“Don’t take it personally.”
How many times have you heard this? With a consoling voice, dismissive, sarcastic, even an angry voice? Yours or someone else’s?
What happens in your body when you hear these words? Do you feel relief, calm, relaxation? Or rather more rigid, with interpretations such as righteousness? Judgement? Maybe even a comeback like: ‘that’s THEIR problem’. A push off.
Does this help us become more available to relationship? To others, to – ourselves?
As soon as we are judging and feeling righteous, we are outside of our Selves. Our conscious Selves – the aspect of us that is available to Life, open hearted.
What does that mean, and what does it matter?
When we are available, streaming, allowing our experience and feeling to flow through our bodies, our cells are being nourished. Even when the sensations are uncomfortable, allowing them to flow through – is healthy. Getting stuck in our heads with judgements about a situation is – not.
Don’t take it in to the personal.
When we take something in to the personal, we make it small, cramped, something we want to react to. The personal is the Ego self. The aspect of us which likes to control, judge and put things in tidy packages (though never really ever succeeds). We need the Ego to assist us in structuring our lives, but it is not ALL we are.
We can give our experiences more space. We can discover more aspects of our nature.
When we bring our awareness, our attention, to what we are feeling NOW: twisting, curly flip-flops in the belly region, tension and lifting around the chest and neck, softening down the back of the head, tingling in the soles of our feet…whatever it is…we open ourselves to another state of consciousness that connect us more deeply with our Natural, Divine Self, the aspect that knows no separation. This Self, when nurtured, through practices of conscious, focused attention (eg. meditation) assists us to allow the streaming of experience – no matter the situation.
If a boss, partner, friend criticizes you…can you allow the feeling THROUGH? Shaking, squirming…breathing and allowing. Perhaps you won’t be able to respond immediately, but over time response will come more easily, honestly and effectively. This is something we practice in our workshops.
In a group of people who are wanting to become more conscious and aware of ego activity, we enter experiences that shake us up, get us to see our ego, AND to experience the Self that is not separate. We share our experiences. We respond to dynamics that arise in the circle. We practice with one another what we intend to inspire in our world. We learn that what we believe in our normal state of consciousness may not be what actually is.
Don’t take it personally OR don’t take it into the personal. You can choose that which serves Life and relationship rather than that which distances us from knowing our true nature.
When we experience Life from a place that knows we are not separate, there is more space – for every experience, and every Being. We live and explore ourselves as a community, on a small scale in our workshops, and on a large scale around the globe.
In the workshops, we experience unity with our fellow human beings as well as ourselves as an individual aspect of this unity. We are becoming more aware of a broader level of perception from which we experience ourselves and the community as a harmonious field that is constantly changing, expanding and optimizing.
Through words, movement, sound, attention and silence, we can perceive ourselves and our influence on the field more intensively, trying out our limits and possibilities. So we reveal more and more of our true nature, our authenticity, our uniqueness. The more aware we are of this, the more grounded, powerful, and joyful we become in our lives.
Our true nature is a unique, effective aspect of human creation.
Creation strives for optimization, for perfection. As humans we move in the paradox of “Everything is already perfect – Everything has to be optimized”. But that is the very nature of creation, the life force that we humans can only accept but not take personally. But we can experience our life in tune with it and let it carry and stimulate us.
-Heidi and Veronica.