Mind Set Go

Less than a year and a half ago, I was absolutely crushed by some things that someone said to me.  Crushed.  I have had an enormous weight on my shoulders ever since.

The word “fear” is but a symbol of something very powerful.  What am I, then, afraid of and unable to process?  Me, a person who overcame the fear of jumping out of a plane at 14,000 feet after five days of meditation.  Me, a person who “prides myself” in feeling extreme joy for others’ successes and accomplishments.  Me, a person who gets along with other people, embracing empathy and kindness that even strangers identify.

I have been able to forgive often.  But in this case, it has felt that a great internal harm has been lingering inside me.  I am not fearful of forgiveness, itself.  No, it is not that at all.  I am not angry, either—just utterly sad in a way I wouldn’t categorize as depression.  Just who do I think deserves forgiveness, and is true forgiveness such a self-centered act?

I have been bullied before.  I remember quite well a girl on the elementary school bus who badgered me daily.  I suppose her motive was: because I was there?  Because she could?  It hurt, and it hurt a lot.  Some bigger person (literally and figuratively) came to my rescue one day, an action I’ve never forgotten.

When I was attacked by three poodles while selling Girl Scout cookies, I didn’t fight back.  Instead, I got on my bicycle and rode away as the attackers proceeded to continue the attack.  Later, that night, at the dinner table I was asked why I didn’t kick them off of me.  I honestly said, “Because I did not want to hurt them.”

In 8^th grade, many of us were tormented by a bully.  She followed us into the bathroom, beat on the doors and was mean for no apparent reason.  We all knew she had her own demons.  Later, I had the “opportunity” to expose some unbecoming traits and actions she had, but I chose not to.  Even she deserved a break.  Especially her.  I did not wish her ill will—ever. 

There came a time in college when my culture was challenged on a daily basis.  Even when I raised my hand in an advanced theory class, asking for an assignment to be repeated, the professor, a Harvard grad, himself from a culture that had endured extreme ridicule, mocked me in the class of six students in a school of 30,000.  I——‘ll repe——–at the asiiiiiiiiiignment for the duuuuuuumb Southerner.”  Trust me,  I stared him down.  Everyone left the class at the hour, and I alone, was left, staring.  It was not okay.  No one “has the right” to offend you, but that does not stop them.

More recently, I came to the conclusion, wrongly, that what hurt so much in this most recent bullying episode, was that something was taken from me—that it kept me from being able to volunteer with someone I love.  But tonight, after some meditation, I realize what it is. 

It is fear.

Yes, the brave soul who doesn’t particularly like heights, who was able to jump from a plane with pure joy and excitement and not fear, is feeling utter fear.  Utter fear from words that don’t matter from a person I no longer respect in the way I did.  Fear.

I wanted to be liked.  To be accepted.  To be respected.  I was, after all, a revered teacher and mentor to so many.  Wasn’t I?  I assumed I would be welcomed and, yes, even loved as I always was.  But I wasn’t.  For two years I waited in the wings doing nothing but supporting and waiting for an opportunity to, I don’t know, be needed?  Be understood?  To help?  To be valued?  To be treated with kindness?  But that one night, I was utterly rejected.

Now, you may very well be thinking, that others have gone and are going through much worse than this.  My “problem” is insignificant by comparison.  But, it isn’t a comparison.  The sadness I have felt is extreme.  It is real.  One very apparent difference is that my problem can change quite simply while other, seemingly much more real and detrimental, problems are not so simple. 

What am I afraid of, and what, by comparison, are you afraid of?  What is holding you back?  Getting in your way?  Keeping you from living your best self?  For me, it seems to be a fear of not being liked.  This is very real.  Think of young people who find themselves “exposed” on all fronts with no where to turn.  For me it wasn’t blackmail.  This wasn’t something that caused me to want to hurt myself or others, either.  This was utter pain, however, as if a knife pierced a heart and made it bleed.  My heart.  Very real.  Not to be discounted in any fashion.  But, in hurting, one can, in fact, hurt one’s self internally.

So what is your fear?  Fear of failure?  Exposure of your faults?  Are you afraid of not having enough? 

I know I am empathetic.  Do I have a fear that someone is incapable of empathy?  Am I afraid to forgive and forget—that it might happen again?  I wish that person no ill will, but picking myself up after a fall caused by a shock, an enormous blow, has felt almost impossible. 

My first instinct was to leave the situation.  I wondered if I should leave the entire organization, but if I did, others would have gone with me.  That wasn’t fair to them or the organization.  And so, I stayed to fight the demon, with the demon being my own inner fears.  Fear.  Yes, I wanted to go away and lick my wounds.  It is said that “time heals all wounds.”  Where the heart is involved, however, time can stand still.

It has been hard.  Forgiveness would, it seems, solve everything.  The person, presumably, is unchanged, but that is a judgement I really cannot and should not make.  What do I want?  An apology that was not forthcoming?

While it is sometimes important to confront the actions of others, we need to confront our own fears. 

I have been afraid.  Afraid to not be liked.  Afraid I’ll be hurt again.  Afraid to hear mean words like, “Your style and personality don’t fit” or “the way you praise kids” doesn’t fit or “even your writing is disingenuous” again.  Those words cut me, because, although from an entirely different culture, I do fit.  I fit.  We all fit.  If someone confronting their own demons thinks we don’t fit, should we consider it a compliment?

Will I laugh about this one day?  Can I think this experience, the greatest, however mean, teacher I have ever encountered?  Maybe “feeling sorry” for someone else is the wrong concept, but… can I feel compassion for them?  And can I finally take the “I” out of this equation?  Rather than, “Why do I feel this way” or “Why did someone hurt me?” or “Can I offer compassion?” Can all of that ego-driven mindset be, instead, just compassion?  Compassion.

Trading compassion for fear is pure, pure acceptance and an acceptance of one’s self and others.  It doesn’t involve forgetting.  True compassion is not motivated by an intention to move forward; moving forward occurs.  Now.  In this moment. 

When we are in the moment it is affected by where we just were.  We don’t forget that memory.  We can even glance back, although it is already part of us and not just a story of us.  If we only look ahead, we lose sight of where we are.  Pain is a reaction that can be appreciated.  It tells us something.  But what it never tells us is the mystery of what may be unless we accept it and live with it.  Then it morphs into something for which we have no word.

If you have fallen, if you have lost something or someone very dear to you, if you have lost your way, please know that this perception you embrace now will, too, change.  Your mindset can set you free.  Mindset is not a goal or something you strive for, however: it is an energy, perhaps very much untapped, that is yours. 

The time has come to not only let go of what is holding you back, but to accept it, to hold it in your heart and to let it melt into where it belongs.  Mindset is the opposite of Catch 22, where fear can be but a four-letter word.