Don’t Wait for Permission
(2 of 3)
In Speaking of Change, we discussed fears and contemplated reasons we may make to stay stagnant in our lives rather than move forward.
I hope that this note may help confront one of the many, but powerful reasons not to embrace our inner changes – feeling as if we need permission to do the task, take the job, move out of state, lose the weight, start a new business, earn another degree, or live the life we desire.
Ask yourself these questions.
Am I my own entity? Do I depend on another’s lungs to help me breathe? Am I capable of thinking for myself?
Surely, as a living, breathing person, you desire to do things that not everyone else around you wants to do. Say this to yourself: “I am unique.” Embrace your autonomy. You’re the master of you.
To require another’s permission to eat, breathe, sleep, laugh, relax, or play is silly. How you do things is strictly up to you. Take this notion into other areas of your life. As simply as it is to be yourself, it is just as simple to make changes in your habits, or create changes in your life. Of course, if you desire any major change, such as breaking poor habits, consult a step by step program that is well designed and has a proven success rate. My aim is to inspire you to muster up your inner spirit to move forward with positive changes without feeling like you need approval from anyone. You don’t. Those fires that wake you up at night are your own inspirations. Listen to them. Do you ache for a better quality of life? You have what it takes within you.
Let me note a strange phenomenon that sometimes occurs in the psyche. After we grow up, into adulthood, we forget that we are adults, equipped to decide what is best for ourselves. That’s left for those major decision makers, we say. Nonsense. We are no longer children. Who else but you knows the best path? As long as we remain aware of our true selves and our surroundings, we can make the best decisions. What do I mean by our true selves? Remember, my suggestion is that our true self is the one that wakes us up in the middle of the night. It’s the voice that you attempt to muffle because you know it speaks the truth about your circumstances. It’s the voice that would have you do something you’d rather not listen to because it would invoke change. It’s clear. We’re lazy. But we can do what are deepest desires require. Change.
Resist the urge to wait for anyone’s permission for us to live the lives we ought to be living.
Samuel Beckett’s ‘Waiting for Godot’ 1953 is a classic, absurdist, two-scene play, now on Broadway depicting two men under the impression to wait in one place for a man named Godot who never arrives. Does your life feel like this? Do you wait in one place, one circumstance, for something to happen? Read the script:
Dear one, you’re the one who is to make your life happen.
Ah, so you think you have all kinds of time, do you? You haven’t read the play.
Read the last in this series:
No, You Don’t Have Time
Joy,
Cheryl
Speaking of Change
(1 of 3) Speaking of change. . .
This post will come as three parts:
Speaking of Change,
Don’t Wait for Permission, and
No. You Don’t Have Time.
I’ve delayed in writing this particular posting as I have been deep in the midst of my own change. Typically, I like to throw myself into changes just to see how they work out. Get Your Wisdom On blog is one of the fairly recent changes to my scope of work. Writing this particular post hasn’t come as easily as I hoped, so I took some time to contemplate the reasons it’s taken more mustering than usual.
If you have ever embarked on a part of your journey that you’ve no comparison, it might seem that the path is difficult to navigate. I speak of a change that’s so foreign, you wonder why you should even attempt it. Ha, I suppose that’s the beauty of the new thing. Many of us have moved out of a neighborhood or stepped away from a job that had become what seems like part us. If done often enough, that type of move can become banal and not worth the time spent thinking about it; we just do it. I don’t mean to demean this type of move, though. Changes like these can be complicated, as you take into consideration many aspects. You may ask yourself if your decision is the best one or not.
*Let me say:
The best decision is the one that is good for you right now.
You’ll know soon enough for sure; then you may make additional changes to make it fit your life.
Let’s get back to the choice you may make that will change everything you know and embark on an epic journey, the one you have never had an inkling of experience. We will never know our futures, nor will we ever be secure in our choice to make the plunge. What I mean is simply that the future isn’t certain. The road we’re on feels comfortable to us only because it’s familiar. Familiarity isn’t safe. If it’s a job change, we think because it pays a certain salary each week, it’ll be waiting for us forever. I’m going to play havoc with that belief system. Many people over the years have thought that job security exists. It doesn’t. Companies change. Those who run companies change their minds about how that company is run. You’re most often the chess piece used for the sport of making that company money. Yes, I know you’re loyal and you feel they’ll be as well. One can never really tell. My suggestion is to follow your dream.
If you plan to do anything in your life, realize that change is inevitable. And it is neither good or not good. It’s change.
What helps is to understand change and the fears that come with it. One of the keys is to embrace change no matter what.
Before you learned to drive a car, snow board, earn a degree, or anything new, you didn’t know how it would change you. Your choice enabled you to feel freedom, pleasure, or accomplished. Good things came from your change, but you didn’t know that at the time. You struggled through the beginnings of it. You might even had fears such as running off the road, falling over a snowy cliff, or failing miserably. But as you worked further, you found that you gained confidence. A lack of confidence keeps us from something we wish to attain through change. Exploring your fears helps to identify what holds you back from entering the door before you.
Do you think you’ll lose friends if you change? Do you think you’ll miss out on something else if you change? If you become successful at the new thing, who do you think you’ll hurt?
Think about this: change happens all around us each day. Most of these we accept without much thought. Technological changes are the norm. We expect the latest gadget to become obsolete within the next few months. Other changes are not so commonplace. In the US, the health care system is changing. In this instance, some of us will embrace it while others will resist.
What about changes we decide for our own lives?
Do we or should we resist our own desires if we feel the slightest fear of the unknown? Surely we’ve gone through other changes; and today we look back at what now seems trivial. We say, “Of course it can be done. I did it.”
How about how others will see us as we change? Do we often feel like we should ask for permission?
Read my next post entitled. Don’t Wait for Permission.
Spanish Pointe
Acceptance
A few years ago, I learned a valuable virtue from my dog.
Yes, I’ve heard of all the wonderful praises dogs receive from their owners, etc. We can learn patience from them simply because they’re patient with us. Dogs don’t criticize, nor do they judge us. Probably the best quality they have is the ability to love us just the way we are, despite how we see ourselves. Many jokes are shared across the Internet describing this very sentiment:
Don’t you wish you were as great as your dog thinks you are? – Honestly, you are probably pretty great, but you may not accept yourself for who you are. Self-help books aim to help us accept the way we look or behave so we can improve. They may also help to accept the reality of certain situations, especially those which are negative or undesirable. In the process of doing so we find a healthier outlook and hopefully happiness rather than trying to resist or change things.
The common definition for acceptance would be to receive that which has been given to us.
We can look at it as accepting a gift from another: a common event, yes. And very simple. But if poor vision, the loss of a loved one, giftedness, or riches prevail in your life, you must accept that reality, good or not good. And, of course, pleasant things are the easiest to accept.
To be truly accepting is to accept another’s personality traits as you would your own.
With all the different temperaments people possess, it’s often difficult to get along with those we find abrasive.
This is precisely where my metaphor comes in handy to help us realize people have their own bents and habits just like we do.
One day while playing catch with my dog, she stopped to do what dogs sometimes do. She had been running around off the leash somewhere in the acres of land in the back property. Usually she picked up on the scent of something dead and rolled in it, probably so she’d go undetected while she hunted unsuspecting prey. Other times she’d eat the dead, partially eaten animals left in the field by coyotes. At least three times that I can remember, she was skunked because she just couldn’t leave those fluffy waddling skunks alone. She also would run through the house with muddy paws if I wasn’t fast enough to catch her first.
This particular day, to my dismay, she began to cough and throw up some slimy, disgusting particles she obviously could not digest. The worst part is when she proceeds to lick it back up.
If I weren’t there to stop her, she would do just as she pleased like any other time I wasn’t present. Who am I to change her nature?
Now, while this is graphic to an extent, it’s important to understand my metaphor for what it is. I’m not saying people are this disgusting in their behaviors. Not at all. But the next time your spouse doesn’t put the seat down, forgets to put the toothpaste cap back on, or something else despite how often a request has been made, think of this:
I was so grossed out by my dog’s behavior, I caught myself telling her to stop doing what she does. Basically, I yelled at her for being a dog.
What? Yes. I did. Ha ha. Like that would stop her. She was a dog after all.
You see, I cannot stop her for being what she is as much as you can’t stop people for being who they are by nature. Acceptance is a virtue because it allows us to see people as they are and receive any oddities they possess as favorable and thus approve of those oddities. Just because others do things we would not do, doesn’t mean we need to change them. The only person you can change is you. Practice approving others. You may find a core trait that at first seemed odd, but in fact is the trait that makes that person unique.
As far as my pooch goes, now that she’s gone, among other awesome things I miss about her, I also miss the muddy paw prints she’d leave on the carpeting: a sign of life and vibrance.
Joy,
Cheryl
Bird Key
Serenity of Palms
The Calm Within
Last time, I mentioned the unexamined life and looking within ourselves to find what we can eliminate or add in order to live optimally. After all, philosophy aims to answer the question, “how shall we live?”
Years ago, when I began to look within myself, I found much chatter going on in my head. My condition, one that most people suffer, is often called “the monkey mind”. It can be scattered and aimless despite its complexity. Some writers use the monkey mind for stream of conscious writing. It allows the chatter to become physical on paper. This type of writing is useful for brain-storming ideas. It’s also a tool that writers call freewriting, coined by Peter Elbow, which allows us to extract the brain without judgement in order to discover the gold nuggets our brains produce, especially when writer’s block occurs. The act of freewriting does have a side benefit. It can aid us to become less scattered and fragmented. Like journaling, once the thought is on paper, the less disrupting that thought is. It loses power. Thus, we can see that the mind would rather not be as unfocused as we allow.
Some of us use meditation to calm the brain down. Repeating Mantras or paying attention to our breath helps us to clear the mind of the chatter. Mastering our own minds becomes a sought out achievement. One way to look at is to try Eckhart Tolle’s suggestion and wait as if you’re a cat focusing on a mouse hole. You’d never know when that mouse is coming, but staring intently, waiting, waiting for the next thought. Try it by closing your eyes and imagining the hole and wait for the next thought. What happens?
Think of a time when something didn’t go as you had expected. Or, think of the days when there is so much going on around you, it’s difficult to think at all. These are the times we can center ourselves.
When I think of the chaos that goes on around me at work, commuting, or just my own thoughts, I realize I need to come back to myself. The real me in the midst of the crap.
I like to think of Thor. He’s a really cool dog who likes to play catch. He’s the type who while huddled in a closet in the midst of the raging storm outside still has a ball in his mouth wanting to play. More on dogs later… I know he’s just a dog. And dogs’ minds don’t work like ours. Thor couldn’t care less about the hurricane or the loss of a job or bill collectors for that matter. But wouldn’t that sense of calm be nice to have on demand?
Ok. Maybe the dog can’t help us achieve the calm in the eye of the storms of our lives. Let me provide another image. Lord Cutler Beckett in the second Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest – He’s the manipulative mastermind of The East India Trading Company. Here’s a photo taken from wiki if you can’t recall this character:
In one of the final scenes of the film, Beckett calmly walks down the stairs of a ship that explodes with each step he takes after muttering famous last words, “It’s just good business.” Debris whirls around his face, but there is no sound save for background music.
You see, even though there’s a load of misery or shrapnel in our lives, a master of the mind, our minds, can breeze through it all. The next time your little ship on the ocean of life explodes, think of Thor 😉 ha, think of Lord Beckett and center your self. Cut the sound of chatter in your brain off. Play some music. Allow the junk to fly. It’s no matter. You’re still alive. Master your monkey mind and become the calm within.
Joy,
Cheryl
getyourwisdomon 