#244 – How are you blocking your inner freedom?

When you restrict the experiences you allow yourself to have, you're reinforcing the locks in the metaphorical gateways to your freedom.

Every weekend growing up, my family watched a rather mediocre telefilm after lunch – the main goal being falling asleep.

We had three channels to choose from and one constraint, which my father vehemently imposed: the selected movie couldn't show kids suffering (illness, death, paralysis, kidnapping...).

Since telefilms are quite formulaic, we recognized a child's tragedy from the opening credits. If the music sounded a certain way, if the first few images showed certain objects, my father hastily switched the channel – "Not this one. I'm sure it's about a kid who dies or becomes paralyzed."

We laughed at his emotional "weakness," although I thought I understood: as child himself during the Spanish civil war, he'd already seen too many children suffer.

I learned this behavior, and trained my Ego to support it: if I don't like how something makes me feel, I avoid experiencing it and pat-pat, problem solved. Right?

Wrong.

Anything I refuse to experience will stay there, and will take over me when I least expect it.

The solution?

To become emotionally strong – which doesn't mean hard. Far from that: it means permeable and flexible. Soft but resilient, like a spider web.

Whatever comes our emotional way, we allow it. We let it touch us and cause whatever emotion it causes inside. We let the emotion unfold until it's fully developed, and then we let it pass through – without clinging to it, even when it was a beautiful experience.

Now, how to do that? It sure takes practice. You start by getting curious about your experience.

Any time you're feeling something uncomfortable, ask, "What is going on inside of me now?" Trying to answer that question will put you in touch with the emotion and you'll allow it to develop until it eventually leaves you.

Note: never try to understand the emotion or where it came from; that will take you to your head, where the Ego and Ghosts will want to take over, which is the opposite of what you want.

What experiences might you allow that will make you spider web-like?

Love,

Carolina