by Ada Porat | Feb 12, 2019 | Conscious living, Life skills, Mindfulness, Peace, Personal growth, Self-awareness, Spirituality
Of the many things that cause us pain, our expectation that life should be perfect, is one of the primary causes. The idea that there exists a perfect Shangri-La somewhere that we can somehow locate, is a form of magical thinking that sets us up for false expectations and disappointment..
It creates dissatisfaction with the life we have and pulls us out of the present moment into an unending search for perfection out there somewhere. It also leads to frustration when our efforts fail to create the perfect outcomes we think we need, deserve or desire.
If we truly desire inner peace, we need to trade this magical thinking for a more accurate version of truth. Zen teaches that to find peace of mind, we need to “think of life as a series of imperfect facts.”
I have used this helpful reminder in countless ways in my personal practice.
This phrase reminds us that our reactions and outrage often stem from an unconscious belief that life should be perfect – or that our individual lives and outcomes ought to be perfect for us to have peace.
Because this limiting belief operates beneath the surface, we may be unaware of it. If I were to ask you, “Do you expect your life to be perfect?” you would almost certainly say no.
And yet, we get upset when our lives do not match our idealized dreams! This process is known as cognitive dissonance – the conflict between what we want and what actually shows up.
It is worth checking how often you become angry or frustrated when something relatively minor goes wrong, or when events don’t turn out the way you wanted. You may even feel outraged when life refuses to follow your commands!
With some mindfulness, we can turn such moments into Zen moments: we can think of life as a series of imperfect facts. And know, too, that sometimes those apparent imperfections are really blessings in disguise.
In the same way that we can become outraged when life “goes wrong,” we can sometimes react very harshly when people let us down, or when our expectations are shattered by some very human behavior.
Our relationships do best when we can accept that people sometimes will behave badly, inconsistently or thoughtlessly. Sometimes they will let us down.
As long as this doesn’t happen all the time and does not put us in danger, it is healthier for everyone when we can see these behaviors as part of the big picture and get over the smaller disappointments.
When we focus on let-downs and disappointments, our relationships weaken and may even disintegrate. By choosing instead to see others as flawed as we are, yet generally doing their best, our relationships with all of life become easier, more relaxed and far more rewarding.
Mother Teresa reminded us of that when she said:
“People are often unreasonable and self-centered. Forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of ulterior motives. Be kind anyway.
If you are honest, people may cheat you. Be honest anyway.
If you find happiness, people may be jealous. Be happy anyway.
The good you do today may be forgotten tomorrow. Do good anyway.
Give the world the best you have and it may never be enough. Give your best anyway.
For you see, in the end, it is between you and God. It was never between you and them anyway.”
When we can see the perfect unfolding of life as a series of imperfect facts, our acceptance of what is, brings freedom and joy.
About the author:
©Copyright Ada Porat. For more information, visit https://adaporat.com. This article may be freely distributed in whole or in part, provided there is no charge for it and this notice is attached.
by Ada Porat | Feb 25, 2018 | Mindfulness, Self-awareness
Some people possess a very special gift: they embody the presence of peace within. When we have a chance to sit close to someone like that, we also feel calm. They radiate inner peace in a way that deeply touches us. The presence of their inner peace stills our wandering thoughts and calms our anxieties.
Whenever we have a chance to be with a soul who lives in the eternal Now, we can feel this subtle source of peace and joy. Through their presence, we’re able to connect to that source as well. Their inner tranquility calms the turbulence in the world around them, and they teach us by example how to find peace within.
You too can learn to live this way. Living from a place of inner peace is not reserved for gurus and spiritual masters only. It is a learned behavior, just as constant worry is learned.
You can shed your learned ways of hurry and move through life as if there is no need to be somewhere else in this moment. You can move through life as if you already are exactly where you need to be — as if you are arriving with every step. Every moment of your waking consciousness can bring you closer to that perennial peace within —embodied in the presence of Now.
When you choose to move through life this way, you dissolve your sense of isolation in the world. You start remembering that you’re not a separate individual rushing about to avoid bad and reach for good. Instead, you start feeling again your connection to the whole, like droplets remembering they belong to the ocean. The drop of water does not need to do anything – it simply feels the embrace of the ocean and lets itself be carried along by the current in each present moment.
That inner current of peace is your spiritual core; the inner voice that whispers to you whenever you tune out the brassy loudness of the material world. To truly feel alive and at peace, it is essential to learn how to tune in to the presence of one’s spiritual core in each moment, and to live from that inner presence instead of reacting to the outer chaos.
When we forget this, we act in ways that cause pain or separation between ourselves and others. We become reactive; we may misunderstand others and lash out in fear or anger. And afterwards, we beat ourselves up with guilt, shame and regret.
You cannot change the past, but you can release its hold over you. The power of healing the past lies in this present moment. From this place of mindfulness, you can choose forgiveness and reconciliation to clear away misunderstandings, anger and grief from the past. It is exactly in this moment, Now, that the work of healing must be done to set you free.
No matter how difficult the challenges of the past were, they are over. You are here Now, reading these words. You are alive Now! Treasure the fact that you are alive in this moment and embrace the opportunity for healing it offers. Sit down quietly and go within: meditate to look deep and sweep away the woundedness, prejudice and mistakes of the past. Accept the opportunity offered by the presence of Now, so you can be free.
This present moment offers a gift. It allows you to forgive, to heal and return to peace within, which is your natural state.
Life is present in this moment, waiting for you to choose what to do with it, and your choices determine the quality of your peace within.
About the author
©Copyright Ada Porat. For more information, visit https://adaporat.com. This article may be freely distributed in whole or in part, provided there is no charge for it and this notice is attached.
by Ada Porat | Jan 22, 2018 | Conscious living, Fear and anxiety, Resilience, Self-awareness
Are you feeling rushed as you read these words right now? Welcome to the modern world of constant connectivity! And the faster our pace of life, the more essential it becomes to nurture our inner life for resilience.
We’re living in an amazing age, every bit as futuristic as the Jetsons or Star Trek sagas some of us grew up with. I love being able to connect face to face with clients on the other side of the world, or download a song in a second. Yet this continuous connectivity also poses a challenge: many of us have trouble disconnecting from all the intensity for some peace and quiet. Our inner life can silently wither even as we chase the outer holy grail of success.
The thinner we spread ourselves, the more we skitter across the surface of our outer lives, never going deep. And technology can track us down just about anywhere, anytime, it seems there is literally no escape!
Trying to keep up the pace can take a huge toll. That stress shows up in suppressed immune systems, high blood pressure, anxiety, depression, insomnia, and digestive ailments.
What is needed is more resilience: the ability to rebound from setbacks and challenges, similar to the elasticity of a rubber band returning to its original shape after stretching.
Resilience can be developed with practice, just as you can develop muscle strength by exercising.
The process of developing resilience starts with a reminder that our true nature is eternal and not time-bound. We literally need to disconnect and remember that our souls exist in timelessness. Poet E. E. Cummings put it this way:
“How fortunate are you and I
whose home is timelessness:
We who have wandered down
from fragrant mountains of eternal now
to frolic in such mysteries
as birth and death
a day, or maybe even less…”
By connecting to the soul’s eternal nature, we regain our inner sense of poise. We can learn to not push into the future, nor run from the past, but to walk our path in this present moment with unhurried grace. Lama Surya Das calls this place of the eternal present “Buddha Standard Time.” In his book with the same title, he quotes Liu Wenmin, an early sixteenth century poet, making peace with time:
“To be able to be unhurried when hurried;
To be able not to slack off when relaxed;
To be able not to be frightened
And at a loss for what to do,
When frightened and at a loss;
This is the learning that returns us
To our natural state and transforms our lives.”
The busier we are, the more we need time out of the rat race to regain perspective and renew ourselves from within. It is our inner life that ultimately sustains us, and not the outer bells and whistles.
Honoring your inner path of truth is essential for a meaningful life. Research by palliative caretaker Bronnie Ware showed the number one regret of dying people is wishing they’d had the courage to live a life true to themselves, and not the life others expected from them.
How do we honor our inner compass amid the frenetic demands of life so we can live without regrets? Three concepts come to mind: Stay true. Stay present. Follow the energy.
- Stay True:
A commitment to truth, at all levels, is automatically a commitment to freedom. It is always truth that sets us free. And where Higher truth prevails, why would anyone need to lie?
In Shakespeare’s Hamlet, Polonius advises his son Laertes:
“To thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.”
Any “security” gained through loss of inner freedom actually submits to fear at the cost of integrity and truth. A nation that puts national security above personal freedom has lost its true power base. In saying this, I am not suggesting that a country should suddenly lower its guard against all enemies (both real and imagined). I am saying that addressing the outer issue before addressing the inner conditions in consciousness that created it, will simply not solve the problem.
This is why politics is not the answer to what plagues the human condition. Politics is like a trainer who seeks to harness and train the collective energy so it will function for the good of all. It will ultimately succeed only at the lowest common denominator.
True freedom is an inside job that starts with elevating consciousness at the individual level by aligning to Higher truth. That alignment fosters confidence, resilience and trust.
- Stay Present.
Stay in the Now. Past and future are always adjuncts to that. Don’t let the busy-ness of the world rob you of this priceless gift of NOW.
That means you need to make peace with your past so you can live without regrets. It also means you need to release the need to control the future because that is an illusion causing unnecessary anxiety.
You and I do not know what the future will look like because it is not yet manifest. There is no other human who can accurately predict how life will play out, because the future is created through a myriad possibilities and individual choices that ultimately manifest when conditions are favorable.
There are no veterans or pros for where humanity is going now – it is new to all of us. The choices you and I make in each present moment, will collectively decide the future that unfolds for us. So let’s nurture our inner resilience and stay true to our path right here, right now!
- Follow The Energy.
Let your body be your barometer. It will show you what you really need. You always create the perfect scenarios to get what you really need.
There are no good or bad energies. All people and things are just energy… which is, essentially, neutral. Energy is as neutral as the electric current that lights up both a cathedral and a drug lab.
Some frequencies of energy may seem particularly useful and attractive to you for where you’re at in your individual consciousness right now. Other frequencies can repulse for the same reason. That does not make them good or bad; they are simply useful to your journey at this particular time or not.
Pay attention to the things that attract or repel you; they are clues to what you need to do, choose or say in order to move forward on your path.
Together, these three principles can help you cultivate a richer and more resilient inner life, no matter how much turmoil you face in your environment.
About the author
©Copyright Ada Porat. For more information, visit https://adaporat.com. This article may be freely distributed in whole or in part, provided there is no charge for it and this notice is attached.
by Ada Porat | Feb 22, 2017 | Conscious living, Emotional healing, Self-awareness
Deep beneath the social masks and happy faces we present to the outer world, lurks a hidden shadow: an angry, wounded, fragmented or isolated part of us that we tend to bury or ignore. Integrating the shadow is essential for a balanced life.
The shadow compounds all the dark impulses—hatred, aggression, sadism, selfishness, jealousy, resentment, sexual transgression—that are not socially acceptable and thus hidden out of sight. The name originated with Carl Jung, but its basic origin came from Freud’s insight that our psyches are dualistic, sharply divided between the conscious and unconscious. Socially accepted norms require that we suppress our unconscious side, but what hides in the shadows will attempt to come out.
Whatever qualities we dare not face within ourselves, we tend to project out onto others. Everyone carries a shadow, and the less it is integrated in a person’s conscious life, the blacker and denser it is. The work of becoming spiritually conscious requires us to face and integrate the shadow, or else it will sabotage our best intentions.
Put another way, one does not become enlightened by imagining light, but by making the darkness conscious so it can be integrated. Rampant shadow projection is a hallmark behavior of the spiritually unconscious.
The shadow always wants to be heard – when ignored, it turns ever more mean and nasty. Resisting the shadow simply solidifies it, causing suffering. This arrogant behavior causes pain and suffering in anybody who has suffered because of the shadow’s cruelty, either in themselves or others.
And herein lies a great gift. Whenever the shadow projections out there trigger an emotional response in us, it means that there is a need for forgiveness, healing and acceptance. This emotional charge is a dead giveaway that we need to do some healing within ourselves so we can become neutral to the shadow projections out there.
In other words, we’re able to recognize the shadow projections out there because the same potential exists within each of us, whether we act on them or not. Most of us are uncomfortable with this truth, which causes us to further suppress and project our own shadow. In truth, the enemy is not out there but in each of us.
The enemy is in the White House, but the enemy is also Muslim; the enemy is a Jew, the enemy is a terrorist or a non-documented immigrant; the enemy is the person we choose to blame for our own situation, and the refugee from whose needs we recoil… the enemy is in all of them, and also in you and me. In truth, the enemy is really not an enemy at all. It is but a dark reflection of the shadow that resides in each of us and gets projected out there onto whomever we choose to judge and condemn. This enemy is an orphan, cast out of our consciousness and wandering the dark alleys of our collective unconscious as the shadow.
We cannot fight the shadow with more shadow, for that simply escalates issues and increases suffering on all sides. Instead, we need to heal the shadow by bringing the light of consciousness to it. The wounds in consciousness can only be healed through consciousness.
Bringing shadow material into consciousness drains its dark power, and can even recover valuable resources from it. The greatest power comes from having accepted our shadow parts and integrated them as components of ourselves.
The shadow can be a source of emotional richness and vitality; and integrating these orphaned aspects of our being can lead to restoring personal wholeness and leading more authentic life. We start this process by recognizing the shadow existing in us, forgiving ourselves for our fear and aversion of it, acknowledging it for what it is, and learning to use its powerful energies in productive ways.
In their book, Romancing the Shadow, authors Connie Zwieg, Ph.D. and Steve Wolf, Ph.D. share effective ways of decoding the messages of the shadow in daily life to deepen one’s consciousness, imagination, and soul.
Integrating the shadow takes honesty and courage, but the rewards are immense. First, the suffering stops. This is the surest sign that we have chosen the right path again: the unnecessary suffering stops.
More importantly, new possibilities emerge everywhere in life. Author David Richo calls this work “shadow dancing” in his book, Shadow Dance: Liberating the Power and Creativity of Your Dark Side. Changing our relationship with the shadow allows us to discover a critical shift in our viewpoint: Where everything seemed sterile and barren and there seemed no possible answers before, now everything seems possible.
How to manage the shadow currently rampaging through society? A few things come to mind.
- Become part of the solution. Instead of cursing the darkness, align with the light by consciously changing your tribal attitudes, words, and actions. Refuse to dehumanize others based on their race, religion or background. Recognize that the world’s wrongs have their seeds in you and me as well. The potential for good or evil exists in each one of us. Once we begin to acknowledge that in ourselves, the shadow immediately begins to diminish.
- Recognize opportunities for healing, change and growth. See the rampaging shadow out there for what it is: an opportunity for each of us to heal. Now is the time for true shadow work to begin. The spiritually unconscious cannot do this work; it needs to start with you and me. When we take responsibility for the work of forgiveness and healing in our own lives, we will find the courage to start doing so on a larger scale. That is how we heal the world; not with bigger weapon systems, more name-calling or hatred.
- Strengthen your commitment to higher goals, vision and values. Nurture your core values, your soul and your spirituality. Meditate, spend time in nature, do energy work to set your soul free, and cultivate an attitude of gratitude.
- Learn how to practice detachment. Do your very best to continuously release thoughts of resistance and attachment, for they are simply sides of the same coin. The Sedona Method has a wonderful phrase to summarize this process: “Embrace that which you resist, and surrender that to which you cling.” Detachment frees you from anxiety so your inner space can be peace.
- Remain in the Now. The past is over and no amount of worry can change it; the future is not here yet; so stay in the present moment. This moment is a golden opportunity to grow in consciousness. Choose to see every event of your life as a gift from heaven, sent your way with the sole purpose of enlightening you.
- Stay open to the possibilities. During turbulent times, the ego works overtime to find some security. In the process, we often settle for the safe rather than the good. When you have faith in a Higher Power and stay open to all the possibilities in the Field (even those you have not yet conceived of), you are making space for optimal outcomes to show up.
- Keep learning. Perhaps you cannot change all the things out there that trouble you. But you can learn something new each day that will help you outgrow the limitations of tribal thinking and become the highest expression of yourself. What will you learn today? Tomorrow? Next month? It is the accumulation of small changes over time, that feed the evolution of your consciousness.
- Stay involved. When faced with the shadow and all the cognitive dissonance it creates, it can be tempting to hide your light. You may want to play it safe, go into denial and avoid conflict. I’m here to tell you that you were created for bigger things! You are on this planet at this time because at some level, you recognized the potential for growth, change and fulfillment offered by the very things you call challenging in your life right now. This is not the time to find excuses for remaining passive, or to wait for heaven to come and rescue us. We are the ones that we’ve been waiting for! So muster your courage, stand tall, breathe in faith and let your light shine, for you are meant to be here now! Become an instrument of change and healing, and your own fulfillment will follow.
Finally, remember that shadow is aligned with the ego and never wins in the end!
About the author
©Copyright Ada Porat. For more information, visit https://adaporat.com. This article may be freely distributed in whole or in part, provided there is no charge for it and this notice is attached.
by Ada Porat | Feb 3, 2017 | Conscious living, Decision-making, Self-awareness
Cognitive dissonance is the discomfort of self-image colliding with reality. Such collisions are inevitable, as self-image tends to be based on values – what is most important to you – while reality tends to be created around behavioral choices, expectations and commitments in the world around us.
Psychologist Leon Festinger coined the term ‘cognitive dissonance’ to describe the uncomfortable tension we feel when we experience conflicting thoughts or beliefs (cognitions) within ourselves, or when we encounter behavior that is opposed to our beliefs.
For example, if someone believes that they are not racist, but then discriminates against another based on race, this confronts the discriminator with the discomfort of facing that their behavior is in fact racist. To escape this discomfort, the discriminator may rationalize their behavior on some other grounds, no matter how obtuse, but which allows them to hold on to their otherwise discredited belief.
Not everyone feels cognitive dissonance to the same degree. People with a higher need for consistency and certainty in their lives usually feel the effects of cognitive dissonance more than those who have a lesser need for such consistency.
To release the tension between two opposing cognitions, we can take one of three actions:
- Justify our behavior by changing the conflicting cognition;
- Ignore the dissonance by diverting our attention to new issues; or
- Minimize the dissonance by changing our behavior.
While cognitive dissonance happens to all of us, it is HOW we respond, that determines whether we evolve through expanded understanding or whether we devolve into a reactionary, limiting stance.
Unconscious strategies can serve as temporary coping mechanisms, but will not result in optimal long-term solutions. To optimally resolve cognitive dissonance, we need to take conscious action.
Unconscious Coping Strategies
Some unconscious strategies often used to cope with cognitive dissonance, include:
- Avoidance– avoiding information that leads to dissonance by avoiding discussion of emotionally charged topics.
- Distortion– deleting or distorting facts and beliefs to reduce dissonance.
- Distraction – distract oneself from uncomfortable issues by focusing on other issues.
- Confirmation– exercising selective bias by embracing information that confirms or bolsters one’s own cognitions while ignoring other, verifiable facts.
- Reassurance– looking for reassurance from others that one’s cognitions are correct and OK.
- Re-valuation– changing the importance of existing or new cognitions to reduce inner dissonance.
Cognitive dissonance is a formidable adversary that can destroy good judgment. But this is something we must overcome as individuals if we wish to grow and mature.
A huge part of combating cognitive dissonance is learning how to navigate from outdated worldviews and limiting belief systems to updated ones where we expand our understanding and grow in maturity. That transition takes effort, but the alternative is worse – delusion and stagnation.
Healthy Coping Strategies
Here are seven healthy strategies for overcoming cognitive dissonance in ways that empower and lead to personal growth:
The first step in overcoming cognitive dissonance is to go deeper; questioning our own values, motives, desires and expectations. We may not have answers to the dissonant issues yet, but cognitive dissonance offers us a chance to review our own principles. When we do so honestly, we can release those that no longer serve us, update our outdated frames of reference, and recommit to our core values. This willingness to question ourselves as well as the dissonance outside of us, forms the foundation for personal growth.
- Comfort vs. Accomplishment
Human beings are absurdly insecure. We tend to cling to comfort and avoid discomfort to feel safe and secure. Ironically, comfort is the enemy of accomplishment. It’s at the edge of our comfort zone where true growth is achieved: the place where we question our cultural conditioning, beliefs and ideas. When we muster the courage question our own tightly-held beliefs, we stretch our comfort zone until we become more adaptable and fluid in our living.
In a world of rampant anti-intellectualism and mindless trolls hell-bent on attacking the Other, we can find personal freedom by recognizing that we need not change another’s belief systems in order to feel safe. In fact, it takes all kinds to make a world, and the sum of diversity is richer than the individual aspects that comprise it. When we recognize that we do not gain stature by chopping off another’s legs, we become more tolerant of the endless variety of belief systems that make up society.
Personal freedom lies in recognizing that we are limitless souls experiencing life in a dualistic Universe. When we recognize the uniqueness of each soul sharing this human experience, we find the equanimity to celebrate the uniqueness of each life, no matter how different, without the need to judge or change them. It also frees us to celebrate and develop our unique gifts and talents as a gift to ourselves, the world and our Creator.
- Harness Dissonance for Growth
We can learn to harness our cognitive dissonance as a tool for growth instead of seeing it as a threat to comfort. Indeed, a rough road often leads to greatness. One of the ways to turn perceived threats into opportunities, is to ask ourselves about a challenge, “How can this be useful?” Rather than resist the challenge, we can look for ways to use it as a stepping stone for growth.
Humor and joy are powerful tools to help us escape the intensity of cognitive dissonance. Anthropologist Joseph Campbell said, “Find a place inside where there’s joy, and the joy will burn out the pain.” When we learn to poke fun at our own fears and failings, it sets us free to find joy. Comedians use this principle well by ridiculing the very things which others take too seriously. Robert Frost quipped, “Forgive, O Lord, my little jokes on Thee, and I’ll forgive Thy great big joke on me.”
- Get Off The Hamster Wheel
There’s an awful dread that comes with knowing that we are fallible, prone-to-mistakes, and imperfect mortal beings; but there is also a kind of awe-inspiring beauty to it. The idea that we can learn from our mistakes; that we can transform pain into knowledge, anger into courage, and loss into love, is at the heart of the soul’s journey.
To fully participate in this journey, we need to actively participate in shedding the habits and limiting beliefs that have kept us running on the hamster wheel of life without any point of arrival. The change that needs to happen is not outside of us; it starts within. As Gandhi said, we need to BE the change we wish to see in the world. The more we use the discomfort of cognitive dissonance as a sharpening stone to hone our core values, beliefs and truths, the more we will experience inner peace, regardless of the outer challenges we face.
Conclusion
The choice to courageously deal with obstacles is at the heart of personal growth work. Cognitive dissonance can actually help us mature.
As dissonance arises, we can face it head-on. We can work at getting a clear sense of what has changed in our environment and how best to respond. We can recommit to our truth and values despite the dissonance it evokes, and determine to hold our space as unique souls until the tide turns.
About the author
©Copyright Ada Porat. For more information, visit https://adaporat.com. This article may be freely distributed in whole or in part, provided there is no charge for it and this notice is attached.
by Ada Porat | Dec 20, 2016 | Change bad habits, Conscious living, Mindfulness, Self-awareness
The power of our minds can be harnessed to empower us. It can also sabotage our best intentions. Here are seven lies we commonly tell ourselves to indulge or to hide the truth from ourselves. To live our best lives, it is essential to recognize these self-sabotage patterns and evict them to make more empowering choices.
I wish I could do _______, but I can’t.
‘I can’t’ almost always means ‘I don’t want to.’ We hide behind ‘I can’t’ to pretend the choice isn’t really ours. In the short run, it may feel beneficial because we can avoid owning our preferences and pretend that we have no choice in the matter. But it comes at a significant cost! By habitually hiding behind ‘I can’t’ we disempower ourselves across all areas of our lives. What we really need to say is ‘I don’t want to’ instead of ‘I can’t.’ It is more honest and restores our sense of personal power and choice.
I deserve this dessert….
Or this dress… or this outcome… or… whatever. This is one I hear often! Lying to ourselves by pretending that we deserve what we lust for, lets us indulge in momentary comforts. The problem is, once the momentary gratification wears off, we’re back to facing the original, unpleasant feelings. I have seen people overeat by saying they deserve to indulge after a long day at a job they hate or working with people they loathe. They use food as a reward even though it wrecks their health; and this is the epitome of self-sabotage cloaked in righteous garb. Nobody deserves to wake up feeling awful about their choices. By addressing core issues, every person has the power to restore a sense of well-being to life.
Another related, insidious phrase that people use is ‘I need,’ as in, ‘I need that new dress’ or ‘I need you to listen to me.’ If you’re alive and surviving without it right now, then you clearly don’t need it. This habit may sound insignificant, but it is dishonest. Changing ‘I need’ to ‘I want’ is incredibly freeing. Whereas ‘I need’ sets you up to believe you’ll be hurt if you don’t get something, ‘I want’ gives you freedom.”
I’m definitely right.
This is one of the most damaging lies we can tell ourselves, according to social psychologist Carol Tavris, Ph.D., coauthor of Mistakes Were Made (But Not by Me): Why We Justify Foolish Beliefs, Bad Decisions, and Hurtful Acts. It’s called the basic bias—the idea that everyone else is biased, but we’re not. The belief that you know best and that you’ve got all the facts prevents you from even listening to evidence that you’re wrong—that your memory may be wrong, your perception inaccurate or your explanation faulty. It’s inherently self-damaging because it keeps you stuck in the limitations of what you think you know. It also makes you a miserable person to be with, so watch for this lie!
I have no willpower.
You do have some willpower. We all do, even though laboratory tests have shown that willpower is finite – after people used self-control for some tasks, they had less of it for subsequent tasks (that’s why it’s not a good idea to quit smoking, start a stressful job, and go on a diet on the same day!) Researchers have found that willpower, like a muscle, can be built up over time through regular training. Moreover, it has spillover benefits: If you decided to straighten your posture every time you thought about it for two weeks, you will not only improve your posture, but you’ll also experience all-around improvement in self-empowerment in completely unrelated areas!
I’ll never get over it.
In The Emotional Life Of Your Brain, author and neuroscientist Richard J. Davidson states that we’re not necessarily conscious of just how rapidly we recover from adversity. You’ve probably heard of psychologist Dan Gilbert’s research showing how people who’ve been paralyzed are about as happy a year after the accident as they were before; likewise, lottery winners were found to be no happier a year after their big win.
By allowing yourself to simply feel the negative emotions of major setbacks and trusting nature’s ability to heal, you’ll discover that negative emotions actually have a finite lifespan and tend to abate over time. While there is substantial variability in how long each person may need to grieve their losses, it is a good rule of thumb to start looking for some sense of forward motion after about six months. If not, you may benefit from professional help.
Researchers have found that people who are slower to recover from stressful events in fact have brains that are wired differently. Fortunately, we can change our brains activity patterns with mindfulness meditation, which boosts activity in the pre-frontal cortex. Studies have shown how this practice over time weakens the negative chain of associations that keep us obsessing about setbacks.
I don’t judge others.
Sure, you do! Research into how humans categorize and perceive others, shows that we all make spontaneous trait inferences about others within less than a second after meeting them! These findings are remarkably consistent across the globe, as people instantly judge each other on two main qualities: warmth and competence. People who are judged as competent but cold (such as a wealthy tycoon) elicit envy or hostility. People who are perceived as warm but incompetent (such as elderly people) bring out feelings of pity. Here’s the kicker: all judgment is ultimately self-judgment. When we size people up, we’re judging them with our conscious mind – and we are ultimately judging ourselves because we’re trying to figure out how we fit in.
If only I had a million dollars, I’d fulfill my dream of _____.
This little self-deluding bomb? It’s disproved every time we see an attorney who aspires to own a restaurant and goes to cooking school at night, or a mom who build an Etsy business while her kids take their afternoon nap. Somehow, we are so certain — so absolutely certain — that we can’t take the leap without a certain financial guarantee or windfall. We totally delude and block ourselves with this lie! Instead, why not take a step closer to your dreams from where you are at right now, and make the commitment to gradually transition to what you really want to do with the rest of your life. It is only too late if you don’t start now!
