Tag: hearing the truth

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Feedback Anxiety Days

I have an exciting new project starting in the near future…a Podcast!

I hope it’ll be super helpful for continuing to offer you (and me) inspiration in questioning your troubled thinking and seeing what unexpected fun, relief, and freedom can appear in your life.

Click Here to answer two brief questions about it…the first one being: what should the title of the podcast be? You get to choose between two, or offer me a suggestion. It’ll only take two seconds, so click here to give me your feedback. It will really help me out.

Speaking of feedback…what an interesting area of investigation for our relationships with others.

Someone gives us feedback, we like it or we don’t like it. We give someone feedback, they like it, or not so much.

And then…we might have a few thoughts about those people who either gave us feedback or who we gave feedback to, and what it means.

That rotten jerk, how dare he say such a thing to me, I will never talk to him again! That beeoch, she’s so defensive, I was just trying to tell her to chill out! Those dorks, they don’t know what they’re talking about when they say I screwed up! These ding bats, they never change, even when I give them good suggestions!

This week in the Our Wonderful Sexuality teleclass, a fabulous inquirer had this thought to bring to questioning: “I want my partner to prioritize my feedback!”

Yeah! You got that right!

People should listen to what I want, hear what I’m suggesting, understand my ideas, take my comments into consideration!

Or what about if you’re on the reverse side of the feedback, where you’re the receiver?

People should stop being so picky, stop trying to control the situation, be more flexible, not have so many opinions, quit competing with me!

The stress appears all in that moment, so speedy it’s faster than greased lightening. FEAR!

Whether you’ve given feedback that appears to be ignored or criticized, or received feedback you don’t like….some of the same core beliefs come alive.

And they can cause a lot of pain on the inside.

I’m kicked out. They don’t like me. I’m not important. I did it wrong. No one cares about me.

Let’s take a look.

Hold that situation in your mind, where feedback went BAD.

Either you gave it or received it, and it hurt.

In that situation, is it true that you did something wrong, you’re out, you’re not likable or important, or that those people don’t care about you?

Yes. They said mean things. They withdrew. I feel guilty. I should have never….they should never….

Are you positively sure these things are true, that the way the feedback was given or received was overall BAD BAD?

No.

I don’t know everything going on in that other person’s mind. They are allowed their own opinion. They have it anyway, I notice.

How do you react when you believe this feedback exchange means YOU are outta line, you messed up?

Oh man.

Sick to my stomach, enraged, ready to go on a rant, or hit something! Ready to QUIT!

Fine! If that’s the way you react to me speaking up then good riddance! If that’s what you think of me, then good riddance!

(March off, slam door. Write email, hit send).

So who would you be without the belief that this news, this feedback, means you are unlovable, wrong, or uncared for, stupid, or unimportant?

“If a criticism hurts you, that means you’re defending against it. Your body will let you know very clearly when you’re feeling hurt or defensive. If you don’t pay attention, the feeling rises and becomes anger and attack, in the form of defense and justification. It’s not right or wrong, it just isn’t intelligent. War isn’t intelligent……After you’ve done inquiry for a while, you can listen to any criticism without defense or justification, openly, delightedly. It’s the end of trying to control what can’t ever be controlled: other people’s perception.” ~ Byron Katie

Without the belief that I am hurt in this feedback thing that’s happened….WOW.

I actually want to know more.

If they don’t like my feedback, I want to hear more about their thoughts, their feelings, what’s going on inside.

If I’ve gotten their feedback, I hear it and nod and allow it to enter me, instead of pushing it away.

And a most remarkable thing happens.

Closeness. Intimacy. Maybe tears, questions asked, concerns spoken out loud. Contact.

I turn the thoughts around:

I’m invited in. They like me. I’m important. I did it right. Everyone cares about me. 

I notice now that the people I’ve had greatest conflict with, what we’d call (to put it mildly) negative feedback…have been the most important, dynamic, powerful teachers in my life.

“Every time you find yourself irritated or angry with someone, the one to look at is not that person but yourself….Search for this person’s defects in your own heart and in your unconscious mind, and your annoyance will turn to gratitude that his or her behavior has led you to self-discovery.” ~ Anthony De Mello

OK, so when I’m afraid I’m not loved and given uncomfortable feedback, or they ignore or react to mine….I can look inside myself.

Oh. It’s pretty vast in here. Right?

It’s expansive, open, patient, unattached, spacious, gracious, full of humor.

I thought it was them….then I thought it was me….but then I realized it’s no one.

Ha ha!

Bring on the feedback!

Much Love,  Grace

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Daring To Question The Great and Powerful Oz

It was a hushed, late night, pitch dark outside. The house was very quiet except for my clicking fingers on my keyboard, and the glowing light of the laptop screen.
I was writing my heart out in email.
I was sharing with a friend my response to her challenge the day before, also written in email, that I was doing something she felt uncomfortable with in my wedding preparations.
She told me she didn’t feel the celebration contained the formalities she thought important. She thought we shouldn’t call it a wedding if we weren’t going to actually get a license.
The night was quiet. It was very late, after midnight. Very unusual for me. I couldn’t sleep because I just couldn’t stop thinking about her email I had received, that I was now replying to.
My inner immediate reaction (not the email I wrote in reply) to her email was, on first read, something like this:
“She doesn’t know me at all! She doesn’t understand me! I thought she was less conservative than this! She wouldn’t bring this up if I were gay…what a hypocrit! She’s not the person I thought she was! She’s such a snob! Forget her–she can GO TO HELL!”
 
Yes, it was that mature.
My stomach tightened, my heart sped up just a little, a shot of adrenaline zinged through my arms as I grasped what she was saying and read her words that she did not agree with what I was planning for the ceremony.
She thinks I’m not being HONEST? How DARE…….
 
……Ooops. 
 
I have an automatic timer that goes off when I begin to say the word “how dare you/she/he/they/this….”
Because I know I’m being totally, completely, utterly defensive.
How dare they? Like they should be afraid? To dare question the Great and Powerful Oz Grace Bell?
As I couldn’t sleep, I knew it was time to inquire.
Stressful thoughts were multiplying. I was beginning to question the entire friendship.
Is it true that she doesn’t know me? That she should know better? That she’s too conservative? That she’s not the person I thought she was (in other words—WORSE than I thought she was)?
Is it true that she should go to hell?
Argggh! But! This is wrong! She shouldn’t be so contrary! What does it matter to her how the ceremony goes, how it’s recorded or planned, what traditions are included, whether it’s an official license or not (my husband and I weren’t sure what we even wanted at that point)?
She’s in my business!
Gulp.
Is it absolutely true? Is she not allowed to speak up? Is it true that if she says what she thinks, she’s a snob?

 

No. Deep breath.

I am in favor of people telling the truth. Whether it hurts or not. I love the truth. I adore real, passionate, heartfelt words.
Communication at the core, authentic, most truthful level is my FAVORITE THING. Um…usually.
And even when it’s not, my closest friends are people I connect with and talk with with complete openness, even if we’re afraid.
How do I react when I believe someone is speaking against me, challenging my core beliefs, threatening me in some important way?
I want to write them off, get away from them, cut them out of my life, ignore them, act nice but back out of the room slowly.
Or I might wish they die in a plane crash, off the top of my head. I mean, I want them DESTROYED.
I feel really afraid, even if my reaction appears angry on the inside. I know that what I am…..
…..is terrified.
But who would I be without the thought that she was frightening? That she was wrong, critical, too conservative, and a snob?
I would realize that she brings up excellent agonizing questions, that the whole nation is actually debating. Whether to get a marriage license or not, to declare assets together as a business/economic entity or NOT.
(And I love equal rights for everyone).
In my heart I was getting married with a deep emotional and inner value of commitment. But I KNOW emotional commitments are enormously likely to change over time.
They are more likely to change that to remain stable.
And my past experience is that when the relationship grew more distant (in my previous marriage) that the economic end of the marriage was eventually dissolved.
It’s called divorce.
So for me, there was NOTHING stable about committing to marriage on paper, with the county, the state, the nation, one other human.
My friend expressed my deepest angst and anxiety about what was true for me. I did not know. In fact, I had no idea if this whole marriage/commitment thing was good for much of anyone.
My inquiry was ultimately with the government, laws, marriage, and what I had learned socially. I was mad at my society and my conditioning. And mad at her for learning the same conditioning.
Sigh.
Who would I be without the thought that she shouldn’t speak her mind? That she isn’t expressing something important, meaningful, and loving?
I would read and re-read her email, and see that she didn’t call me names, she didn’t berate me, she was loving, kind, direct and caring.
Without the thought that this was wrong….
….I relaxed so deeply, knowing that there is no absolute answer. I have no idea what the future will be. There is no future.
And after a wonderful discussion with my soon-to-be partner that day after I received the email, I searched online for marriage licenses “just to find out what’s involved these days” with this thing I am not even sure I agree with.
Oh. The offices to get licenses just happened to be about 2 miles away from our home. And this one night of the week, only on Tuesdays (it was Tuesday) it was open later into the evening. It was open right then, for another hour.
So my partner and I said to each other “Let’s go over there and get a license. What the heck?”
So we did.
Turning my thoughts around, I saw that I was the snob, I was the conservative one, she was freer and more liberal in that she could express herself to me.
And what did it matter if she were not the person I thought she was? I wasn’t thinking well of her in that moment….so….good. I was not the kind, generous person I thought I was.
Thank you everyone who has “dared” to tell me honestly what they think. Even if it sounds mean. Even if I don’t like it, or feel quite desperately frightening by it.
That dark night, after inquiry, after my stimulating discussion with my now-husband, I wrote an email full of honest love and gratitude to my friend.
And then pushed SEND.
“When I don’t look for approval outside me, I remain as approval. And through inquiry I have come to see that I want you to approve of what you approve of, because I love you. What you approve of is what I want. That’s love—it wouldn’t change anything. It already has everything it wants. It already IS everything it wants, just the way it wants it.” ~ Byron Katie
With love,
Grace