I've discussed empowerment and victimhood before, so today I would specifically like to write about labeling, limitations, and expectations.
Meditation: Day 18 - Taking Back Your Power
Synopsis: Every day, our lives are shaped by forces we may not even realize are part of us.
Some of the most prevalent themes that get reinforced in society are: winner and loser, lovable and unlovable, victim and perpetrator, beautiful and ugly, powerful and powerless. When you put yourself in one of these mental boxes, you lose the power to shape your own story.
Today’s meditation is about taking back the power to create your own life story, and to speak and act according to your own truth.
We often define ourselves by transient labels that do not speak to the unchangeable, infinite Self that inhabits within us all. The dilemma of label-attachment is significant, for our whole lives can feel shattered upon losing any of these externally imposed identities. If we define ourselves as "manager" or "runner" or "musician," who are we when we lose these jobs, abilities, or interests? Does losing these things change who we are as people? Or is that a permanent Self that abides?
Even labels such as "sister" or" "father" can be dangerous. For we allow these roles to define us rather than ourselves deciding how we want to define and show up in these roles. Labels are limiting and curtail our creativity and self-expression. Most of all, boxing ourselves into prescribed roles gives away our power and takes away our freedom: we become slaves to an idea of what ought to be.
Many of our labels come from what people or society expect us to be and do, though even more of those labels and expectations are our own projected outwards as a way to protect our insecurities and fears of failure. Owning our Self and our decisions is scary because we must live with the resulting judgment and consequences. It is scarier still to have our decisions and our Self "fail" publicly.
Thus, we place identity after identity and label after label over our real Self, like Band-aids over an open wound. When we pull back these layers of covering, we will feel more intensely. We will feel a heightened sense of anger, fear, desperation, sadness, and vulnerability. Pain will be more intense. But so will love. And laughter and delight and passion and connection. And only when our Self sees the light, will be truly be healed.
Mantra: I define myself by choosing who I want to be.
QUOTES:
PS Articles roundup:
Dating & Relationships in the United States [Infographic]
Can the White House explode the Barbie myth?
Deadly diabetes in 'unrelenting march'
Mississippi gov. signs law allowing service denial to gays
How Colorado Is Turning Food Waste Into Electricity
Study Finds Risks for Teens of Mothers Who Took Certain Antidepressants
Gucci advert banned for using ‘unhealthily thin’ female model
San Francisco Is The First US City To Require Fully-Paid Parental Leave
Cambodia to Bring Wild Tigers From Abroad in Fight Against Extinction
PPS
Meditation: Day 18 - Taking Back Your Power
(Chopra Center 21-Day Meditation Challenge: Shedding the Weight
Synopsis: Every day, our lives are shaped by forces we may not even realize are part of us.
Some of the most prevalent themes that get reinforced in society are: winner and loser, lovable and unlovable, victim and perpetrator, beautiful and ugly, powerful and powerless. When you put yourself in one of these mental boxes, you lose the power to shape your own story.
Today’s meditation is about taking back the power to create your own life story, and to speak and act according to your own truth.
Centering Thought: I define myself by choosing who I want to be.
Mantra: Vratam Ahum (I am the wisdom that embraces life.)
Quote: “How many cares one loses when one decides not to be something but to be someone.” - Coco Chanel
We often define ourselves by transient labels that do not speak to the unchangeable, infinite Self that inhabits within us all. The dilemma of label-attachment is significant, for our whole lives can feel shattered upon losing any of these externally imposed identities. If we define ourselves as "manager" or "runner" or "musician," who are we when we lose these jobs, abilities, or interests? Does losing these things change who we are as people? Or is that a permanent Self that abides?
Even labels such as "sister" or" "father" can be dangerous. For we allow these roles to define us rather than ourselves deciding how we want to define and show up in these roles. Labels are limiting and curtail our creativity and self-expression. Most of all, boxing ourselves into prescribed roles gives away our power and takes away our freedom: we become slaves to an idea of what ought to be.
Many of our labels come from what people or society expect us to be and do, though even more of those labels and expectations are our own projected outwards as a way to protect our insecurities and fears of failure. Owning our Self and our decisions is scary because we must live with the resulting judgment and consequences. It is scarier still to have our decisions and our Self "fail" publicly.
Thus, we place identity after identity and label after label over our real Self, like Band-aids over an open wound. When we pull back these layers of covering, we will feel more intensely. We will feel a heightened sense of anger, fear, desperation, sadness, and vulnerability. Pain will be more intense. But so will love. And laughter and delight and passion and connection. And only when our Self sees the light, will be truly be healed.
- Make a list of all the identities you can think of that you and others have used to define you.
- Under each label, make bullet points describing how you show up and show you are "supposed" to show up in each identity.
- On a separate piece of paper write only your name.
- Meditate on the freedom of openness and a clean slate at every new moment in your life.
Mantra: I define myself by choosing who I want to be.
QUOTES:
Spirituality
is meant to take us beyond our tribal identity into a domain of awareness that
is more universal. - Deepak Chopra
If
you're given the freedom to be anything, or be anyone, what do you do with it? -
Chuck Palahniuk
I am
no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent
will. - Charlotte Bronte
Most
people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else's opinions, their
lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation.” - Oscar Wilde
Perhaps
it's impossible to wear an identity without becoming what you pretend to be. –
Orson Scott Card
PS Articles roundup:
Dating & Relationships in the United States [Infographic]
Can the White House explode the Barbie myth?
Deadly diabetes in 'unrelenting march'
Mississippi gov. signs law allowing service denial to gays
How Colorado Is Turning Food Waste Into Electricity
Study Finds Risks for Teens of Mothers Who Took Certain Antidepressants
Gucci advert banned for using ‘unhealthily thin’ female model
San Francisco Is The First US City To Require Fully-Paid Parental Leave
Cambodia to Bring Wild Tigers From Abroad in Fight Against Extinction
PPS
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