I wrote this while thinking about things going on in my life personally. But in reading it, I’m realizing how applicable it is to the current political landscape for half of our Country… and what to keep in mind if you’re living inside of “I’m upset because…” as a result of the election.
- Andy
Every time I think I have “it” figured out, something happens that makes me know that no…. I don’t.
I’ve gone through this cycle again and again… looking for an answer to something that is going to help me move past any sort of inner discomfort, pain, anxiety, worry, or fear that I’m in… into a place of peace, happiness, contentment, and joy.
And the answer always involves moving from the discomfort of uncertainty to the security of certainty. That’s what I want more than anything… CERTAINTY.
More than anything, I want OUT of the unsettled feelings that occur around things like home repair/improvement costs, paying for college, taking vacations, building my business, maintaining my health, affording retiring, becoming an empty nester soon, and many others that invariably come as a consequence of being alive. I want to KNOW.
Because when I don’t know, when I slow it down enough to really be with it, I’m just a scared little kid. And that little guy wants something or someone to come along that will make him know that it’s all going to be okay, he’s going to be okay, and life is going to work out.
Of course… because we all have that scared little guy (or girl) inside. We all want to know it’s going to be okay and work out.
But there is an inherent problem in that thinking.
It’s self-fulfilling, self-creating.
Someone that need needs to be reminded that it’s going to be okay, I’m going to be okay, and life is going to work out has an inherent belief that he/she/it MIGHT NOT be okay. And so of course that person needs reassuring, comfort, and certainty.
Why else would you need reminding? Why else would you need certainty? Why else would you be scared or want someone or something to swoop in an make it all okay?
Because you believe inside that it might not be… you might not be.
But who created the story that you might not be? YOU DID!
It’s not a given. In fact, if you look up into the sky to ask the moon, stars, planets - life it’self - whether it knows what it’s doing and whether it will work out… a few billion plus years of the existence might tell you something. Who am I to question THAT?
So do you see the vicious cycle that we, as humans, create?
The need for certainty, to figure it out, be okay, and to be happy, joyful and at peace, REQUIRES the belief that it’s not already that way!
And nothing you do will ever be enough to bring you enough certainty… as long as your inner narrative continues to generate the story that you need rescuing, you’re not safe, and you’re not worthy.
As I sit here writing this, I’m realizing the insanity. I KNOW THIS. I know this so well that I can see it in what others are struggling with, in conversations with clients, I can help guide them toward finding relief, I can write about it in an article like this.
But I’m never immune from coming under the spell, falling into the trap, living inside of the human thinking “machinery” that is built into the system while I’m here on earth school in human form.
The “answer” to the predicament, that stops the machine in it’s tracks, short circuits the mechanism, albeit temporarily, is KNOWING that my thinking simply isn’t true, that this idea that I’m unsafe, need comfort, and might not be okay is all not true, it’s my mis-understanding.
I have always been enough. I’ve never been unsafe. It’s always going to work out and be okay… no matter what… it always was and always will be, in spite of the difficulty of the circumstances.
Now, if only I could remember…
With Love -
Andy
P.S. Thanks to you, Scott, for your gentile nudge today to get back to writing!!
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Nice essay Andy!
Great reminder. It's OK now 🙏