‘I am stupid. Being stupid opens the door for learning, curiosity, and a life.‘ ~ Jodie, one of my students.
Today’s shares were like soothing ointment on blistering skin… I have been living with that blistering skin forever, it seems.
What is that blistering skin? The heat I generate in my articles, in my workshops burns my skin, but doesn’t often reach the clients… So I burn and they don’t.
Until just now.
It’s better late than never… but I am filled with joy and grief… sweet and sour.
It seems, looking back, that until you get to distinguish entitlement, you can’t get further.
So let’s spend a little bit of time with entitlement, looking at it anew, and see how it defines the human condition.
The cornerstone of the human condition is meaning. Meaning you give, meaning you accept. Meaning is not in reality, meaning is a human construct.
We, humans, make meaning and then forget that we made it and call it reality. We feel entitled to do that. To feel entitled to make up meaning.
And this, being entitled to our opinion as our birthright, and being entitled to call it ‘reality’ is the human condition. This is underneath the culture of humans… and, of course underneath all the conspiracy theories.
It is what separates us from each other. If you look around, there is no unity. And non-unity destroys love, destroys friendship, destroys the planet. Destroys families. Companies. Marriages.
I have seen long running TV shows destroyed by one character, actor, suddenly entitled to their opinion, and disrupting and then destroying a perfectly wonderful show. It almost happened in NCIS, it happened in ‘New Tricks’ that I loved… until it was destroyed by one of the actors.
It is more the rule than the exception… One actor feels entitled to feel whatever, and the show plummets.
And life and TV shows are not different. We are all people, with a soul correction, with ego, with soul, with ‘demons to contend with’… hellbent on destroying. Hellbent on being entitled to our opinions.
Now, what happens when you have an opinion? That is a meaning?
All opinions are meanings created from the limited perspective of the human mind.
After creating it, from there on that is all you can see. Not what is happening, not a person, but the meaning happening again and again and again.
This is what I wanted to teach in a workshop nobody bothered to sign up to.
Even that, not being interested, is probably part of that arrogance, that entitlement. You already know and f… Sophie.
How do entitlement and arrogance connect?
We could say that the two words mean EXACTLY the same thing in reality. Not in your head, but in reality. When you look at someone: the two words are interchangeable.
Ultimately both mean the same thing: You hold your opinion as reality… and damn all evidence to the contrary.
So the woman whose cancer is now in her colon… another woman who has the third recurrence of cancer, the guy who doesn’t allow anyone else to talk, but when it comes to say something he would get paid for, then he drops the ball and retreats into his shell… These are three examples for arrogance/entitlement.
I could list every single client of mine… And point out how their insistence, their entitlement causes their misery, their no success.
The human condition is that we exchange the dangerous world of reality to the comfortable world of Plato’s Cave… and we NEVER actually look and see what is happening in reality. We are only dealing with our meaning of it.
I am an Israeli citizen living in America. I have managed to withhold my opinion about the Israeli-Hamas war, and have resorted to weeping instead. A lot of weeping. I am weeping now.
Yesterday I watched John Oliver’s Last Week Tonight. And managed to not have any opinion, any meaning, anything that would freeze what I see into some frame… It was not easy. Because of the human condition. And because of my soul correction which is VERY arrogant.
But luckily for me, I have managed to turn off both my entitlement genes, and reduce my entitlement to my opinion to 3% in a world where it is normal to have that 100%.
So what did I do, and what have my clients who are becoming successful are doing?
I started to stay out of Plato’s Cave. And be HERE NOW, as some guru said. I say: be present. 100%.
What happens when you are present? You actually see. you actually hear. And you actually feel what is there. BEFORE OR INSTEAD of the meaning you make up.
Had I had the chewing challenge 30 odd years ago, I would have done it much faster. I didn’t know what I was doing, so it took me 30 years.
The tiny moments of presence can gel into minutes, while chewing.
What you do to stay present, or to return to being present become a template for how to do that in other life-situations. And you start SEEING, HEARING, FEELING what is real everywhere.
Instead of seeing, hearing, feeling your opinion.
The more time you spend in reality, the juicier life becomes.
Your entitlement to call yourself the best and the worst starts looking ridiculous. You may even become curious. And start living in reality.
And it all begins with that moment of presence while you are doing the chewing challenge.
If you eat food that loses its taste while you are chewing, eat food that doesn’t!
One of my clients is on a rice diet… and rice doesn’t seem to have much taste to mine… but when you are willing to let go of your opinion, it actually does. It bursts of flavor. Your opinion prevents you from tasting it.
The stronger you insist on being the Arbiter of the Universe whose word is law, the harder it is for you to taste what you taste. You taste your opinion instead.
Now, let me address the elephant in the room.
If in your whole life you’ve been pretending that you are superior, then climbing down from your throne and becoming human, ordinary, is going to be difficult. About half of you are in this category. I am one of you. It’s a soul correction, considering yourself special.
I remember using bathroom breaks to help me get off that throne. You need to get that your sh!t smells as bad as the next guy’s… We are in this together.
If we look at the United States’ Constitution, and we haven’t looked at it this way, it says, in the Constitution, that all men are created equal. And the Constitution arrogantly says: it is the truth.
When you look at humans IN REALITY, not in your head, the only thing that we all share, is that we are all talking animals. Our lower self.
But everything else depends on opinions, and force. Coupled with entitlement, of course.
The rich, the ruling class behaves exactly as entitled as you. They and you protect your opinion at all cost.
Rich and poor both live in Plato’s Cave, talking inside the head, talking outside of the head. Unhappy, because life inside Plato’s Cave is not fresh, not lively, not enjoyable.
Your job, if you are here reading this to become a human being. If you are here to become all you can become, Your job is to become present, and start living at least some of your life outside of the Cave. In reality. Without your opinion giving you your experience.
So what is the attitude that is most useful at climbing the Tree of Life… the lowest branch of it is ‘being present’?
I have found and written this:
Considering my life, the attitude that life is an experiment has been probably the best thing I’ve ever invented for myself. Why? Because it killed 90% of the voices inside that said that I was stupid, that I was a loser, that nobody will ever love me. It also killed the voices that said I am smart, special, extraordinary, superior, blah blah blah.
And once the voices lose power over me, I can actually BE and LIVE in reality. And have what I have. A becomes A. The result becomes the result.
Here is an illustration… I didn’t get to have a Popeye sandwich yesterday.
The dude had a tentative ‘almost promise’ to take me. At 4 pm I was already very hungry. So I sent him a text message saying: I am hungry. Shall I eat?
Then I ate and went to bed. Three hours later he answered: ‘maybe tomorrow‘.
But when he didn’t answer right away, I was stewing in my head. For about an hour. Did I offend him? Who do I think I am? For me it was unfamiliar, because with a 3% entitlement/3% about-me score I don’t do that with any regularity. I can’t even remember when I did that last.
Then I let go. I said to myself: ‘it is what it is. I don’t need it. but it would have been nice‘.
I found his message this morning, which is yesterday’s tomorrow…
I got up, as is my habit, at 3 am. Slept well, undisturbed. I read his text… and answered: ‘maybe on a day when your schedule and my schedule match… like a weekend?‘
No expectation, no emotions, no nothing… Life. No big deal either way.
I’ve always craved the flow… A life that flows.
I didn’t know that I am always the one who makes the waves, not life. And those waves are the meanings I add to life… So my life, for at least 60 years was like a storm in a teacup…
Until I got to reining in my meaning making machine… Since then it is mostly smooth sailing.
And that is what I want for you. It starts with learning to be present and learning that you are not present. And the fastest and easiest way I know learn that is the Drink your Food challenge.
Depending on your soul correction it will take longer or shorter time… Depending on your judgmentalness level…
It may take a very long time… But it’s worth it.
If you are in this ‘game’ and that is why you are reading this article, then sign up to the challenge. But let me warn you: doing it on your own will be ineffective. Your voices will take you out of the game before you’ll get any traction.
Start with getting present
