by Elly van Laar | Oct 15, 2014 | Acceptance, Personal Growth, Self-compassion
Last Saturday I wrote how humor can help us take our own desires a bit more lightly, and allow us to relieve some of the shame and embarrassment around our feelings and wants. “Yep, I want to do a striptease, that’s just my thing. Haha”. Not to make fun of ourselves, but to invite ourselves to accept our own desires for what they are: just desires, not a reflection of our self-worth. Humor can help us befriend ourselves.
Rick Hanson talks about befriending yourself as a key ingredient of self-care. Being on your own side. Accepting yourself. Taking a stance for who and how you are, with all your desires, however you feel about having them. He offers an exercise to deepen your friendship with yourself. This is my summary:
- Sit in a comfortable position, and connect to your breath as it flows through you. A quiet, private space can help you focus and feel safe.
- Think of a moment, a situation where you really took a stand for someone, listened with an open heart, supported with care and compassion, protected them from harm, encouraged them to grow into their best selves, helped them heal and grief. A moment where you really took someone’s side and supported them wholeheartedly.
- What did you do? What did you say? How did you feel? Which needs were met? Which values were alive? Connect to yourself, while you put your hand on that part of your body where this experience resonates, to reinforce the neural pathways of what being a friend means to you. Breathe in all the positive feelings, all the needs met. Take your time to fully connect to this experience of taking a stand.
- Now extend this experience of friendship to yourself. Imagine you befriending yourself in the same profound way. What does that look like, how does your life change, if you take a stand for yourself each and every day? Reflect on this, and ACT on it! Throughout this day. Throughout tomorrow. Throughout all days. So that your friendship with yourself grows strong and helps you show up for who you truly are.
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You want help to befriend yourself? Contact me 512-589-0482 to schedule a free, discovery session.
by Elly van Laar | Oct 1, 2014 | Compassionate Communication, Nonviolent Communication, Personal Growth, Self-compassion
“Sorry seems to be the hardest word.” At least, that’s what Elton John sings.
“Sorry” seems to convey that there is something wrong with us, that we did something bad, and that -as a result of our action- we are unworthy of love, acceptance, and belonging. It is the beggar’s word in a one-up relationship, where I know what is good and what is bad, and decide whether you are good enough to be in the inside circle.
Sometimes this burden of self-incrimination turns into the opposite, and our “sorry!” becomes oblique, as we run out the door, leaving our spouse frustrated with our unwashed dishes and our stuff at the counter, with no intention to clean up after ourselves the next time we’re in a hurry.
It does not have to be this way.
Sorry can also reflect a profound self-reflective journey of looking inward and acknowledging the times we did not show up the way we wanted.
The ten days between Rosh Hashanna and Yom Kippur invite us to this journey of self-connection and reflection on our transgressions against G*d, our fellow living beings, and ourselves.
I understand transgressions not in the legal way, but as a longing to awaken to our true nature of love, compassion, and mindfulness, and to our innate desire to contribute to the well-being of others, including ourselves.
Atonement is the process of restoring our at-one-ment, our interbeing.
Nonviolent Communication calls it the cycle of Mourning, Celebrating, and Learning. We ask ourselves which universal, human, precious needs were unmet with the behavior we now regret. And we ask ourselves which precious, human, universal needs we did meet -or were trying to meet- with the behavior we now regret. And in that process of looking deeply, understanding, and accepting our choices, we open up to learning different ways to nurture all those needs: the ones we met and the ones we didn’t meet. It is the process of connecting to our values and that what is most important to us: life and love.
When we approach the word “sorry” as an indication of our learning, as a sign that we realize our unskillfulness in pursuing our needs, without giving up our dignity and worthiness of love, acceptance, and belonging, it is the easiest word possible. It expresses that we are human beings who search, sometimes stumble, through life, looking for ways to honor our needs, those of others, and those of G*d. It indicates that we are not stuck in the past, wallowing in our regret, but that we open up to life and making more wholesome choices in the future.
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You want help to mourn, celebrate, and learn from actions you now regret? Contact me 512-589-0482 to schedule a complimentary discovery session.
by Elly van Laar | Sep 17, 2014 | Compassion, Compassionate Communication, Marshall Rosenberg, Mindfulness, Nonviolent Communication, Self-compassion
Tonight I am gonna sit with my Sangha as silent witness as Lisa Coleman gets executed.
What good does my sitting do? How is my sitting on the steps of Capitol Hill with ten or less people, hardly visible, not even at the place of the execution, gonna make a difference?
I should be like Sister Prejean. She has been working incessantly for the abolishment of the death penalty for the last 30 years. She visits death row inmates, she travels the country non-stop to engage with the audience, she speaks on television and radio. Her story even got filmed as Dead Man Walking.
I should do so much more.
Marshall Rosenberg refers to Dan Greenburg to demonstrate “the insidious power that comparative thinking can exert over us. He suggests that if readers have a sincere desire to make life miserable for themselves, they might learn to compare themselves to other people. For those unfamiliar with this practice, he provides a few exercises.” Dan starts with the suggestion to compare ourselves to a male and female photo model. Just observe their body measurements and compare theirs to ours.
I don’t even need to do that exercise. Only thinking about it, makes me miserable: my belly is too poochy, my breasts are too small and hanging, the corners of my mouth growl down in seemingly dissatisfaction.
“Since physical beauty is relatively superficial, Greenburg next provides an opportunity to compare ourselves on something that matters: achievement… Greenburg lists the languages Mozart spoke and the major pieces he had composed by the time he was a teenager. The exercise then instructs readers to reflect on their own achievements at their current stage of life, to compare them with what Mozart had accomplished by age twelve, and to dwell on the differences. Even readers who never emerge from the self-induced misery of this exercise might see how powerfully this type of thinking blocks compassion, both for oneself and for others.” (Marshall Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication, 2003, p. 18-19)
Thank you, Marshall Rosenberg and Dan Greenburg, for your wisdom.
I will follow my heart’s calling and be true to myself. I will practice looking deeply to see how comparing myself to the achievements of others doesn’t nurture the peace, compassion, understanding, love, and support I want to bring into the world. I will honor myself and the contribution I can make with an open heart and sit as silent witness.
And that’s enough.
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You want help to follow your heart’s calling? Contact me 512-589-0482 to schedule a complimentary discovery session.
by Elly van Laar | Jun 21, 2014 | Compassionate Communication, Nonviolent Communication, Personal Growth, Self-compassion
Now that I’ve publicly declared I am committed to go vegan, I am noticing anxiety coming up. Thinking of my upcoming travels to family and friends in the Netherlands, and not eating slices of bread with Gouda cheese. Not eating pancakes with Jeroen, poffertjes with my mom. Not sneaking out of bed and eating ontbijtkoek with butter. Not now. Not ever.
All those moments of connection are history. And not only that, the easy strategies to comfort myself, when my social anxiety, shame, loneliness, confusion, and sadness come up, are history. No more stuffing myself up, so there is no space for them.
100% Veganism requires me to be more conscious of what and how I’m eating, if I ever want my food choices to bring more compassion and mindfulness into this world. That includes animals. All the workers who brought this food to my table. Do the laborers get decently paid? Do the chauffeurs get enough breaks during their drive? Does the store treat it’s employees with respect? And myself. Am I willing to compassionately embrace all the shitty feelings that hit me once in a while?
Bang!
Rather not!
Rather I feel happy, clear, energized, calm, self-confident, than all the unpleasantry of feeling shame, upset, loneliness, confusion, you know the drill. And if I have to feel these feelings, because they are too loud to be ignored, I rather eat. Eating is such a perfect strategy to silence these feelings. Whether it is sweets, cheese, chips.
I practice five minutes of mindful eating each morning. I recite the five contemplations as offered by Thich Nhat Hanh, I thank G*d for my enoughness, and I chew consciously. Only recently have I started to bring awareness to how my food lands. And I notice how often I continue eating, even though I am full. I want to eat for the full five minutes. I want to finish my breakfast. I like the taste. And most importantly, I like having a bloated belly. Not the look of it, but the feel of being stuffed. Not feeling too much discomfort, but forcing myself to chunk along. The last two weeks I stop, as soon as I notice that feeling. And I realize how overeating is an easy strategy to silence my uncomfortable, unpleasant feelings. Or at least, stuff them. Just like we do with our animal properties. Stuff them.
Maybe my veganism is actually about deepening awareness. Expanding my willingness to embrace all of my experience. And thàt is something I’m willing to say ‘yes’ to.
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You want help to embrace all of your experience? Contact me 512-589-0482 to schedule a complimentary discovery session.
by Elly van Laar | Jun 13, 2014 | Acceptance, Compassion, Compassionate Communication, Personal Growth, Self-compassion
I had my last conversation with my grandfather. After three weeks hanging out together, five times a week for half an hour a day, he tells me it is enough. It is time for me to get back on my meditation cushion and sit and breathe, and be by myself.
He wants to talk about scarcity. He likes the Lynne Twist quote in Brené Brown’s “Daring Greatly” (p25):
“For me, and for many of us, our first waking thought of the day is “I didn’t get enough sleep.” The next one is “I don’t have enough time.” Whether true or not, that thought of Not Enough occurs automatically before we even think to question or examine it. We spend most of the hours and the days of our lives hearing, complaining or worrying about what we don’t have enough of… Before we even sit up in bed, before our feet touch the floor, we’re already inadequate, already behind, already losing, already lacking something. And by the time we go to bed at night, our minds are racing with a litany of what we didn’t get, or didn’t get done, that day. We go to sleep burdened by those thoughts and wake up to that reverie of lack… This internal condition of scarcity, this mind-set of scarcity, lives at the very heart of our jealousies, our greed, our prejudice, and our arguments with life…”
“Elly, the opposite of scarcity is not abundance. It is enough… I wished you’d see that you have enough. Enough income, enough time, enough self-confidence. You don’t need to force yourself to get more. You have enough within you and around you to live the life that fits you. You don’t need to look for anything more. You are all set to get all the clients you want, to create a booming business, to thrive, to live and to love.”
Du-uh?
There is nothing lacking in me? I’m pretty, popular, smart, funny, verbal enough? I don’t need to “improve” myself? I don’t need to try to be a better version of myself?
Being myself is plenty enough, and exactly what the world needs?
I think of Carl Rogers and self-actualization: our innate, irresistible tendency to grow into ourselves, to be us in the fullest sense of the word. Maybe I don’t need to challenge that. Maybe I don’t need to force myself to be, do, or have anything more than life offers. Maybe I can trust that my current conditions are more than enough to be happy, and that I can relax in the flow of my energy.
I thank him. We have spent three weeks of humanizing my hero-image of him, of getting closer. Three weeks of deepening self-acceptance and self-understanding. A life-time of richness and gratitude. Yes, I have enough. More than enough.
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You want help to experience your enoughness? Contact me 512-589-0482 to schedule a complimentary discovery session.
by Elly van Laar | Jun 11, 2014 | Acceptance, Compassionate Communication, Personal Growth, Self-compassion
(continued from June 9, 2014 Inner mediation between my grandfather and my father, 2/3)
I take a seat on the couch, in between the grandfather-part on the right and the father-part on the left. I feel shy. I didn’t expect my grandfather to accept me for my Elly-ness. I didn’t expect my dad to understand that I try to live by my principles, not my considerations. I feel relieved. I have the acceptance and understanding I’m longing for. It creates the connection I want. It integrates different parts in me, which is healing and relieving. I have clarity about my next step: continue being me, just me. Do what I know to be life-serving. Have what I receive with love and gratitude.
Life is actually pretty simple that way: we are born, we live, we die. No matter what happens in between, we know we’ll die in the end, so we better live to our best. I once heard a beautiful saying:
At the end of his life, rabbi Zusha wasn’t asked “Why weren’t you like Moses?” He was asked “Why weren’t you Zusha?”.
The only purpose in life is to be ourselves. We achieve greatness when we fulfill our potential. We reach our potential if we let go of old beliefs, core convictions, and limiting self-doubt. I have found this inner mediation a fantastic tool to do that. I recommend it to anyone.
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You want help to mediate different parts of yourself and reach your potential? Contact me 512-589-0482 to schedule a complimentary discovery session.
Rick Hanson talks about befriending yourself as a key ingredient of self-care. Being on your own side. Accepting yourself. Taking a stance for who and how you are, with all your desires, however you feel about having them. He offers an exercise to deepen your friendship with yourself. This is my summary:
