A YOGI CHA BLOG

It’s always personal – for you

Jung said that it would happen in your 30’s. Maybe these days it’s less predictable and it happens earlier or later since our society is going through some kind of individuation process of itself. But I guess it’s a question of having trialed and error one too many times. At some point, if I have the luxury to take some time for myself, we begin to look at WHO we are.

What makes you, you?

Have you ever wondered where the ideas you have of who you are really come from?
How come we feel so strongly about certain things and how come we sabotage for ourselves in situations that seem so clearly good for us in hindsight?

Just how much do we make it real just by saying that “we’re just not good at it”?

Why do we let guilt and fear control so much of what we say and how we act?

Have you ever wondered why you have an addiction to this, that or the other?

We are born into this world fully trusting ourselves and others but we are early on shaped according the society’s mould. Our caretakers are doing this to us so that we survive in this world and we are adapting to it, also as a way to survive. The way that we relate to the world starts to take place. How we deal with other people, the same gender as well as the opposite, to older and younger people than us, to familiar faces and to strangers.

And more so: how we relate to ourselves is based on this perception.

These ideas, these impressions or these BELIEFS become our reality and like a thermostat set to keep an average degree in a room, we will always oscillate back to what is familiar when our reality is being questioned with new ideas. There is no need for us to walk around on a daily basis and think about these beliefs, there are far too many new impressions and experiences to take in for us to have space for. So these beliefs are safely embedded in the subconscious mind.

The subconscious mind is a part of us, just like the conscious part of ourselves, it is just hidden so that we can think about more urgent matters. Like a programmed machine, our body contains the information necessary to survive so that we can react without even having to think about it when needed. Our fear responses are triggered when a threatening situation is approaching and we learn to sublimate painful feelings with different kinds of distraction, internal and external. You can see that in our patterns of behaviour that we develop but also in the addictions we get used to having (addictions are not just of toxic substances or social media. We are addicted to most of the things that gives us pleasure).

But whatever we push aside, comes back knocking on the door in a different shape or form. When we adapt to the group, we loose of our authentic responses in some situations. When we are instructed that negative emotions are not good (because they make the other person feel uncomfortable) we push it away in order to show something more acceptable. But like mentioned earlier, nothing ever goes away. So it is stored in the subconscious mind instead. It is stored in the body.

This is why we do things that seems counterproductive and doesn’t seem like moving away from pain even if it is…
If the pain behind the symptom is greater than the damaged done by the fix, we will keep damaging ourselves. It’s logical. The greater the pain, the harder to find its root. This is why we find superficial enough reasons to blame our behaviours in adult life. This means: we think we’re upset with our boss, we think we’re sad over a breakup, we believe we smoke to look cool, we drink because we want to loosen up… but none of it is the real truth. So we cannot change the habits because we can’t see the forest for all the trees.

When we awaken from the slumber of not wanting to understand the ways of the mind, we can begin to see the whole picture.

Einstein said its up to you to decide wether you live in a universe that’s hostile or a universe that’s supportive. What you focus on, you will fill your universe with. This is why we want to create as much EASE as possible, so that our world will be EASY. It goes with creating a pleasurable environment inside and therefore outside of ourselves.

This is the hard part. Because it will demand your commitment.
You need to learn how to focus, how to direct your attention for a prolonged time towards what you wish to have your world filled with. You need to cultivate this focus so that it becomes your habit, that it becomes familiar to you and that you will easily evoke it in your minds eye, in your vision. Whenever you want.

And this is where most of us stop.
Is it that we’re too lazy to do the work or is it that we’re afraid it would actually work. It would mean we would have to change. We probably don’t think that consciously. We probably think the opposite, that it would maybe not work. So why bother trying?
What if I try and I fail? In any case, I’m not good at trying new things because I usually don’t stick to them. And somewhere in that twisted mind, there is comfort in those ideas. Because it feels familiar. Because it feels like someone you know. It corresponds to the IMAGE you have of YOU.

In my new masterclass (www.yogicha.com) you will be introduced to this topic and what to do about it! Make your mind your friend instead of foe!