This happened not more than a few weeks ago…
I was out on the streets walking briskly. Not because I was hurrying to get somewhere – but because I was trying to run away from myself.
How does one run away from themselves? They don’t because they can’t. It’s impossible, right?
The reason I was trying to get as far away from myself as possible was because I had just had an argument with my partner.
That wasn’t the problem.
The problem was that I had said things that not only did I regret – but I had done this same thing multiple times before – and had promised myself to never do that again.
Yet, I did it again.
At that particular moment on the running-from-myself walk, I couldn’t coach myself – it seemed as if my biggest inner critic was dropping a nuclear bomb on me.
I couldn’t objectively BE with what happened either (to witness it and have compassion towards myself as being human having a very human experience).
It was as if I had all my resources taken away from me (but not my resourcefulness).
So the next best thing I could come up with to try to save myself (from myself) was to call a friend – a coach, and to ask him for support and coaching around this.
Just fifteen minutes later, I had a lightness in my step. My harsh self-judgment had completely stopped.
I felt renewed.
The coach didn’t do any magic on me (he did… but he’d simply call it deep coaching).
Do you want to know what he did?
Two things:
He listened to me deeply, intently, and compassionately – the way only someone with zero judgment towards others and with zero ego/self-interest can do.
And then he asked me one thing…
“You said that you keep hurting the closest people to you. You do. My question is: who is the closest person ever to you?”
I got it!
It was me – I was the closest person to me.
And true – I was consistently hurting myself by being hard on myself, by judging myself harshly, by making myself wrong.
And this is outright ridiculous because I hold the firm conviction that…
THERE IS NOTHING INHERENTLY WRONG WITH ANYBODY
We learn early in our childhood that “something must be fundamentally wrong with me” – all because something was said or done (perhaps repeatedly) that at the time we couldn’t reconcile or explain in any other way.
“There is nothing wrong with anybody”
I know this deep in my body to where I can immediately see in my clients where they have a view of themselves that’s a reflection of what they’ve been through – not of who they truly are!
But apparently not deep enough to be able to always and unconditionally “include” myself, too.
There was more that I was reminded of during our put-out-the-fire coaching.
By focusing on “the mess that I am” (especially painful because I am a coach, right – I should have my shit together?!) I was reinforcing the very same self-judgment – that I am a mess (What we focus on expands in our awareness).
There are many lessons in what I shared above. I trust you found most of them – or at least the ones that pertain to your particular situation and circumstances.
For the sake of completeness, here are the lessons as I intended:
Lesson 1: No matter how harsh you are on yourself – there is NOTHING WRONG WITH YOU! You are simply trying to survive your own internal narrative
Lesson 2: You ought to be very careful what you choose to put your focus and attention on because it gets reinforced in your life and circumstances
Lesson 3: It’s okay to admit that you are human and ask for help. You are not meant to figure it all out on your own
Lesson 4: We are all works in progress (myself included) – regardless of what social media and skillful marketing want you to believe
And here’s the bonus lesson that ties it all together…
Lesson 5: Permanently transcending all “there’s something wrong with me” internal narratives is your True Purpose (capital “P”) – and all your other human-level purposes are the means to that end!
Much love –
Ivan