12 June 2008

The Battle Between Desire and Trust

All battles in any form are internal. They’re the battle between two elements: desire and trust. What causes conflict in most people is that they give birth to a desire, and then they grow angry with themselves that they would have the audacity to give birth to a desire that is plainly not possible. In other words, they give birth to a desire and then distrust that desire at the outset. This is a very common phenomena.

Here’s a typical desire: “I want money, but I don’t want to work for it.” The objections to such a desire are immediate: “That’s lazy. That’s not the way the world works. That’s a dangerous thought; you could end up on the street with such a thought. It’s immoral to want something without delivering something in return. How dare I even think such a thing. My desires just might lead to my downfall.” And the objections continue.

Now, in reality, the objections are irrational. There are infinite ways to receive money without working for it. You could find out that your house is worth much more than you thought possible;You could receive an insurance refund, or a tax refund, or a renters rebate, or a gift of money from a friend; you could win a contest, you could be asked for the rights to your life story; you could be compensated for something you invented or created; you could find out your crappy little desk is worth thousands of dollars; you could find money behind the sink as you were trying to pull the cat out from under there (as happened with us); you could inherit money; you could receive restitution for something you didn’t even know you had a right to. Use your imagination. The possibilities are endless.

And yet, for some reason, many people think objections are rational. Objections are always irrational. They’re a form of purposeful obstruction. They’re an argument in favor of limitation. Ask yourself: Is limitation ever rational?

People who have a habit of thinking and speaking limitation will tell you that limitation is rational because it happens. So what. Just because something happens, this does not mean that it has to happen. It means that it’s one option. It’s like standing two feet from a cinnamon roll and saying, “I can’t have that cinnamon roll because I can’t reach it.” That’s absolutely true. You can’t reach it at that moment, but standing in one place is a choice. It’s not a picture of reality. It’s a statement about the choices you’re engaging. Because, with a couple of steps, you could have that cinnamon roll, but if you refuse to acknowlege the movement of your feet as a choice then you won’t engage the action. This applies to all desires. You can’t acknowledge limitation and expect anything to move in the direction of what you want. You have to make the lack of limitation rational.

If I had a dime for every time someone told me I couldn’t do something, I’d be a very rich woman. Sometimes, my mouth would drop as I heard someone exclaim (as I once did), quite vehemently, that I absolutely could not do what I was about to do. I’d think, “Why would this person limit herself so violently, and then why would she try to extend that limitation to me as well?” Because, to me, it was not only obvious that my choice was possible, but that I was going to do it (in this case it was law school, the woman stated that if I was married with a child that I had missed my opportunity to go to graduate school and that I had no right to even contemplate it. Obviously, she was wrong. Limitation is a choice).

Individuals aren’t wrong for indulging in limiation, but it’s not logical to make the leap into the assumption that limitation is rational. Limitation is irrational 100% of the time. No exceptions.

Now, I’ll make a statement like that to someone in conversation and invariably, they’ll say something to the effect, “Yeah, well I want to marry Angelina Jolie, and that’s not going to happen, so I think your argument is flawed.” The only reason people make statements like that is that they’re not accustomed to understanding their own desires. The guy in question doesn’t even know Angelina Jolie, so he doesn’t really want to marry her no matter how much he’s convinced himself otherwise. He wants what she symbolizes to him. He wants to be with someone that makes him feel like he’s a success, that he’s attracted to, someone exciting, and so forth. The mix of things he’s actually wanting has nothing to do with a movie icon. In fact, saying he has to be with an Angelina Jolie is, once again, indulging in limitation.

Of course, indulging in limitation is a big part of our culture, and I catch myself doing it all the time. In fact, I write blogs to figure out ways to jar myself out of these habits. I lay the logic out to myself to see if it really works the way the world is yapping that it works. Most of the time, it doesn’t, but changing the habit is still tricky stuff.
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Comments

# John Beder said:

Hello Samantha,

Thank you for your blog, I deeply appreciate your intention and focus to uncover the beliefs many of us hold to, yet are not aware of, in our living.

Rumi, the Persian poet wrote a poem called the Guest House. He wrote, “This being human is a guest house. Every morning a new arrival."  In the poem he advises to greet each guest with honor, as they all carry messages from beyond.

In playing with the metaphor, my guest house has a round table, like King Arthur, with a hearth in the middle, where all guests are invited to sit. I noticed right away that doubt is a frequent visitor. So I wondered, what makes my house so attractive to doubt. It’s as though doubt found a permanent home at my place. Along with doubt sat fear, worry, anxiety, and close to those visitors, sat a guest I call the Judge. It was the Judge who revealed the belief in his own necessity, told me that doubt too was necessary and natural. The world had a certain order, it worked a certain way, caused by certain laws, so I had better listen. For the first time, I stopped identifying with the judge, and regarded all those folks as guests, all with their opinions on what was necessary. By honoring every one, it occurred to me that the Judge reasons but doesn’t feel anything. Compassion, for example, is not what the Judge is interested in. The Judge has a strong belief in punishment, and enjoys a perverse sense of humor when he convinces me that he is the arbiter of reality. So, I wondered again, who else might be visiting? Well desire arrived, a longing for wholeness, for integration. It was then I noticed Intention, sitting very close to desire, and a new guest, or perhaps, a newly noticed guest, one I call the considerer.

I would like to state here, that noticing these guests can produce feelings of reverence and awe. A focus, a realization, that intention “is here” can easily be felt as a true blessing. We are alive, the world is alive, because of Intention. By focusing on Intention, one will “see” more Intention. The considerer, whose capacity to deeply focus with imagination, comes with a host of fabulous associates. To name a few that I have noticed when they “arrived” are, kindness, gentleness, perception, discerning, intuition, and inspiration. I sense that they all possess an inward impetus toward the experience of beauty, awe and reverence in the world.

As I continue with entertaining guests, I have noticed the Intention to focus away from mechanical conceptions of what life is or how life works. The Intention now is to focus on ideas of how Intention and Spontaneity coincide in the living of life. I have noticed that any mechanical interpretation of life leads away from the freedom and joy to experience life. One new idea I enjoy repeating when I notice Intention is “Lucky as Life”.  Luck, good fortune, or any words like that are all about the spontaneous workings of life, of consciousness. I am not obsessed any more with what the prevailing order might be. It is what it is, however, my focus is moving elsewhere.

As a thank you, I would like to mention that The Guest House metaphor came from Focusing.org,, click focusing in Afganistan.

I recall Seth suggesting that beliefs could be seen as furniture in a room or in a house. I find that by becoming a guest house, the visitors do all the work uncovering beliefs, and all one has to do is listen. In a sense, I feel that collectively, all that is heard from the "guests", makes the “sound” that Seth was talking about.

The skill of listening to one self is a core practice in Gene Gendlin’s  Focusing steps,  and I highly recommend it. I also thank Ruth Hirsch, a focusing instructor based in Israel, who helped mentor the ability to listen. It is allowing a deeply felt shift in my experience.    

With Gentleness,

John Beder

artist, author of Feeling Faces Cards

28 June 08 at 1:18 PM
# Samantha said:

Hi John:

I really enjoyed your personal interpretation of the guest house metaphor. It's a very calming and easy-feeling idea that also packs power. At least that's how I felt as I was reading it. I also think the "Lucky as Life" saying is something I'll be adopting. So, thanks for both!

Love,

Samantha

28 June 08 at 2:54 PM
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03 September 08 at 4:11 PM
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About Samantha

Samantha Standish is a writer and a former intellectual property and corporate law lawyer. She received her B.A. in history with honors, and her B.A. in Spanish with honors, in 1989 from the University of California, Santa Barbara and went on to get her law degree Cum Laude from the University of Maine School of Law. In her legal career, Samantha worked in government and the private sector, most notably in the financial planning and software industry. In her personal life, she’s been married for twenty years and has a fifteen year-old home schooled son. Samantha resigned from the bar in 2005 and has devoted herself to bridge writing (making complex ideas about space/time easy to understand for the average reader) ever since, focusing mostly on self-help articles for artists and writing bridge books on the side. In her words, “The first forty years of my life were fact finding; the next forty years are about applying, expanding and exploring what I’ve learned.” Her books can be found at samanthastandish.com. Samantha’s NWV blog is titled The Magical Life.