B is for Being

It’s been a big week. I’m in the process of refining what I share with you and part of that process has involved me asking myself a lot of questions. Some of which are: who exactly am I trying to reach with what I’m sharing, and what was it that inspired me to start sharing in the first place?

All of these questions got me to look back at my own journey.

As I looked back at the last 3 years of my life, I realised a lot has changed for me. Two areas of my life have undergone significant change. My creativity and my relationships with others.

In this episode I share the journey leading up to the realisation which compelled me to start B is for Being and take a look at why it’s at the core of everything I share.

Buckle up, it’s story time!

Take a look at the core of everything I share.

It’s been a big week. I’m in the process of refining what I share with you and part of that process has involved me asking myself a lot of questions. Some of which are: who exactly am I trying to reach with what I’m sharing, and what was it that inspired me to start sharing in the first place?

All of these questions got me to look back at my own journey.

As I looked back at the last 3 years of my life, I realised a lot has changed for me. Two areas of my life have undergone significant change. My creativity and my relationships with others.

In this episode I share the journey leading up to the realisation which compelled me to start B is for Being and take a look at why it’s at the core of everything I share.

Buckle up, it’s story time!

Highlights and Takeaways

* I was creatively blocked.

* I felt insecure in my relationships with other people (friends, family and partners) and never felt like I could just relax and be myself.

* I was having a hard time in a relationship I was in and went search for answers on how to stop feeling so bad.

* Self-awareness and acceptance was the main theme of all the self-help books I read.

* Fear-bound energy (fearful thoughts and feelings) can be cleared with self-awareness and acceptance.

* Our authentic state of being is always there. And it’s always been there.

* The combination of self-awareness and acceptance, present moment awareness, and a compassionate self relationship form a powerful tool for self-transformation.

Show Notes

Creativity and Relationships

* Ben: I could feel this desire to create and express myself. At the time I was doing a lot of video projects, writing short stories and film scripts - but all of these projects I’d quickly lose interest in or find myself procrastinating about working on them and never get anything done. So I ended up with hundreds of unfinished projects.

* There were some times when I would get lucky and feel really inspired and sit down for one or two days and produce a video or even a song. But that didn’t happen so often. I was often waiting to feel that inspiration instead of working on a project progressively until it was finished.

* I wasn’t having such a flowing time with my relationships with other people. So my friendships, my interactions with family, my interactions with partners. This isn’t to say that these interactions were all bad and horrible, we still had great times, but I never felt like I could completely relax around others. And that might sound strange to some people who know me because on the outside I seem very relaxed and calm and chilled out. But on the inside I was always alert and watching what I said and did. I made sure I always had something interesting to say or that I was trying to be funny or crazy. And for me this felt like a necessity, like I always had to keep proving that I was interesting and likeable and intriguing for those around me to stay friends with me. And I even had the thought that people were just hanging around me because once upon a time they’d seen something interesting in me, but it was kind of an accident; like they’d seen me do something when I was having a really good day and then they thought, “awwh, Ben’s this really cool guy, he does those things.” I thought it’s only a matter of time before they discover how un-interesting I was. So I felt this pressure to be someone I wasn’t in order to maintain that connection with the person.

* Obviously all of this insecurity is going to be compounded in my intimate relationships. I was really fearing that the person I was with would uncover this complete mundaneness, this complete uninteresting part of me that I thought was the default me.

Practicing self-acceptance can be challenging while we're holding beliefs that we should be thinking, feeling, doing or being something different to how we are.

Unconditional acceptance of ourselves has the power to completely dissolve our strongest beliefs of inadequacy.

In this episode I take a look at two of the dynamics which can result from using self-help material before we've accepted our current mental/emotional state. These dynamics can keep us running in cycles of inadequacy and seeking temporary relief without ever actually addressing the core of the problem.

I share some of my own experiences and challenges with self-acceptance and how I realised I was using self-help material against myself instead of for genuine self-understanding and growth.

Let's not forget the 'self' in self-help

Practicing self-acceptance can be challenging while we're holding beliefs that we should be thinking, feeling, doing or being something different to how we are. But unconditional acceptance of ourselves has the power to completely dissolve our strongest beliefs of inadequacy.

In this episode I take a look at two of the dynamics which can result from using self-help material before we've accepted our current mental/emotional state. These dynamics can keep us running in circles of feeling inadequate and then seeking temporary relief, without actually addressing the core of how we feel.

I share some of my own experiences and challenging times with accepting myself and how I realised I was using self-help material against myself instead of for genuine self-understanding and growth.

Highlights and Takeaways

* We can use self-help material as ammunition against ourselves.

* Using self-help material as a temporary fix is easy to do but doesn’t touch our underlying core beliefs of feeling inadequate.

* All self-help material is designed to help us. But if we skip ourselves in the process we’re missing out the most important part.

* Accepting how you are right now dissolves any feelings of ‘I’m not good enough and I need to be better.

* Accepting ourselves is us accepting everything that we’re thinking and feeling right now.

* It feels counter intuitive to accept such a strong unpleasant reaction.

* It takes courage to completely accept everything you're experiencing right now.

* Acceptance is an on going practice. It’s not something you do once or twice and then you’re done.

Show Notes

* Ben: If we don’t accept how we are right now (thoughts, feelings, our current level of clarity and confusion) and go straight to trying to fix ourselves with self-help material, it’s very easy for us to use this new information to reinforce a belief that we are not good enough as we are right now. That we are inherently inadequate.

* We can use self-help material as ‘quick-fixes’ for our feelings of inadequacy. When we just look for these fixes and haven’t accepted ourselves first, we may feel temporarily better when we apply these fixes or read some comforting words but we need to keep coming back and finding new material, new inspiring words, new words of healing and hope for us to feel better again. And it’s possible to continue this process for a very long time without actually addressing our deeper core beliefs of inadequacy, brokenness, wrongness, etc.

* Without accepting what’s already there inside us (before searching for self-help material) we can easily slip into just looking for these quick fixes and staying in this cycle of not really changing anything for ourselves, but applying these ‘temporary relief band aids.’ We feel a bit better for a short time and then those feelings come back and we have to do it again. So nothing really ever shifts in that process.

How We Use Self-Help Material Against Ourselves

* As I mentioned first – we can use self-help material as ammunition against ourselves to reinforce our belief that we should be better than we are.

* I was reading The Power of Now a few years ago, obviously that’s a book that’s been designed to help people. There’s a lot of information about how to step out of compulsive thinking. At the time I was reading this, my belief that I should be better than I was, was still very strong. And I’m reading this information and thinking, ‘oh my god, I’ve got to stop thinking’ and every time I had a thought I started beating myself up for always being out of the moment, ‘ahhh I shouldn’t be thinking!’ ‘ah I can’t do this.’ ‘This book is telling me I should just be in the moment and...

A raw look at two of the biggest limiting beliefs my parents passed on to me and the tools I used to discover they weren't to blame.

As kids we were around our parents almost everyday. We looked to our parents on how to relate to the world around us, and just like a thirsty sponge we soaked up everything they showed us - both the good and the bad.

We watched our parents go through their own struggles and took note (usually sub-consciously) of how they reacted to certain situations, certain people and certain  feelings they were experiencing.

But why would our parents show us things which would make our lives harder and healthy connections with others more difficult? Why would our parents treat themselves and others poorly in certain situations? These were the questions I had as I began to dig deeper and deeper into my negative reactions which were causing trouble in my own relationships with others.

Show Highlights and Takeaways

Our parents have given us a lot of helpful positive beliefs and also the negative.

We don’t usually acknowledge the positive gifts as they enhance the quality of our lives and don’t usually get in the way.

The negative beliefs, cause friction within ourselves and in our interactions with other people. So these are what we notice as they can make our lives unpleasant.

Ben: I was in a relationship and noticing I was having very strong negative reactions in certain situations. At the time I was already in the habit of writing down my feelings, so I explored these negative reactions in my writing.

I discovered that I held the beliefs:

That I was inherently unworthy of receiving love, and I needed to prove my worthiness in order to receive it.

And that my default state was inadequate, that I wasn’t good enough just as I was.

These beliefs caused me to search outside myself for a sense of love and acceptance, and undermined all of my creative pursuits, how I socialised, how I expressed myself…

I asked myself why do I feel this way? I found that this was how my mum and dad operated. I saw that I was copying what I’d seen my parents role model to me as a kid. This was how their own relationship was and I was just copying what I saw.

It made sense to me. The two people that were constantly in my life as a kid were my mum and dad - I was relying on them to give me love and acceptance, so whatever they said I accepted. I wasn’t going to question how they were showing me to live.

And all these years later these beliefs were causing me some problems.

The behaviours they’d shown me in their relationship had started to cause me problems in my own relationships.

When I saw I’d picked up these beliefs from them I became incredibly angry. I couldn’t belief they would act that way towards each other and other people.

I felt disappointed, I felt let down and that things should have gone differently. Because if things went differently I would not be having the problems I’m having right now.

Why Would My Parents Show My These Negative Beliefs and Behaviours?

I wanted to know why they why the would act that way? Why did they think that would be a good idea?

I continued exploring by asking myself questions. Writing down what I’d discovered and asking myself: why would that be the case?

Why would my mum only believe that love only comes to you from another person when you’ve proved your worth?

Why would I believe from my dad that things are inherently not good enough?

I discovered they were behaving in that way, not because they wanted to, not because they were even aware of their behaviour, but they were just copying how their parents had done things.

But Why Would Their Parents Act That Way?

Why did their parents believe love only came from outside you and that people are inadequate by default and be better than they are.

I saw that these behaviours had just been passed on.

A raw look at two of the biggest limiting beliefs my parents passed on to me and the tools I used to discover they weren’t to blame. As kids we were around our parents almost everyday. We looked to our parents on how to relate to the world around us, and just like a thirsty […]

I met Eve at OM Power Yoga. She is my Yoga teacher. Her classes are fun, spontaneous and not afraid to flow in a different direction.

Her studio offers much more than your average dose of downward dogs. It has organically evolved into a thriving social hub with regular after class chai-time and spontaneous hangouts quickly becoming the norm.

Eve’s dynamic and ever-flowing energy has been a cornerstone of this evolution, but Eve’s own evolution has been far from average.

Following a period of intense accidents, Eve decided to make some changes in her life – to start making decisions for herself based in love instead of fear.

In the second half of this episode we dive into why it’s felt so difficult to take care of our needs around other people and share some practical tips which have made this process much easier, resulting in our needs being taken care of and others feeling respected.

I met Eve at OM Power Yoga. She is my Yoga teacher. Her classes are fun, spontaneous and not afraid to flow in a different direction.

Her studio offers much more than your average dose of downward dogs. It has organically evolved into a thriving social hub with regular after class chai-time and spontaneous hangouts quickly becoming the norm.

Eve’s dynamic and ever-flowing energy has been a cornerstone of this evolution, but Eve’s own evolution has been far from average.

Following a period of intense accidents, Eve decided to make some changes in her life – to start making decisions for herself based in love instead of fear.

In the second half of this episode we dive into why it’s felt so difficult to take care of our needs around other people and share some practical tips which have made this process much easier, resulting in our needs being taken care of and others feeling respected.

Tim's life is flowing with creativity, authentic relationships, and expansive personal growth that's taking place at an exponential rate.

The first time I met Tim I was blown away by his solid sense of Self and I noticed he wasn't looking to anyone to see how he should act or what he should do next; he was simply and completely just being himself.

During our conversation I discovered Tim hasn't always lived a life of such grounded flow. He experienced a big shift in his life at age 14 and then again at the age of 18. With the help of some powerful self-discovery tools he began a conscious journey into himself to release blocked emotional energy and become aware of his limiting beliefs and genuine needs.

There's a lot of heartfelt sharing in this episode. I share some of the fears I've encountered on my own journey to self-expression, and Tim shares the tools he's used to create the enriching and dynamic life which is unfolding before him everyday.

Tim's life is flowing with creativity, authentic relationships, and expansive personal growth that's taking place at an exponential rate.

The first time I met Tim I was blown away by his solid sense of Self and I noticed he wasn't looking to anyone to see how he should act or what he should do next; he was simply and completely just being himself.

During our conversation I discovered Tim hasn't always lived a life of such grounded flow. He experienced a big shift in his life at age 14 and then again at the age of 18. With the help of some powerful self-discovery tools he began a conscious journey into himself to release blocked emotional energy and become aware of his limiting beliefs and genuine needs.

There's a lot of heartfelt sharing in this episode. I share some of the fears I've encountered on my own journey to self-expression, and Tim shares the tools he's used to create the enriching and dynamic life which is unfolding before him everyday.