Two simple questions with very different answers if we are not fully present and able to see the truth. It’s like my mentor Wayne says to me all the time. “there is what is, and then there is what is said about it”. This is a post about my process of understanding context. It wasn’t until I understood context that I could get some traction on how I was unconsciously playing the roll of the victim. As long as my ego was in control and I was not able to see the truth, I had no ability to do anything about it.
Context used to be something I wasn’t able to fully understand. When I don’t understand a word, I always look it up and do my best to understand it better. But for some reason when I first looked up context, I still could not get to the real essence of the word. What I didn’t realize was that my ego most likely did not want me to understand context because then I would realize that the story I was telling myself was a lie. If you have not already read my last post “What is the story you tell yourself” go ahead and read it if you like and you will have some better context as to how I came to understand the meaning of the word as well as how I was making my story mean something about me… the most simple and best way to put it is from Oxford dictionary… Context is “a frame that surrounds the event and provides resources for its appropriate interpretation”. However, when it comes to our whole life, it could have a different description. I believe it was said best in an essay written by Murray Stein on Individuation. You see, the reason I could not “get” context fully, was because I was still operating from a child’s perspective. I had not truly become an adult. Here is her description of “individuation”. “The assessment of individuation describes a person’s conscious and unconscious assumptions and attitudes: about the basis and sources of identity and sense of self worth, about the quality and meaning of relationships to other people and to the world at large, about the energy (or the absence of it) poured into personal striving and ambition, about the objects of desire and passions that lead a person into the highways and byways of life, about the focus of life’s meaning.”
Living in my story was all I knew. I used to think my thoughts were me. I was totally identified with the narrative in my head and it took rigorous practice of challenging that story to begin to even crack open the shell around my heart I had created to protect myself. That is why it was so important for me to get coaching. Everything we experience in our lives may or may not be clouded by our current mood, attitude, preconceived notions, cognitive biases, and or defense mechanisms our ego created, and continues to create when we experience trauma and helps us survive…at all costs. That is, until we start to wake up to the reality of life. As I started to wake up and realize the truth, my ego was challenged and it was confusing, scary, painful, and confronting. When the ego realizes we do not need it any more to protect us, it will do anything to try to survive. I found myself compulsively rationalizing and justifying my choices and actions constantly and I felt like I was going crazy. Turns out it was all part of the process. You see I was realizing I was an addict. I was addicted to my story and the drama that went along with it. I was addicted to being in pain. As much as I did not want to admit it, I was addicted to being a victim.
The process of waking up was learning a new language. A language of responsibility vs. the language of victimhood. It was not only about the language I spoke. It was just as much about how I listened, heard, and Interpreted the words that others spoke. There is a distinction to be made between what someone says and what context they are coming from and what I hear and what I am making it mean. There used to be a lot of space between the two. I was challenged in a seminar once to be honest about how I characterized my partner at the time. As I wrote down the ways in which I characterized her, I realized how much anger and resentment came up. I was confronted by the reality that I was actually projecting the things I unconsciously didn’t like about myself, or my past, on to her. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I had good things to say about her too. I realized though if I was characterizing her based on my own context and how I judged and interpreted her words and actions and always made them about me, it was impossible for her to show up to me any other way. If I believed that I was un wanted and un lovable then I was seeing her through the eyes of the hurt little boy I was so good at pretending not to be. As soon as I was able to make that distinction I could see clearly she was loving me in the best way she could. I called her that night and shared with her honestly how I was characterizing her. It was terrifying and I felt so guilty. I never wanted to hurt her, however I realized I was not being authentic if I couldn’t tell the truth about how I felt. Sharing with her the truth about how I thought she was selfish, sarcastic, and acted like a victim all the time making everything someone or something else’s fault was hard. I would take everything she said and make it about me. It woke me up to how selfish I was. It was even harder telling her that I realized I did it to be right about the story I told myself. What I recognized is that since my context for life and relationships was that I was un wanted, coming from that perspective that I chose to live by out of my experience as a 3-4yo little boy, how could she show up to me in any other way? To my surprise, she actually thanked me for telling her. And she forgave me. When I returned home a few days later I was in for a shock. I got a further lesson in context and the creation of it. Because I showed up authentic in that radically honest phone conversation, little did I know, that created a new context for our communication and relationship. One hard conversation was the first domino in a more open and honest dynamic between the two of us. I went first and it gave her the courage to speak the truth to me as well. I felt more connection with her than I had felt in the 11 years we had lived together. Regardless of how hard the things she had to say were to hear, it felt so amazing to be heard and also have the clarity and capacity to actually hear her, for real this time. We had a relationship built on dysfunction and addiction. An unspoken agreement to meet each others needs in return for unconscious, conditional love. For the first time being able to see the truth about it felt like a new beginning. An opportunity for change and growth that was not available until we could see the truth about where we were at. Like Wayne says, “You can not leave a place you have never been.” It’s interesting how blind we can be to exactly where we are at.
Another thing that is interesting to me is that I had read so many books that pointed at this level of truth and until I was confronted and challenged I was still not able or willing to access that level of accountability. One of the books that stands out to me is The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide To Personal Freedom, written by Don Miguel Ruiz and Janet Mills. The book is full of great wisdom and insight. However without being radically honest and recognizing the context I was living in, it only got me so far. That reminds me of another book, Radical Honesty, written by Brad Blanton. A must read if you are interested in discovering your voice and the truth about your life. This is why it is so important to surround ourselves with people who challenge us and our narrative. People with integrity and the strength to ask us if we are telling the truth or are we caught up in the story we are telling ourselves. People who are a voice for possibility and transformation. The problem is, until we are ready to be truthful, we will attract the people who will affirm and support our context we formed in childhood. It’s familiar and feels safe because it’s what we know. Living in the realm of what we know is not where life happens. Life happens now, and it happens when we start to open up to the things that we don’t know. It is a challenge because we do not even know what we don’t know. Thats what makes life so amazing.
So the next time you get your panties in a bunch, ask yourself what the truth is about what you are experiencing. When was the first time you felt this way? Is this a pattern in your life? How are you characterizing the person you are dealing with? How are you interpreting someones words? Are you making it about you, or is it really about them? How is this a reflection of the story you are projecting? After all, until we can be truly present and radically honest, our life experience is merely a reflection of our own story or context that we are projecting. Are you living in a story or are you committed to living a life of integrity, authenticity, Love, and abundance? Your ability to distinguish how you make distinctions and interpret information and communication will be equal to the quality of your life experience.