I sat with a new client recently for a reading. After Jane’s elderly father, a Baptist minister, passed away she’d had a very moving dream about him and became curious about the kind of existence her dad-in-spirit might be living.
We began with a contact with her dad, and after validating his identity through the evidence he shared, Jane’s father began to express his simple joy by recalling an old joke about St. Peter at the Pearly Gates. Jane had a hard time accepting this part of the contact because “Dad would never joke about God.”
“He loved everything about the Church and he always said serving God as a minister required being in a state of awe and reverence all the time,” she said. “He would never in a million years joke about Heaven or God.”
“He is filled with delight and wants to share that with you, and the best way he can do that now is with laughter,” I replied. Jane was having none of it and we ended our session soon after. As she walked away I could tell that this message had turned her off completely because she couldn’t square a light-hearted, irreverent spirit-father with the solemn and serious earth-father.
My client Kerry came for some psychic coaching. She was following an awakening interest in energy healing and looked for an intuitive action plan that would direct her towards the best modality that could certify her as “qualified.” I gave her an example at one point that was funny and silly, and she drew herself up and suddenly became very serious. “I really don’t think this is a topic to joke about,” she said. “I mean, we’re talking about the GOD FORCE here!”
Kerry watched me intently throughout our session, taking notes and doing her level best to keep the tone of our meeting serious. She was surprised I didn’t actively meditate and told me she had saged her entire home, removed all frivolous decoration, and had hung pictures of Buddha, Jesus, Quan Yin, and angels all around to remind her of the importance of keeping her mind on the GOD FORCE at all times. Whenever she said “GOD FORCE” her voice dropped to a whisper, as if the GOD FORCE might overhear her taking its name in vain.
Erin came in for spiritual coaching in her pursuit of a relationship with God. She’d grown up in a family that didn’t practice any religion and she’d never learned how to pray. She’d set up an area in her home where she lit candles and burned incense and tried to get to know God. It bothered her that her boyfriend ribbed her about her “altar” and made too much noise in the background whenever she was trying to pray. “He doesn’t realize how serious this is for me,” she said.
All three of these wonderful people were plagued by the toxic fog of low self-esteem (LoSE), though they might not consider so at first. I worked with each one a few more times after our initial meetings and and showed them how LoSE was misdirecting all of their earnest efforts. Once understood, Jane, Kerry, and Erin were able to continue pursuing their searches with more satisfaction.
LoSE frequently comes with a set of rigid rules that the LoSEr either rebels against entirely or follows with a gravitas bordering on obsession. Neither response is a surprise. Jane, Kerry, and Erin fell into the second category, toeing the spiritual line in the vain hope that simply by doing so they’d be rewarded.
In the miasma of low self-esteem, we LoSErs (I was one, too) understood that if we followed the rules for success laid out for us by our early Important Adults and Authority Figures, we’d experience happiness or at least feel that we’d earned our place in the world. Simultaneously our uniqueness and self-expression was often suppressed, minimized, or dismissed altogether until the formula for success was hammered home. We learned that following the rules made us good girls and boys, and that above all was the prize. Once we earned — and maintained — good girl/boy status, we could expect to relax just a little bit because for the moment we’d made the cut.
Entire cultures have pressured young people to fit in, from sex-role stereotyping girls away from the sciences in school to expulsion from churches or families for preferring the wrong gender. The message was “Don’t be yourself if you want to be happy. Follow these rules that make sense to us.” To do any different was to be seen as selfish, weird, anarchic, or subversive. To do so came with the classic LoSEr mantle of shame.
When LoSE has your personal sense of value so warped as to feel almost nonexistent, it’s no surprise that you’d take the rules very seriously. The punishment for straying outside of them is too painful or dangerous to contemplate. For me to do so felt like I would disappear. It was only because I was following the rules that I had any sense of being grounded in reality.
When it comes to spiritual matters or other matters that originate in the subconscious mind, such as dreams, emotions, hopes, and other “soft” intangibles, the mind of the LoSEr naturally wants to apply rules or some other observable, measurable process. We’re so ingrained to do it “the right way” if we want any hope of success, we can be our own worst masters.
One of the devastating results of low self-esteem is a pervasive distrust in oneself. And so often, any journey we undertake in the soft, intangible realm is not measurable because it’s wholly subjective. I remember when I was “learning” ESP I was searching for teachers and authors who could explain to me what my ESP felt like and when it was signaling me. Many of the books I read strongly suggested listening to my inner voice and hearing what my guides were telling me. I wasted years in a frustrated haze of failure because I’m not auditory!
We all have strong learning channels, and some people learn best using visual techniques, others kinesthetic or feeling styles, and some do best when they’re listening. I didn’t learn until much later that my two major learning channels were visual and kinesthetic. When I just listened to an instructor without taking notes or visualizing her ideas, I struggled to digest and comprehend. These are not learning disabilities, just natural channels of input that differ for each person. (If you’re interested in how you learn best, you can do an internet search for V-A-K charts, or type in Learning Channels. There are charts and “tests” that will help you understand whether you’re visual, auditory, or kinesthetic, or some combination of the three).
Yet there I was, trying to “hear” and failing miserably. I was following all the rules as these authors and teachers presented them, and yet the prize of satisfaction and accomplishment eluded me. In my low self-esteem I had one way of going forward: following the rules laid down by Important Adults. When that resulted in failure, I was left with nothing but the evidence of my unworthiness and an amplified low self-esteem.
The bottom line is that LoSE often demands that we take everything — especially seeking — seriously. LoSE demands discipline and chases us on our self-seeking journeys with a stick, its chant echoing in our minds: do it right, do it right, do it right. Breathing down our necks and taunting us with the LoSEr reality that failure and evidence of unworthiness is hot on our heels. LoSErs can be some of the most driven people you’ll meet.
When faced with a subjective journey, LoSErs expect that if they follow the same rules that objective tasks require, they’ll get where they’d like to go. But that misperception coupled with distrust in their own inner sense of themselves confounds even the most dedicated seeker. And it’s those who seek inner peace that need that trust the most!
When you begin to recover your inherent self-esteem (RISE), you accept the more subtle nature of the intangible information and recognize that it will likely not make the kind of sense that tangible data does to the conscious mind. You trust it anyway. RISErs realize that inner guidance and nudges from their intuition come from a place of love and knowing and sometimes — often — fly in the face of convention.
When I decided to leave my corporate job to open an office as a hypnotist, I was following my own counsel. Family and friends did their best to dissuade me because they were concerned I was making a huge mistake (I wasn’t). RISErs follow their hearts and dreams and have the confidence to withstand the pressures outside themselves to conform.
My client Jane wanted to have the feeling belief in Heaven that her dream had suggested, but at first was unable to step outside the rules about Heaven that she’d learned in her church. She had rigid expectations about what it meant to be in spirit, but was curious and open enough to eventually drop those expectations and trust in her dreams and feelings.
My client Kerry felt a calling to pursue healing but tried to apply the same rules of medical school to her energy healing. She kept asking, “Yeah, but what do I do? What classes should I take?” In time Kerry came to see that the answers were within her and that no matter who “certified” her, energy healing would always be subjective and she’d need to learn to trust herself if she was truly going to thrive in that modality.
Erin wanted to believe and experience God in her life, but her low self-esteem convinced her that there was only one right way to do that, and it was hidden somewhere in the sacred texts of various spiritual traditions. She said to me more than once, “If I can only crack the code….” We discussed an idea in the Jesuit tradition (founded by St. Ignatius Loyola in the 1500s) that suggests talking to God as you’d talk to your best friend, one who loves you without judgment.
If you find that you too take the “rules” very seriously, consider what might be driving that. Especially notice if you’re defensive about your process or rules, or if you argue or feel uncomfortable when someone challenges the rules you follow. You might be trying to seek through the toxic fog of low self-esteem.
There is one aspect in the self-seeking process that I do suggest you take seriously, and that is RISE-ing. If you’ve suffered from low self-esteem you must — and this is hard because you’re already at a deficit in the area you need it most — have the confidence to believe that a part of you is perfect. Not only is that part perfect, but expressing it in your own unique, necessarily different way, is the only way to the peace, contentment, and fulfillment you seek. The rules don’t apply here; throw them all out.
You must pursue your inner light of eternal perfection with the kind of obsessive study you learned to apply in the rational world. The key to this process however, is that there is no wrong way to do it. Remember, this self-revelation is entirely subjective. Nobody knows the one way to accomplish it or how to determine that you have accomplished it. It’s all in your self-perception.
This, more than anything, deserves your serious efforts. If you don’t make RISE-ing a priority, you will always be last in line, hoping for the crumbs of contentment that fall off the table of the rules you obediently serve.
Begin by thinking about your dreams and goals, and your unique expression of them. Give them serious consideration. Consider them to be VIP guests in your home. Make a place of honor for them. Your yearnings are serious business, but the expression of them ought to delight you, challenge you, empower you, and fulfill you.
Take the belief in yourself seriously. It will bring you confidence, balance, and peace of mind.
There’s no giant book in the sky that defines what is the best way for you to be you. The joy of self-discovery is what life is all about! If you suffer from LoSE, the toxic fog of self-misperception tricks you into thinking that life is all about toeing someone else’s line, and the “you” inside can indeed be defined and should/could/ought to fit into a set a rules and expectations someone else put in place. Yet we’re miserable when the rules don’t fit us or when, after a lifetime of following them, the reward of fulfillment eludes us.
RISErs know that their first responsibility is to know and express their own unique ideas, and the most rewarding vocations are those that encourage us to do so. Individual fulfillment can never be defined or measured by outside forces. RISErs know that they must trust themselves and how the spirit guides them; only then will they experience — for themselves — true peace and joy.
That’s not to say there aren’t good roadmaps out there to help us discover ourselves, but, like roadmaps, they are not the living experience of that journey. They are just guides, and your experience on the road is necessarily going to be unique to you. You can’t turn around and tell anyone else how it’s going to be either; you can only offer your experience and the helpful hints you used to navigate challenging terrain.
For example, I can tell you that I know what low self-esteem feels like because I lived with it for years. I can outline (and I have, in my book “Fix Your Screwed-Up Life. Recover Your Inherent Self-Esteem and Start Living the Life of Your Dreams”) suggested ways to RISE). But your LoSE and your RISE-ing will of course be unique to you.
Try to remember not to take the rules, the outside forces, and/or the Important Adults so seriously. Try not to take the spiritual seeking so seriously. You don’t want to be so heavenly that you’re no earthly good to yourself. Above all, remember that you don’t have to earn spiritual peace, freedom, and fulfillment — it’s your birthright. You inherited the right to creative expression of your SELF, and all the joy inherent in that sovereign Self.
You don’t have to work hard to be happy or to follow God or explore healing, ESP, mediumship or other intangible modalities. You simply have to trust yourself and respond to the direction from your inner holy light. That might just mean putting down the rule books altogether.
