I have just had the MOST interesting week! This past week I gave myself a golden opportunity to see more of me, appreciate myself and gain a little more insight into the human condition.
I have been studying metaphysics in one form or another since 1970, and a good many of those first years of study were spent with me trying to find a way to overcome or supercede the human condition. My sense of fairness came into play, and I think I had a little victim consciousness left over from my childhood, so it seemed to me that if I could stop doing all those pesky, unproductive, unfulfilling and painful human things that somehow my life would be wonderful.
I worked on that long enough to understand that it wasn’t possible. By 1989 I had quit studying with my current teachers and had struck out on my own journey of discovery. I felt at loose ends. I tried to keep using some of the tools I had in my bag of tricks, but I wasn’t sure how to fit them into my life. That was my first experience of the joys and pains of “the fertile void.” There was nothing to do but keep hanging out with myself and see what happened.
In the process, I began to see being human in a different way. I got tired of being down on myself for not being, doing or having what I imagined was “better.” And instead of trying to stop being a regular old “human being” I started looking at what it actually is to be one. In the process I came across some really lovely people who guided me to open my eyes and see things differently. One was Byron Katie, who now travels the world teaching The Work. Another was John Demartini, who also travels the world and teaches the Quantum Physics of Emotions (I like to call it that, anyway, even though he calls it the Demartini Method) and both of them keep showing us ways to appreciate and honor all the aspects of being human.
And of course, I still have old niggling beliefs inside my cobwebby mind that say I should already know things, I should have figured all this out by now, so sometimes I don’t actually use the things I have learned, but instead get out the old self-flagellation stick and use it vigourously. But when my mind clears, I remember to love myself and how human I actually am.
I was driving today thinking about how lovely it is to still be naive at my age (almost 60). And that I feel very vulnerable and scared some of the time. And I still have this thing inside me that wants to see and believe the very best about people. And that sets me up for disapointment from time to time. So — do I get mad at myself when I am disappointed? Do I wish that I could not be that human?
My answer is no. I’m okay with feeling that way. I’m not okay to carry it around as a symbol of my victimhood — but I am okay with having rough moments, working through them, getting help and finding that I love myself through the whole process.
So on with the human condition! May I enjoy it so much that it keeps making my life a seeming hell from time to time — and gives me a sense of accomplishment when I find more of myself in the process. I’m starting to get that this is what loving myself is.