2014 is a NEW BEGINNING! The holiday season saw lots of engagement with family and friends where I had the opportunity to observe mySelf engage with so many different aspects of mySelf. One of the things I noticed, outside of me, was no being the default answer to questions or opportunities by others. So I got curious and asked mySelf, “how is this about me?”
In the past two days I engaged in conversations with Susan Weeks and Angela Arbuckle and the conversation revolved around me saying no instead of YES. The many spaces and places where no is my default. The stories I created around saying no, in that it gives me space, that it’s easier to change from a no to a yes, rather than from a yes to a no.
On a much deeper level, saying no allows me to not have to ‘deal with’ or ‘see’ an aspect of myself I have judgements about. Judgements about how I perceive myself or how others will perceive me. There is ‘shame’ attached to yes in some way and to avoid the shame I say no. Genius! And, that does not change my life. I feel so many sensations as I write this, as I choose to reveal this in this space to everyone who chooses to read this. As we know it never ends, this is another opportunity for me to reveal my vulnerability to mySelf out loud, publicly.
Intimacy and vulnerability are intricately intertwined within me. In a recent conversation I could feel confusion swirling around inside of me, and in that space, I go into the gap. I have no thoughts, no answers and the pressure to come up with a response is intense and sometimes, to be truthful, more often than not, I default to what I know, and in those moments, my answer is NO. I also noticed that there are times I say no and change my mind, and yet I still hide, I do not reveal the YES that has emerged inside of me. I am left in the wanting, as opposed to choosing, differently.
In a conversation this morning with a great friend, I discovered that I often say I am ‘unwilling to.’ And in a breath it occurred to me to shift the statement to I am willing to… that is my YES. Energetically as I declare what I am no longer willing to do, or engage, I am in no. In choosing to declare what I am willing to engage, or do I am in YES.
This feels very different inside of me, a massive shift in who I have know myself to be is in progress, I feel it as I type these words, I am BECOMING in this moment.
I choose to shift from saying no to something or someone outside of me to YES, to ME!!! Woohoo here comes my life!
Thank you for reading and/or listening…and now you are feeling…connected to the content? Agitated? A range of emotions you can’t quite put your finger on?
Thanks for posting this Lisa. For me, turning the whole experience into a positive ‘Yes’ along with ‘this is what I am willing to do” opens up so many more possibilities than the status quo, and this small, subtle adjustment enables all of us to experience the choice of wanting more. Saying this out loud changes everything.
Thanks Chris,
since writing this blog I have caught myself shifting from saying “I am unwilling, to I am willing to…” more and more. It’s a small change, and yet the internal shift is massive. I have also let go of judging and categorizing the sensations inside of me as positive and negative. When I do this, I find I give mySelf more space to accept what is presenting, as a result I am able to relax more fully into whatever state of BEING I am in!