low, and trying to hide.  Within this, I see that I also created myself as The Victim as a means to get what I wanted which was to have another feel bad for me, to be sorry, and to never do it again - which does not happen from the source that I desired it from.