It occurs to me that the way out of humiliation is through humility.When I feel humiliated by my situation or someone's (mostly imagined) response to me, I feel humiliation which is another word for shame. Shame is a judgment, the taking on of a certain belief, attitude - it's a judgment that's leveled only by my own fears and self-loathing., not tied to anything objective outside myself, to some standard that's been decreed from on high.
But when I open myself to humility, judgment vanishes. Letting go of it, I'm only where I am, full of acceptance for where I am. Humiliation is static; when I'm flooded with shame, there's no way forward. I'm caught in the prison of judgment. But humility looks only for what is; let me begin from where I am. Humility opens me up to the possibility that I don't know everything, that there may be another view, that there may be something I can or need or want to learn. Humility is a great bowing down, not to any other person or god but to my own shared humanity, a recognition of the human condition with all its faults and weaknesses and fears.
Humiliation is the child of the ego, of all the judgments ego creates. Humility is the gift of the spirit, the way to move beyond ego and find a path forward.
Thursday, October 31, 2019
Sunday, June 16, 2019
NOT OLDER, CLOSER
I read something the other day I really like - a writer paraphrasing D. H. Lawrence - some of us begin a long way from where we need to go and I'm not getting older, I'm getting closer...
The sense of a trajectory, even more a purpose, to keep going toward - what? - toward freedom, from all the things that block me, that keep me suffering, and freedom to be simply where I am. I know I am on that track, that one way to see my past is as a steady march toward connection to the deepest part of me, the place in which I'm grounded in self-acceptance, in confidence that no matter what I will be all right, grounded in gratitude for all that is and my place in it. I've never been more at ease in the world, welcoming and sure of my own welcome.
And yet...there is another track, the one most boisterous and demanding to be seen - the one that's all about the struggles of my everyday life - the practical - making money, cleaning the house, doing the things I say I'll do and think I want to do. The ongoing struggle with self-discipline, my default desire for isolation and simultaneous rejection of it - all the gettings and spendings that make up my day.
When things get the better of me, when depression blocks out everything and leaves me empty, passive, still...I remind myself there is another track, the one of deepening freedom. But to remind myself isn't to feel it; to say the words isn't to connect. Then I can only keep reminding myself, saying the words, until at last something shifts and I again feel purpose and hope.
The sense of a trajectory, even more a purpose, to keep going toward - what? - toward freedom, from all the things that block me, that keep me suffering, and freedom to be simply where I am. I know I am on that track, that one way to see my past is as a steady march toward connection to the deepest part of me, the place in which I'm grounded in self-acceptance, in confidence that no matter what I will be all right, grounded in gratitude for all that is and my place in it. I've never been more at ease in the world, welcoming and sure of my own welcome.
And yet...there is another track, the one most boisterous and demanding to be seen - the one that's all about the struggles of my everyday life - the practical - making money, cleaning the house, doing the things I say I'll do and think I want to do. The ongoing struggle with self-discipline, my default desire for isolation and simultaneous rejection of it - all the gettings and spendings that make up my day.
When things get the better of me, when depression blocks out everything and leaves me empty, passive, still...I remind myself there is another track, the one of deepening freedom. But to remind myself isn't to feel it; to say the words isn't to connect. Then I can only keep reminding myself, saying the words, until at last something shifts and I again feel purpose and hope.
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