In the first part of Essential Keys to Self Discovery, I outlined how allowing yourself to Just Feel is one of the primary keys to unlocking your inner world. By allowing yourself to tap into your feelings, you begin the process of unlocking your essential self. Your true feelings will help you to see what is working in your life, or what is not. Accepting the sensation or feelings that you experience in life helps you to move into a place of making it OK to feel what you feel. By giving yourself permission to feel the sensations of your emotions in your body, you will begin the process of accepting responsibility for the things that are in your life, as well as your reaction to them.
Second Essential Key: Acceptance
Acceptance, therefore, is simply making it OK to feel whatever you feel.
Acceptance is a very powerful key in that when we accept the feelings
and sensations that we have, we break down the resistance we create for
ourselves. Resistance to life creates friction, and when we have friction
in our life, this tends to trigger agitation. Agitation can lead to frustration,
frustration can lead to anger, and so on. When life seems difficult it
is only because we are resisting the very reality which we are creating
[the Third Key discusses the nature of creating your own reality]. At
this point it is important to feel the resistance both in the physical,
and in the emotional, in order for us to clearly see what we are doing
to create this friction in our life.
When we resist situations in our life it usually means that we have become
attached to something. This is not to say that attachment is an altogether
inappropriate choice, but when you have become attached to something you
literally ‘lock’ yourself into a particular way of being. This,
in turn, prevents the ever-changing environment of life from flowing freely,
slowing the natural process of change which helps us grow and learn more
harmonious ways of experiencing life, ways which in turn help to create
a more supportive environment for us. This is akin to paddling a boat
upstream — resisting the natural flow of the water and missing or
ignoring the changing scenery along the shoreline that is life. When we
have attached ourselves to a particular way of being, we prevent life’s
experiences from leading us to the very places which hold the keys to
a deeper understanding of ourselves, our motivations and our purpose.
One of the ways in which we challenge ourselves is through judgment. Judgment
is the process of making some things right and others wrong instead of
simply embracing what is. As the saying goes, “Nothing is right or
wrong, but thinking makes it so”. When we judge our feelings or our
body’s sensations, we change the nature of what we are feeling and
alter our perception of what is. When our perception is changed through
judgment, we can no longer clearly see the reality of our situation —
this is the beginning of self deception.
The more we deceive ourselves, the further away we move from our true
self. As thinking is the jurisdiction of the mind and feeling is the business
of the heart, we might say that it is exactly when the mind attempts to
rule the heart that the self strays from its truest path.
This is where friction comes in.
If you are at a point where you are experiencing a great deal of friction,
either in your personal or professional life, or things just ‘aren’t
going your way’, the best thing you could do for yourself is to start
feeling what is inside your heart. Stop trying to think your way out of
uncomfortable situations and just feel the sensations in your body. The
more you experience these sensations, the more you unlock ‘the answers’
that reside in your true self. When you can allow these feelings and sensations
to be as they are, you will find it easier to accept that which is in
your life and consequently you will come to accept yourself as you truly
are.
In becoming more fully aware of your feelings and empowering them by making
them OK, you embrace your personal truth and begin to make clearer choices
in your life. These choices will be from the heart. A choice from the
heart is the voice of your true self speaking — the more closely
you listen, the more in harmony you will be. It is from this place of
harmony that we are able to step into a more conscious participation in
the creation of our own reality, the third Essential Key to Self Discovery.
About Our Services
