Day 368 - Learn to Smile without Guilt

I remember when I was in South Africa in 2009 and Bernard said to me:  “You have to learn to smile without feeling guilty.“

As always I could not immeditaley grasp the full extent of what he was saying. I reflected on his words and realised that I indeed did not feel comfortable smiling – and that I saw smiling as a way of ‚selling out‘. Because (my belief was that) I was not ‚being true to myself‘. Because ‚why do I have to smile‘?

This goes hand in hand with the apprehension I had towards the system in general and the world of money in particular. Because in the world of money, everything was about ‚smiling‘ and keeping up a ‚positive image‘.

So, why should I ‚smile‘ ?

Later on when I would be working at a job back in my country – I started to realise the meaning of what he said. In essence, smiling was neither positive nor negative. Smiling was simply a way of expressing myself by using my face. Now what I found is that the more I would practice smiling, the more I would start enjoying it.  Meaning, I would be able to put on a big smile at will, and within that actually enjoy myself. I remember one day we had to participate in a photo shoot for work because marketing needed our profile pictures and people generaly appreciated my photo because it was astounding how much I was enjoying myself on the picture.

There was no more uncomfortableness, no more ‚guilt‘.

This is also a point of walking through “morality“ regarding the rules I had imposed on myself in orther to be an “authentic person.“ I found that when I smile, the expression of me enjoying myself was authentic. It was not fabricated. Within me smiling was my genuine expression. This is also a statement that I am cool with enjoying myself – that I am ok with me having fun. There was nothing to hide and nothing to pretend.

Since then, I have continued to play with my ability to smile and used it as much as I could with people in my world. I found that when I allow myself to smile in this way people will be much more open with me and much more willing to share themselves with me. Therefore, smiling is also a way of opening yourself up to the world and stepping out of isolation.  

This is therefore a nice way of applying a ‚behavioral correction‘ within yourself and your world as support for an ‚internal correction‘.  

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For more information about writing, self-forgiveness and applying self-change, visit: http://desteni.org

For the Free online self-forgiveness course, visit: http://lite.desteniiprocess.com

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Day 365 - at the Edge of Storytelling

I like stories (films, novels, comic books, etc) and my partner likes it when afterwards I tell her the story in my own words. This self-forgiveness is about one of those instances where I was telling her a story and during the conversation I started to feel annoyed and irritated:

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to get impatient when my partner does not understand where i am at with the story.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to suddenly feel ‚abused‘ because my partner is asking me to explain more about the story so that she can follow better.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to take it personal when my partner at any given moment can no longer follow me – and take that as a sign that I am not qualified to tell the story.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to try and prevent my partner from interrupting me when I am telling my story, by raising my voice, instead of realising and understanding that it is ok to pause and let the person ask her questions.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to see it as weakness if I allow the person to interrupt me in my story.

I forgive myself to want to be ‚God‘ in my telling of the story and within that want to be ‚perfect‘ instead of realising it is not about me being perfect – but about creating an exchange of value between me and my partner.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to think that if my partner asks questions that means that I am not good enough and I have failed at telling my story.

I forgive myself that i have accepted and allowed myself to compete with my partner whilst telling the story – instead of developing enjoyment in me telling the story unconditionally and allow the story to be a dialogue as well if my partner has questions.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to think that I know best how the story needs to be told and in what order, and therefore if my partner is asking me to go back to a part of the story that she has questions about I will be unwilling to go back and insist that i must continue the story in the way that i am telling it.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to think that ‚perfection‘ is being able to tell the story perfectly – presenting all the elements perfectly – instead of realising perfection is about me being clear within myself in every breath as I tell the story and being able to ‚let go‘ of any expectations that I have myself as to how the telling of the story must go.

I commit myself to tell the story unconditionally – wherin I walk the story breath by breath – and I allow myelf to enjoy the sharing of the story, instead of feeling pressured and fearing that something will not be understood. I realise that at any time I can clarify things and add more information so that my partner can also learn from the story. 

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For more information about writing, self-forgiveness and applying self-change, visit: http://desteni.org

For the Free online self-forgiveness course, visit: http://lite.desteniiprocess.com

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Day 359 - Directing an emotional Conversation

As I was walking out of the garage yesterday, the concierge of our building came to me and asked if all the plastic bottles lying around the backyard were mine. It had indeed been very windy for a few days and thus things had been flying around. I said: „No, because our platic bottles are alwys tight in our blue plastic bag“. The blue bag being a recycling bag which we close with a pin. I added: „You need to tell all the neighbours (in the appartment building) that they need to keep their blue bags tight and closed.“ At this point, and seemingly without hearing me, he raised his voice and shouted: „Because I am fed up of picking up all the trash all the time – it looks like a dump here again! And we keep on cleaning it!“

I had already given him the solution to his problem, so I did not further reply to his comments. I nodded my head in a neutral manner and walked on to the garage. There was a moment where a thought popped up in my head that I should at least prove to him that the bottles were not coming from us, but upon taking a breath, I saw that this would add little to the point and in fact the point was not wether or not he agreed with me the but about whether I am clear within myself about my starting point. When I was done with my business in the garage, I walked past him again and said ‚bye‘.

This showed me that when I am clear inside myself, it is very easy to direct a situation. There is no need to take on the emotions from others.

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For more information about writing, self-forgiveness and applying self-change, visit: http://desteni.org

For the Free online self-forgiveness course, visit: http://lite.desteniiprocess.com

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Day 342 - Less complication

I have noticed change coming through within me, when it comes to having resistance to do something because I have set my mind on doing something else.

For instance the other day there was the need to organise our day and to decide when a specific task was ging to be perfomed by me, such as wet cleaning. Here I immediately responded saying that I would do it 'later' because now I have more urgent things to do such as studying. I said 'I study best in the morning' (and therefore everything else has to wait).

Yet my partner responded, 'Just do it now then it is done and you can still study in the afternoon. It only takes 20 minutes.' Here I normally would put up a fight and how dare someone else 'command my day'. Yet, the energy that I saw coming up within me - I saw that it was not going to be worth it so I decided to just 'pass' and I said: well, yeah ok I can do it now as well. And in that moment I let go of my idea-fix that 'I must study now and if I do not study then I lose out'.

What comes to mind in an interview with Joe Kou that I have listened a few times to - where he and Sunette talk about a moment where she said to him to 'drop it' when he was in a recation and arguing, and in that moment he was able to 'drop it' and let go by breathing through the emotions that were coming up in him. I would say it is an interesting interview to listen to as it really takes the listener by the hand in how to 'move out of a reaction' and 'what it will be like'.

In my example it was similar and I noticed a lightness within me when realising there is a certain ease within making such a decison, I would say that it requires a level of being comfortable with oneself to be able to 'drop such a pattern' because one will then choose for 'less complication' over creating stress and drama.

Here is some additional forgiveness:

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to perceive in a moment that what another is suggesting is somehow 'against me' and 'against my best interests'.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to demonise the other person in my mind - in fear of losing that which I had projected to do with my time.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to fear that what I had projected to do with my time 'will be taken away from me' and I will lose out against the other person.

I forgive myself that i have accepted and allowed myself to compete with the other person where I think that I must try to 'maximise my profit' and 'secure my advantage'.

I forgive myself that i have accepted and allowed myelf to be greedy and within that become paranoid in my relationship with others.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to stand as self-obsession in the center - instead of placing what is best for all in the center and finding what works best for both through communication and working together.

I commit myself to live the words 'relaxedness' and 'simplicity' when it comes to organising myself and prioritisig my tasks.

I commit myself to creating a foundation of effective decisionmaking when it comes to practical organisation and taking into consideration others as myself one and equal.

*For more information, visit: http://desteni.org
*For a (free) guided course on how to use writing and breathing as self-liberating tools, visit: http://lite.desteniiprocess.com