♪ Intro Music ♪
Hello everyone ...
The inability to establish real intimacy is at the root
of all relationship problems that we have today -
including the relationship we have with ourselves.
Intimacy is knowing and being known
for who we really are in all aspects of our lives.
You can think of intimacy
as me bringing all of who I truly am,
and you bringing all of who you truly are,
to the *center* of the relationship.
And both of us being received, accepted, and loved,
for exactly who we are
without needing to fix each other.
There's one major problem though:
I need to know exactly who I am so I can bring myself
to the center of this relationship,
and you need to know exactly who you are
so you can bring 'you' to the center of this relationship -
and none of us really knows who we are ...
Most of us have no idea who we really are
because we have been shamed out of our True Selves
as children growing up in dysfunctional families
in a dysfunctional Human society.
In order to adapt to our families and society
we have created False Selves -
False Selves that are so good at what they do,
even *we* have mistaken them for ourselves.
We have a major problem differentiating between
our False Self and our real Self.
We know that something feels 'off' about our life,
but we don't know 'what' because we have forgotten who we are.
Because we have forgotten who we really are,
we build our relationships off of everything *except* intimacy.
We've built our relationships based on the fact
that we find each other sexy ...
We've built our relationships based on the fact
that we both like football ...
We've built our relationships based on the fact
that he or she would make a good husband or wife ...
We have built our relationship
based on what we do for each other ...
... and so, something is missing from our relationships.
They feel empty after the initial excitement has worn off.
We want someone who will understand how we feel
but *we* do not understand how we feel.
We want trust, but we don't trust ourself.
We want honesty,
but we can't be honest with ourselves
when we don't even realize that we're being dishonest
with ourselves in the first place ...
Society has many mantras - mantras such as:
'Family is everything',
'Nothing that's worth having, is easy',
'Pink is for Girls',
'Money is the root of Evil' ... etc.
These mantras are part of society's programming.
They are designed to control our actions.
They are designed to override the Emotional Guidance System
because we are convinced
that everyone following their own Emotional Guidance System
equals social chaos!
This programming works in a very simple and specific way.
It tells us from a very young age
that what we think we saw - we didn't see,
what we think we heard - we didn't hear,
and most importantly, what we felt - we didn't feel.
Before you feel yourself getting defensive about your childhood,
look at this seemingly innocuous and commonplace example:
A toddler's walking around - they fall down
and they bump their head.
Everything inside this child
is telling them that they are not OK.
The parent picks the child up and says
"You're OK - it's only a little bump."
In that moment,
not only is the parent invalidating the child's feelings,
the child learns that it cannot trust
its internal guidance system.
"After all, I'm feeling like I'm not OK,
but Mom is telling me I'm OK and I shouldn't be feeling this way."
In order to fit into our families and into society
we must adapt.
We have to become a certain way.
For example:
A naturally free-spirited tomboyish girl
is born into a prestigious Southern family.
If she was to adhere to her own Emotional Guidance System,
and stay true to who she is,
life would be very hard for her.
She would be the disgrace of the family
and her parents' disapproval of her
would mean, that from her perspective,
she would lose their love.
So she begins to create a False Self.
A False Self that likes pink and loves Jesus
and collects dolls and has perfect social manners.
She structures her life choices around the values of the family.
She structures her relationship choices
around the approval of the family.
Now, as an adult, inside - she's dying -
but no one would ever know it.
When you ask her who she is
she will tell you that she is a person
with good manners and Southern values,
who has a doll collection, who loves pink,
but loves Jesus.
Her life has turned into the very picture of success
that her parents and her society had in mind when she was born.
She does not know that who she really is - is *not* who she is.
She does not recognize that her 'personality'
is nothing more than an adaptation.
If we do not know how we feel,
what we want and don't want,
what we like and don't like,
we cannot actually be present in our relationships
because it's not *us* that's present in our relationships -
it's our False Self.
Our only hope of finding intimacy and having good relationships
and living a life that we enjoy
and feeling free and not dying-inside every day,
is to let our False Selves go.
Our only hope is to find out who we really are.
Most of us have been too afraid to question ourselves
and everything we think we know about ourselves
and the world we live in,
because we've been so convinced
that there's an unbearable consequence
if we find out that the truth is different
than other people wanted us to be.
Most of us have not taken the risk to be ourselves.
We have not seen that being ourselves completely
is worth *any* consequence,
even losing our families and friends ...
This is a cross-roads for many of us ...
It is a cross-roads we must come to
when we have committed Spiritual Practice
or even just to improving our lives.
Do we keep up the façade
or do we find out who we really are and admit to it?
For the sake of self-discovery,
I want you to start a practice.
I want you to pretend
that you have just come out of a coma
and this is the first day of your life ...
You have no idea who you are,
you have no idea what you believe,
you have no idea what you like and don't like.
Now, re-assess your life.
When you take a bite of food - do you like that food?
What do you like about it?
What don't you like about it?
When you pick out your clothes, how do they make you feel?
If this was your first day on Earth
and you had no preconceived notion
about other people's perspective about those clothes,
what would you think of those clothes?
When you spend time with that person, do you like them?
Doesn't matter if they're your family
and you've always thought that 'Family is Forever' -
what *do* you like about this person ...
... what don't you like?
When you look at yourself in the mirror, who are you really?
Are you an artist?
It doesn't matter if you've painted a picture
or danced a dance in your life -
Are you a mother?
Doesn't matter if you are actually a mother
or if you have no children at all - are you a mother?
What do you believe about this Universe or God?
Throw away your religion and your beliefs for a minute.
Doesn't matter if you have said
'I'm Christian' or 'I'm Islamic' all your life -
what do you believe about this Universe or God?
It's OK if the answer to these questions is 'I don't know'.
'I don't know' is a million times better
than pretending that you know.
It's *better* because
saying 'I don't know' suggests an openness
to knowing the truth of who you are.
Your job is to explore.
Your job is to re-assess the old.
And your job, most especially, is to try new things.
Cut other people out of the equation.
Pay attention to how you feel when you think those thoughts,
when you say those words,
when you do those things.
You may think that you have liked something all your life
only to discover that you hate that thing.
You may have thought you hated something all your life,
to discover that you *do* like that thing.
You may have thought you wanted something all your life,
to discover you don't want it at all.
You may discover you want things you never even knew you wanted.
You may discover that you don't like someone
you thought you liked.
The point is - you have been so afraid
of the consequence of admitting
to who you truly are and how you truly feel -
that you have created a False Self.
You've maintained this False Self with conviction
and now is the time to replace it with who you really are.
We need to be willing to question absolutely everything
we think we know about ourselves
in order to *really* know ourselves.
And it will feel groundless and anchorless in the beginning -
it will feel like we are losing our life-vest,
but this time spent in the unsteady, unknown,
of the ocean of our lives is worth the experience
of landing squarely in, and of, our True Selves.
No more torture,
no more pretending,
no more trying to be perfect,
no more being loved for something that we aren't,
no more meaninglessness,
no more emptiness ...
It doesn't matter whether you're 10-years old or 20-years old
or 40-years old or 80-years old -
now is the time to be brave.
It's the time to be brave enough to admit
that you may not actually know anything
about who you truly are.
Now is the time to be brave enough
to question everything you *think* you know about yourself.
Now is the time to find out who you really are,
and to expose who you really are to the world.
Have a good week ...
♪ Outtro Music ♪
Subtitles by the Amara.org community