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Living my life thinking of my experiences in terms of stories and dramas has become second nature. It’s now easy for me to make the association that I only go into suffering when I tell an unhelpful story about an event occurring in my life. That story inevitably involves me placing myself in the role of victim in some form or another.
Therefore, if I decide to give power to the story of something being done to me, then I must accept that there will be feelings of suffering as a result. The story-that I believed into existence, only begins to lose its hold when I choose to take the broader view and see it as the story it is.
In other words, the suffering only diminishes when I choose to let go of the story and not before. I cannot hold on to my victimhood and return to peace. The two are not compatible.
Yes, I can acknowledge that the event had elements that irked me. Yet without fail, that irksomeness came because I had given away my power to another person or to a life experience. A power they didn’t ultimately have. I couldn’t feel diminished unless I was believing in the event as it was presenting itself.
If I know that I cannot be diminished by anything or anyone, then anything that presents itself in my experience as diminishing me; must show itself to be the story it is. Therefore my suffering is a choice and my peace is a choice that I get to make in each moment.
Our reality is based on our thoughts about events as opposed to the events themselves; so real can get real cloudy! But let me give an example from my own life of a full on ‘story of suffering’ that I used to embrace. That story went:
I’m not good enough.
That’s the basic story. That story, of course, was based on another story that stated: ‘I wasn’t loved well enough as a child.’ Which of course was based on a story my parents had which was: ‘I did not receive enough love, so I could not give enough love.’ I’m sure you get the point.
Now, back to my story.
I’m not good enough. Therefore when that stranger looked at me/spoke to me like that; it means they see I’m not good enough. When my partner doesn’t respond in the way I need them to, then that’s because on some level I’m not good enough.
When a project I started failed; it’s because I’m not good enough. When I let myself be vulnerable and then get hurt; it’s because other people aren’t good people. This is a slight variation I know, but at the back of that is: I’m not good enough to attract good people. It all gets very convoluted!
You can see no doubt, that my original story got attached to every subsequent event automatically, without my choosing. It was a story that was fully believed in, so it automatically got activated by the subconscious; that place where embedded beliefs live, and from where they dictate our response to life.
In order for me to let go of my suffering, I had to let go of the original story of: ‘I’m not good enough.’
This for me meant exploring the original story and identifying every story prior to that (my parents’ stories for example.) All of these false stories fully believed in and handed down through generations.
This deep-rooting was the means through which I released myself from the distortion of my first story of suffering and instead, stepped into clearer seeing. Each of us has to make that choice in our own way.
We come to see that if every event is viewed through the filter of unloving stories, then we are going to experience ongoing suffering; that’s all there is to it. We’ll feel it most potently the more believed in those unloving stories are.
Stories like: I’m not good enough. I’m not worthy. I’ll never find love. I’ll always be poor. People always reject me. I’ll never have or be, enough. I always fail at everything. Or even: I can’t heal, I’m too broken.
We cannot accept that we’re innately, whole and complete, because our clear vision has been distorted by these unloving filters. These filters do their best to refute our wholeness; so those unloving stories retain their hold on us.
For it is only our belief in our unloving stories that give them power and form. Without the power of our belief, they just fade into the collective unconscious waiting to become attached to yet another believer.
Believe in your suffering or believe in your wholeness, this and only this will dictate your experience of life. Isn’t that essentially what the sages have been sharing timelessly? Which shall we choose, I wonder?
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This post is republished on Medium.
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