Tag | keeping yourself intact

Keeping yourself intact

Jan 12th, 2012No Comments

“I care too much about myself to allow you to treat me that way.” This is the phrase that I have domestic violence victims internalize. Many self-development books and philosophies encourage you to open your heart. Find intimacy, take emotional risks, allow yourself to be vulnerable, let your defenses down, etc.  But few talk about keeping yourself intact while you do this.

Keeping yourself intact allows you to take intelligent emotional risks. Opening your self up to someone that does not value the beauty of your heart is setting yourself up to be hurt.  If someone does not honor the preciousness of your heart, they do not deserve your open heart.

Discernment allows you to evaluate if it is wise to open your heart to a person or experience. It is still a risk to open your heart to someone who will likely be gentle with it. You will still feel vulnerable. Discernment merely increases your odds that your open heart will be treated well. Can they handle emotional intensity? Are they critical? Do they gossip?

Or… are they strong enough to be gentle?

Until you find the strength to stop someone from mistreating your heart, it may not be wise to open it. The number one thing to do if someone is mistreating your heart ( a.k.a. emotionally abusing you) is to stop the abuse. You can stop it directly by saying, “Don’t go there”, or indirectly by leaving. But make sure it stops. Shame on them the first time they abuse you- that is the risk you take when you share yourself. But shame on you for allowing it to continue.

It all gets down to how much you value the beauty of your heart.

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Your first responsibility is to yourself

Aug 23rd, 2010No Comments

Before we can be of service to anyone else, we have to take care of ourselves. I call this keep ourselves intact. This includes: taking care of our emotional needs; taking care of ourselves financially; attending to our health; not allowing others to mistreat us.

I like to use the metaphor of the mother lioness. What is the first thing she does when she kills dinner for her cubs? She eats her fill. She knows that if she is not strong and healthy, she cannot hunt or care for her cubs.

Being selfless is great. Uplifting others and making a difference in other people’s lives may be our highest calling. But how can you do this effectively if you do not take care of yourself? Otherwise it just turns into martyrdom- which eventually ends up not being healthy for anyone.

We all have emotional needs. We have things that recharge our batteries. We have to attend to these things on a regular basis. This ultimately gets down to living a balanced life.

Yes, life can get busy. If you are raising children, it may feel like there is no time for yourself. But there has to be. If you do not take care of your emotional needs, you will start meeting them though interacting with your children. This creates confusion and emotional issues for your children. If you are in a helping profession, the same thing applies. You have to meet your emotional needs- outside of your clients or students.

If you are in a crisis, take care of it. But return to your balanced state and recharge your batteries as soon as the crisis passes.

Because… there are people counting on you. If you do not take care of yourself, how can you possibly be there for them?

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Point your boat in the right direction and let go

Dec 16th, 20091 Comment

Choosing and understanding the nature of you forthcoming interactions is essential. I have written several blogs on skills like “setting parameters” and “keeping yourself intact” to put yourself in a position to have clear and fulfilling interactions. But… once you have set up your interaction properly, it is vitally important to let go and surrender to the experience. I picture this as pushing your boat in the right direction before you let go and experience where the river takes you.

Most people are good at one or the other. Some of us are good at planning our interactions. These “planners” set up everything just right, but often do not get out of their head so they can let go (of control) and surrender to the experience. Life is not very fulfilling or fun for planners.
Others of us are good at letting go and flowing with experiences, but do so without much forethought. These “free spirits” often surrender to experiences that are not conducive to what they are after and impulsively act without considering the effects of their actions. Free spirits often do not create the life they really want.
Why not do both? We could point our boat in the right direction and then let go. We could briefly consider if the experience in front of us is good place for us to be, what our parameters and intentions are, and what the possibilities and likely effects are. Then we could make our choice and surrender to the experience. We trust ourselves and our “survivability” enough to let go and surrender to the unknown. We might even lose ourselves in the experience (that could be fun). If the experience starts to go south, we could step back, repoint our boat, and then jump back into the experience again- or leave. We have the rest of our lives to analyze it, but just that moment to experience it.
So how does that float your boat?
, , , , , Create the Life You Want

Sacred space and keeping yourself intact

Nov 18th, 2009No Comments

What is sacred to us are the things that are most important to us. When we share these parts of ourselves we become exposed and vulnerable. We have an emotional and spiritual need to share these sacred things with people. This is what intimacy and closeness is. I refer to this as allowing them into our “sacred space.”

It seems that something so important and vulnerable as allowing someone into your sacred space ought to have some ground rules. The number one parameter for someone in your sacred space is that they respect and honor what is sacred to you. This is not a place for them to criticize, make fun of, or disagree with what is sacred to you. This is not about them. They are in your world now. They are either able to accept and respect what is sacred to you or they are not.
If they are not able to respect your sacred space, it is your responsibility to yourself to get them out immediately. This is called “keeping yourself intact.” They have lost the privilege to share that most beautiful part of you. Not removing them and protecting this vulnerable part of yourself leads to deep emotional wounds and difficulty trusting people.
Removing them from your sacred space is doing whatever it takes to take away the ability for them to continue to disrespect that sacred part of you. There is no correct way to do this. This is not about assertiveness or honest communication. This is damage control. You may not be feeling especially strong after someone just violated your trust. You may be in shock. Saying something as as simple as, “I have to get going now,” or, “It is getting late.” could work. You could change the subject or simply leave. You can confront them or explain things to them later, but this will not happen in the middle of your sacred space.
It seems only fair when you do that most courageous act of sharing yourself, you do so in a manner that keeps you intact. Ultimately, this leads to trusting yourself (to keep yourself intact), so you can share again another day.
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