The Mother of All Choices
The Mother of All Choices
“Man must cease attributing his problems to his environment and learn again to exercise . . . personal responsibility.”
— Albert Schweitzer
You are encouraged to engage in the Self-Reflective Practice at the end of this Lumination.
Excerpted from
Remembering the Light Within: A Course in Soul-Centered Living
Chapter 13 (pages 117–123)
In the previous chapter, we discussed the challenges inherent in moving from your comfort zone into the Divine Unknowing, the most powerful of these being the fear that emerges when you dare attempt the transition. And nowhere is this challenge more prevalent than in Choosing to accept personal responsibility for your internal process, independent of outer situations and circumstances. We call this the Mother of All Choices.
On the positive side, it is by so choosing that you are empowering yourself with a personal “get out of jail free” card that opens the door through which you have an opportunity to liberate yourself from the pain of emotional suffering, including blame, shame, judgment, guilt, and hurt feelings.
Choosing to take personal responsibility for what’s going on inside of you is like your own Day of Deliverance—it’s the day your Authentic Empowerment begins. Each time you bring forward the Strength of your Heart and choose to take dominion within your own consciousness, you’ve achieved a personal victory. You become a Spiritual Warrior; you recognize that emotional reactivity and judgment are nothing more than feedback mechanisms that let you know there’s an opportunity available for Healing, personal liberation, and Awakening.
As you strengthen your “taking dominion” muscles, you’ll begin to realize that all the events of your life are neutral. We certainly understand that some of them are more challenging than others. What’s essential to know is that the thoughts you project, and the story that you’ve created about yourself, become a powerful attractor field that draws to you experiences that validate and thus reinforce your beliefs and your resulting story.
Now here’s the thing! You, and only you, have the inner authority to change your story. This fact becomes eminently clear as you recognize that YOU, and YOU ALONE, are the author! As you change your story by taking responsibility for your inner environment and applying Loving to the places inside where there is hurt or disturbance of any kind, you Awaken more fully into your Essential Loving Nature. In so doing, you transform your inner environment—and, lo and behold, your outer experiences follow suit.
The Challenge of “UnPeace” While
Traveling as an Ambassador of Peace
One of my biggest opportunities for exercising my (Mary’s) “taking dominion” muscles came many years ago when Ron and I traveled to Israel and Egypt with our Spiritual Teacher and 200 others as ambassadors of Peace. I had prepared diligently for the trip, getting all the recommended prescriptions and shopping for pretty little outfits such as a wide-brimmed sun hat to help me avoid bad hair days, a lovely feminine parasol to protect my head and face from the sun, sturdy walking shoes to wear by day, and sexy sandals to wear by night. I even purchased little white gauze gloves at the behest of my inner guidance while having no idea of their purpose or why I might need them—and, believe it or not, I was sooooo grateful to have them as I walked through Hezekiah’s Tunnel in Jerusalem in hip-high water and navigated the low, narrow passages to and from what is aptly named “the Pit” inside the Great Pyramid at Giza.
Finally, the appointed day arrived. We flew to Amsterdam, where we spent the night for my birthday, and the next day flew to Tel Aviv. Upon arrival we made our way laboriously through customs and then, late that night, traveled by bus to a kibbutz on the Sea of Galilee. It was late when we arrived, and so it was quickly to bed.
To my surprise, I awoke the next morning cloaked in basic black dread, wanting in the worst way to go home. I quickly realized that I had best tell Ron, as he would no doubt pick up on my energy and wonder what on earth was going on with me.
Summoning my honesty, I reluctantly shared, “I’m feeling basically dreadful . . . And I’m also feeling like I’d like to go immediately to the nearest airport and go home.” I paused, then followed with, “I’m only going to talk about this once (now), as I don’t think it’s going to be helpful for me to be whining and complaining about this throughout the trip.”
Ron gave me a hug and words of encouragement. I suggested that he go ahead to breakfast, and I would come along as soon as I could prepare myself to muster smiles and small talk. I was still contemplating the pros and cons of staying versus beating a hasty retreat to the airport.
I decided to walk toward the dining room in a nearby building. Then, in the lobby, I sat down to further consider my options. I realized I could choose to sink deeper into the unexplained fear and foreboding and suffer the self-victimization of “I’m upset because . . .” for the rest of the trip—a very unpleasant prospect, particularly because our trip was to be 30 days long. I knew that would mean looking out through judgmental eyes and finding something to blame for my feelings. This was a recipe for a miserable time for myself, and very likely for those around me. I swallowed hard and my eyes moistened with tears as I considered my plight. I was 10,000 miles from home on a trip I’d been preparing to take for more than a year.
On the other hand, I could summon the courage to make the Mother of All Choices by taking responsibility for what was going on inside of me. After all, nothing catastrophic had happened. I realized I didn’t even have a justifiable excuse—a good “because” for the way I was feeling! I decided that this latter choice would definitely be the High Ground.
I began flooding the place inside that was feeling doomed and down with Loving, remembering the Spiritual Psychology Principle, “How you relate to the issue is the issue,” and more specifically, “How you relate to yourself while you go through the issue is the issue.” After a few minutes of breathing Loving into the place in my solar plexus that was feeling foreboding, and talking with myself in a sweet and encouraging way, I began to feel a bit better.I knew I’d need to do a lot more of this by way of bringing Acceptance and Peace to the place inside that was experiencing “endarkenment.” Making this Self-Honoring Choice was a beginning.
At that moment, I heard, “How are you, Mary?” Recognizing my Teacher’s voice, I turned to greet him, flashed him a tenuous smile, and told him I was all right. I quickly got up and gave him a hug. He put his arm around me, and together we walked into the dining room. To me, this encounter with him was very affirming and helped me hang in there during what was to turn out to be a rather daunting, yet profoundly transformational journey. Believe me, the opportunities for taking dominion in my own consciousness took place on a daily basis throughout the trip.
Trading Justification for Empowerment
What we find extremely interesting is the variety of situations and circumstances that people share in which they experience emotional disturbance. And even more amazing is how their disturbance is almost always “justified”—there’s always some “because.” The author Werner Erhard was fond of pointing out this phenomenon when he remarked that, “I never met a man who was just late.” Had he been in the context of Spiritual Psychology, he might have said, “I never met a man who was just upset.”
As we move into the next few chapters, we’ll encourage you in enhancing your willingness to take 100 percent responsibility for what’s going on within your own consciousness. This one step will open you to a whole new world of choices that we’ll be sharing with you as we move forward together.
THIS CHAPTER’S PRACTICE
Freedom Through Accepting Personal Responsibility
You can use these empowering steps to support yourself in making the Mother of All Choices. You’re no doubt well aware that life tends to bring you situations and circumstances that trigger reactivity. So we suggest you choose a period of time (two weeks works nicely) to neutrally observe instances when you experience
any emotional disturbance. As one occurs, note the situation, what happened, and your disturbance. When you have suffi cient time, write your responses to each of the following steps in your journal. (Many people do this in the evening.)
It’s not necessary to experience a big upset in order to find value in this process. Often seemingly subtle disturbances provide rich opportunities for Healing and letting go. And here’s some good news. The more you work with this process, the easier it gets and the more facile you become at the process of taking dominion within your own consciousness.
-
Identify a situation where you found yourself experiencing emotional upset and blaming someone else for what happened and your reaction. What happened? How did you react?
-
Provide a safe and sacred space in which you give yourself permission to honestly share your experience and feelings using “I’m upset because . . .” statements. Give your feelings a voice and write out what they have to say.
-
Move into Compassion for yourself and your feelings. In being with yourself, use Soul-Centered skills such as Seeing the Loving Essence, Heart-Centered Listening, and Perception Checking.
For example, you might write something like, “I hear you, and I hear how challenging this experience is or was for you.”
-
Encourage yourself in accepting responsibility for what’s happening inside of you by separating the triggering situation (the outer event) from your feelings/upset (the inner experience).
For example, you might write something like, “Considering the possibility that my emotional reactions—my feelings—were not caused by what happened, is there another way I might look at this experience and my feelings about it?”
-
Gently work with coming into Acceptance: Acceptance of what is (what happened), Acceptance of your feelings, and Acceptance of the others involved.
For example, you might write something like, “What happened really triggered me, and I’m still upset about it. And I can accept that I’m upset and that I experienced judgment of myself, what happened, the other person(s) involved, and the situation itself. And I’m choosing to move into Acceptance of myself and my feelings and the experience I had. I know that I’m a caring human being who is learning how to take responsibility for my emotional upset regardless of what happened.”
-
Gently remind yourself that the part inside that feels angry or hurt is not all of who you are, and that by applying your own Loving to the place inside that hurts, you can facilitate emotional Healing. Remember, how you relate to yourself while you go through the issue is the issue!
For example, you might write something like, “I’m consciously choosing to move into my Heart, getting in touch with the Loving that resides there, and gently breathing that Loving into the place inside my body where I experience judgment and upset. I’m allowing myself to experience Compassion for that part of me that feels hurt and upset about what happened.”
-
Support yourself in recognizing that by Accepting Responsibility for your inner experience, which is an act of empowerment, you are embracing a foundational building block essential for issue resolution and Healing—and in service to your Awakening.
For example, you might write something like, “I recognize that by Accepting that my feelings are within my domain and are not caused by others, I am choosing to shift from the victim consciousness of blaming others to a consciousness of empowerment. In fact, I see it as an act of Loving empowerment for myself when I acknowledge that someone else did not cause my feelings of hurt and rejection, and that this upset is an opportunity for my own Healing.”
-
Acknowledge yourself for your courage and willingness to experiment with taking responsibility for your own emotional reactions, and to apply Loving to the place inside where there is hurt, emotional pain, and/or upset.
INTENTION
I am bringing forward the Strength of my Heart, Lovingly and Compassionately taking dominion within my consciousness by making the Mother of All Choices—taking responsibility for what’s going on inside of me, especially when I’m experiencing “I’m upset because . . .”
