Tag Archive for: truth

Love asks You to Stand in Your Truth

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To create the life we want, we extend into an I-don’t-know-abyss to consider new people and things. And also, stay present in I-know-myself-alliances to manage past people and things.

But what happens when the old things shift you back into the I-don’t-know-abyss?

As I witness my boyfriend, of two-years, I can happily say that loyalty comes easily to him. He treasures his alliances with friends and me. Commitment, on the other hand, creates a lot of internal conflict for him.

I’ve struggled with little things like, chasing his attention and gaze in public places, or craving reassurances about our romance.

To me, commitment means helping a person feel the safety of their loyalty.

So he’s loyal, but doesn’t want to broadcast it. His I-know-myself alliance turns into an I-don’t-know-abyss at curious moments?

There were times I’d freeze with uncertainty.

Perhaps, loyalty stems from one’s internal nature, and commitment is more of an external offering? Whatever it is, loyalty and commitment make my fella feel very differently.

I’ve always felt that asking for attention was needy. I mean, if I’m special to someone wouldn’t it come easily to show me?

What I’ve discovered is, NO. It’s not easy.

What I’ve come to understand is, it’s not easy to stand in your truth if it triggers personal failures, disappointments or self-doubt. For him or I. It’s not easy to broadcast your truth if you’re afraid of another failed effort. For all of us.

It’s not easy to trust happiness when it’s yet to lead you to happily-ever-after.

Recognizing my own fear of the truth, I extended myself into my own I-don’t-know-abyss. I asked for what I needed, and let myself fear being needy! But what actually happened was quite the opposite. I felt confident! And ultimately, I believe he did too!

I let him know, I couldn’t continue in a romance that didn’t make me feel safe. I’d rather be alone and feel safe in my own company.

For a moment we were both frozen.

Then, the other evening a bar-pal said to him, “We used to flirt with woman together all the time, but you’ve left me to my own devices now that Tammy’s around!” Without coaxing, my boyfriend replied, “Because Tammy is my last ONE, the woman I want till the end of my life. I don’t want to do anything that would jeopardize that.”

His pal was silenced and a male onlooker said to me, “Wow… how does it feel to be that loved!?”

It feels amazing… thrilling… relevant beyond belief!

We have both faced our fears! And, we agree, that love is worth fighting demons for.

Extending yourself into the I-don’t-know-abyss for love asks you to stand in your truth. It feels scary because when you stand in your truth you stand alone… until love catches you.

Second Chance at the Truth

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Tammy on left; Bruno on right.

 

How do you keep internal peace under external pressure?

There are times that your mind analyzes a situation with clarity, yet you’re still triggered emotionally. You can feel trapped in your reaction and blind to a peaceful resolution.

Your mind and body are misaligned. The information your mind gathers and the story your body conveys seem to be on two different tracks, or different intensities of the same track.

The other night, sitting outside for dinner in the chill of winter (the only COVID option) I was met with this kind of mind body misalignment. My dinner date was sharing with me her newest business venture––herbal care. A healing art she had no education in.

I was stunned. My mind was clear that she was putting herself in liability danger and possibly endangering her customer’s well-being. As a 4-year herbal medicine graduate I tried to explain. The conversation was, to say the least, challenging for me.

Returning home with frozen feet and a chill that rose up my spine like a piercing icicle, I huddled in front of my space heater to thaw out. I was still reeling from the conversation and questioned my heightened emotions around the situation.

I felt mentally sound in my position, but emotionally triggered by my friend’s choice.

The next morning my head was nailed to the bed. There was a muscle spasm under my right shoulder blade that prevented me from lifting my head off the pillow! I felt like my body had been high-jacked by an incensed internal being. The aftermath of tension/stress overload!

So, I used a 3rd Eye Practice that allowed me to ask my body questions. It’s a practice that encourages my mind to take a backseat, while my body’s remembering can feel for the answer.

I place one finger lightly between my eyebrows. I let the sensation penetrate so deeply that the base of my skull widens back away from my neck, my eyes float upward and flutter under closed eyelids.

In this expanded position I asked my body, “what are you holding onto, what’s got you so triggered?”

After a quick filing of visuals, I settled on a childhood memory about my Saint Bernard Bruno. I thought, this can’t be the trigger! So, I asked again. And again, I landed on the Bruno story. So, I dug in and looked around to see what I could find.

At the age of 8 or so, I was letting Bruno out of his dog-pen to play in the yard. When exiting the pen his tail got caught in the gate’s hook lock. He pulled and all the fur and skin ripped off the end of his tail! As he wagged his tail blood was flying everywhere!

I screamed for my parents to come quick!

They came running and wrapped Bruno’s tail with paper and plastic. Then off to the vet we raced.

Bruno was fine. But I felt responsible for letting such a horrible thing happen. After all, I let him out of the pen. So, it must have been my fault that he got hurt in the doing. I decided, and formed a belief, that it’s very easy to hurt someone unintentionally.

BINGO! That “feeling state” was the very same “feeling state” I was having in regard to my friend practicing herbal medicine without a license. The guilt and protection my body held––my childhood trauma––was entangled in my clear-minded response to her.

It’s been a week of heating pads, epsom salt baths and resting on a foam roller, while feeling compassion for the little traumatized Tammy who loved her dog. I realized that I hadn’t unintentionally hurt my 4-legged friend, but rather, he’d had an accident. I wasn’t at fault.

In rewriting my old story’s belief, I’ve also soothed my emotional charge toward my friend. My mental position has not changed, but my emotional tolerance has. I can now extend out of my story into hers. And an ease, for her to be on her journey without judgment, has ensued.

I’ve gotten a second chance to align with my life and correct my skewed judgment of fault.

I can thank my friend for the opportunity to reframe this belief-forming story. As I look at it now, it’s been a constant undercurrent influencing my life. I have always looked at life through the lens of, “I could hurt someone!”

Self-aligned strength asks us to dig beneath the surface of our reactivity for a greater, more meaningful, self-aligned truth.