Lucy wanted to be able to stop acting this way, and to know what was at the root of her behavior.
When you find yourself on automatic, stop, and ask yourself what you are felling. See if you can get in touch with the feeling instead of automatically trying to fill the emptiness.
#54 What if You
Get No Messages at All?
Do not panic. Stop what you are doing, sit quietly, and ask for a message. After asking for a message, listen. You need to listen for the message to come. Messages come in a variety of ways. They come to you through direct knowing, through other people telling you things, through books and assorted reading material, in just about any form imaginable.
Messages are fundamental to the Negaholic recovery process. Not only do they encourage you to trust your gut they also remind you that if you are willing to listen, your life can be guided by a wise, benevolent force. The next chapter will give you more information about messages.
9
Listen To
Your Inner Wisdom
We all have an inner sense of rightness. Rightness about people, places, about when it’s time to do something, about when it’s time to stop or avoid doing something. You’ve no doubt heard of, “a time to plant, and a time to reap… a time to gather stones together.” There is more to this than simply following the seasons, watching the cycles of the moon, or the position of the stars. Some people call it a sixth sense. Others call it female intuition, although men have it too. It has been called, guidance inner knowing, inner guidance, instinct, but the real truth of the matter is that if and when we are really honest about our inner workings, there is a lot more going on than most of us usually admit.
#55 Spiritual DNA, the Inner Guide
I call it spiritual DNA. We are born with an inner wisdom, which resides deep within us and transmits messages about the choices that are right for us. If you listen carefully, you can tune into this frequency, which transmits information all the time. It never stops. But we have the choice to tune in and listen or tune out. Your radio, for instance, is always transmitting, but you may not always choose to listen to it. You may turn the volume down low, or completely off. Regardless of the volume level, the radio keeps on transmitting whether you are listening to it or not.
This spiritual DNA sends you messages about everything: when you need to exercise, when you need to rest, when you need to be with people, and when you need to be alone. The messages transmit clues that tell you what you need from moment to moment. The problem is that the messages usually don’t coincide with your plans for the immediate future.
For instance, in the middle of writing a paper, you might get a message to call a friend across the country. You probably don’t know why you are getting this message at this particular moment, but you have a choice: to argue with the message or to act on it. If you argue with it, which is what most people do, you might think, “This isn’t the best time to call, I’m too busy right now, she’s probably not there, I’m too tired, I don’t feel like it, I’ll do it later. More often than not, when you listen to the message, your friend will be there, possibly answer the phone and she might even say, “I was just thinking of you, how strange that you would call right now.”
It will tell you when you need to take a break, when you need to lie down, to eat, to have some quiet time, to take a walk, or go to a specific location. If you listen closely, you will have clear clues about when to travel, when to stay home, when to change jobs, when to get out of a relationship and when to stop doing everything.
Messages give you all kinds of information constantly. It seems disconcerting when you’ve planned to do something and the message has other ideas for you. You plan to take a nap and the message says to get up and write something down so you won’t forget. You plan to go to lunch and the message says to stop and go to the rest room. You plan to read a book and the message says to take a walk.
There are two main challenges about listening to the messages. When your mind is chattering at you, you literally can’t hear your messages. The messages are quiet whispers, and the mind chatter by comparison seems to come through loud voices, drowning out those subtle messages. It’s difficult to hear with the mind chatter jabbering away. The second challenge is that when you do hear the messages, you frequently don’t listen to what they are telling you. Since they sound so bizarre and absurd, you dismiss them as if they were gnats flying around your head. Instead of listening, you discount, discredit, disown, ignore, and blatantly disregard these subtle and repetitious messages that are transmitted all the time. If you are out of touch with your feelings, and you discredit your messages, it is normal for you to end up in a place called, “I don’t know.” What is required is that you are able to hear, listen, allow, trust, and even act on the messages for guidance about your life.
You get messages about everything. You even get messages about what to eat and how much to eat. Some messages come in the form of feelings, and others are like sounds or sensations.
#56 Listen for the Bong
When my body has had enough, it feels a sensation called, “enough!” Your body also tells you when you’ve had enough to eat. The problem is that most people don’t like the body’s sense of timing or its capacity. Try this exercise the next time you sit down to eat a meal. First of all choose what you and your body want to eat. Actually have a consultation with your body. Ask your body what it wants to eat. Then listen for the answer. When you get the answer, don’t judge or criticize it, just listen and accept what it says. Then prepare your meal. Either buy the ingredients or go to a restaurant and order your stomach’s wishes.
When the plate of food is in front of you, take a deep breath before you begin to eat. After you take a bite, put your fork down and chew your food thoroughly. Make sure that you breathe while you are chewing and swallow before you pick up your fork, spoon, or knife. Do this every time you take another mouthful. While you are chewing your food, don't cut and prepare the next bite, butter your bread, or sip your beverage. Focus your attention on chewing, breathing, and experiencing your food.
During this process, listen for the “Bong .” The Bong is a feeling below your navel that lets you know that you have had enough to eat. It is a subtle message from your digestive tract, which says, “That's enough, stop now.” It is a feeling that you may have never heard before, but it is real, and if you listen closely, you will hear it. Often people complain to me: “I have a premature Bong!” They don't like hearing their Bong until they have cleaned their plate. They say they're disappointed that they have to stop eating too soon.
I remind them that they can save food and eat it later. If they are in a restaurant, they can have it wrapped up to take home to some needy pet if they don't want to admit the truth. You have to believe that this is not your last meal, or that you only have thirty minutes to pack in all the pleasure you can get.
Use the Bong exercise to listen to your inner digestive guide. Trust it, honor it, and choose when and how much you want to eat.
#57 A Message to Move
Let me give you another example. Simon first came to California in 1990. He was on vacation in San Francisco, a place he had always longed to visit, and while he was there, he had a very strong feeling that someday he would leave New York and be living in Northern California. He didn’t know when, or under what circumstances, but he knew that someday he would live in the Bay area.
At first this was disconcerting to him. He stewed about it, wondered, and tried to figure out all the specifics. When would it be? What would he be doing? Where would he live? How would he support himself? Of course he didn’t have any answers, so it was pointless to ponder these questions. But that didn’t matter; he was confused and wanted to know was going to happen in his future.
His inner sense was telegraphing something precognitive. In other words, he knew something through direct knowing. He wouldn’t have the cognitive data to explain why he knew this, but his knowing was very clear to him. He knew
something was going to happen in the future before he ever had the right to know the information.
Years passed and he became involved in projects and activities and forgot about his California message. One day in New York, he received a phone call from a friend and colleague who invited him to come to San Francisco. At the time he was in transition, eagerly anticipating what was going to be the next step in his life. He accepted the invitation to come to San Francisco and without making a connection between his 1990 message and this adventure, he set off. When he arrived he stayed with old friends whom he had known from years ago, and he became involved in the San Francisco lifestyle.
On the third day it hit him, this was fulfillment of the message that he had received years earlier. He knew that there was a “rightness” to him being in San Francisco at this time, even though he couldn’t explain it. He knew years ago that the day would come and here it was. He knew about this before he could possibly predict it. It felt almost like déjà vu. He would discover that there were lessons for him to learn, and an important phase of his development would unfold here. San Francisco was the right place for this chapter of his life.
#58 The Message Gets You Unstuck
Diana was a window dresser who styled department store windows. She was having difficulty getting a job. In our session together, I asked her innocently, “Diana, is there anything that you’d rather be doing besides window dressing?”
She glared at me, “What do you mean?”
I said, “Usually when people are clear about what they want they tend to get it. If they don’t get what they want then there is usually something in the way. Either they don’t believe that they can have what they want, they are afraid to get everything that they want, or they may be clinging to what they used to do, what they should be doing, and not what they truly want to do right now----- in other words, their heart’s desire.”
She thought about it for ten seconds, and said, “Do you want to know what I really want?”
I said, “Yes, where would you rather be?”
She burst out as if a flood of water had broken down the gated: “Well, I’d rather be in Paris, of course. Wouldn’t everybody?”
I responded, “Actually, no, but that’s irrelevant; is that where you’d rather be?”
“Absolutely, I’d like to be in Paris more than breathe. For years I have felt that was where I belonged. I have a house, and a child, and responsibilities. I couldn’t possibly.”
Throughout our session I reminded her that the path she was on was riddled with struggle, force, and effort. I asked her if there was any relationship between where she was in her life and how she felt about going to Paris.
She finally told the truth and said that she had been dressing windows for fifteen years and she didn’t want to do it anymore. She said that she had been denying the message to go to Paris for the longest time. She was obsessed with Paris, and it was the only thing that mattered to her.
I told her that it didn’t matter to me if she lived in the States or in Europe, and that she herself was the only one who really cared about where she lived. She pondered and vacillated several times, and finally resolved that she would take the risk and go for her dream, to live in Paris. Within twenty-four hours she had rented her house; in ten days she had dealt with her responsibilities, scooped up her daughter, and left for Paris.
I received a postcard a month later saying, “Thank you for encouraging me to listen to what I was unwilling to hear. I love it here. I’ve never been happier. I am in the right place, all will come together now. Bless you! Love, Diana.”
Messages are like that. They are irrational, illogical, and unreasonable. They make no sense, but they feel right. Listening to the messages is like operating from a different reality. When you live life listening to the messages, you are separating yourself from the confused mainstream. Messages don’t fit into the scientific, rational, analytic system. When you live life aligned with your higher self, listening to those subtle messages, some people may think you’ve lost your grip on reality.
Your mind will have a tough time with messages because of all the questions that remain unanswered. Questions like, “How do you know the difference between a message and your mind chatter? What is the difference between a message and just being lazy? How do you know when you are just being self-indulgent? Can’t listening to your messages get you into trouble?” Of course there are responses to these questions, but what the questions are really saying is… “This is so alien from anything I’ve ever been taught that it frightens me. I’m scared of these notices because there isn’t anything to hold on to. Given my upbringing, it seems far out and weird.”
Go Stand on the Corner!
Buzz went to business school at a prestigious Eastern university, was very traditional, and upheld his parents’ values. Buzz was visiting Boston with his wife and two other couples. They all agreed to meet at a restaurant for dinner, and because of the size of the group they decided to take two cars. Buzz and his wife got to the restaurant first and waited for the others to join them. They waited for what seemed like the longest time. When the wine came, Buzz got a message to “go stand on the corner,” which he rationalized by saying to himself, “Why should I stand on the corner when everybody knows where we agreed to meet? Besides, it’s February and it’s cold and snowy outside. They’ll be here any minute.”
After the salad arrived, he heard the inner message again, only this time it was clearer and louder. “Go stand on the corner.” By this time he was feeling edgy, but he remained stubborn and firm and held his ground. He argued with the message. “Look, they know where we’re meeting. They are intelligent people. I am enjoying being with my wife, keeping warm, drinking my wine, and listening to music.”
When the waiter returned for the third time to take their order, he heard inside his head, “GO STAND IN THE CORNER!” loud and clear. He had fought and was resistant but now he thought, “Okay!” He turned to his wife resignedly and said, “I’m going to stand on the corner.”
She asked why. He said, “Don’t ask, I’ll be right back.”
Buzz walked through the restaurant muttering to himself and feeling rather silly. No sooner had he gotten to the corner than up drove the car with the two couples. He said that he would explain everything inside over a glass of wine. The two other couples parked their car and when all six were seated the tale was shared.
The other car had gone to another restaurant with the same name across town, and they couldn’t find Buzz, nor his wife, and had almost given up the idea of having dinner together. Then all of a sudden, as they were driving around Boston, there was Buzz standing on the corner. They all had a good laugh, and Buzz secretly questioned where the notion came from to stand on the corner in the first place.
There is a strange and inexplicable feeling of rightness with choices that come from somewhere other than the mind. You don’t know why you are saying something, or why you are doing something, but you know on some level it’s right. Messages are the clues in the scavenger hunt of life. They rarely make sense. They just tell you where to go or what to do, and you’re supposed to trust the message and follow it if you want to win the prize. Whoever said that life was a scavenger hunt?
Messages take many different forms. They can come in the form of inner directives, as Buzz’s did. They can come in the form of several friends suggesting that you do something. Messages can be phone calls, letters, books, periodicals, literally any way that you can receive information. The tip-off is that if it is a message, it doesn’t go away. It is recurring and incessant. After three repetitions of the same message, it’s a good idea to stop, look, and pay attention.
The Lord Will Save Me!
There is a story about a very religious man who lived alone in his house. He prayed every day, and felt that if anything terrible ever happened the Lord would be there and take care of him.
One day it started to rain. It rained and rained and began to flood.
&nb
sp; Some people came running by, wading through the water, saying, “Come with us to safety, hurry!”
His reply was, “The lord will save me.”
The water level rose and a car drove by, barely making it through the deep water, and the people inside said, “Get in, we have enough room, we’ll take you to a safe place. But hurry, there is not much time.”
His response was. “Thank you kindly, but the Lord will save me. The Lord will save me!”
The water level rose so high that he had to go up to the second story of his house to stay dry.
A boat came by, and the people said, “We’ll throw you a life preserver, grab on and we’ll bring you on board.”
His reply was, “Bless you all, but the Lord will save me. Go your way. I’m waiting on the Lord.”
Finally he was standing on the roof of the house with the water level rising fast. A helicopter passed overhead and the pilot shouted down, “I’ll toss you a line and we’ll hoist you up.”
Predictably he said, “The Lord will save me. Any minute, you watch, the Lord will do something and I will be saved!”
Within minutes the water level rose and covered his whole body. Shortly thereafter he drowned. He ended up in heaven.
When the Lord was reviewing the list of new arrivals, He said to the man, “You’re not supposed to be here! It’s not your time. What are you doing here?” The man said to the Lord, “I believed in you. I believed that you would save me. I waited and waited, and you never came. What happened?” The Lord replied, “I sent you a car, a boat, and a helicopter. What more do you want?”
Negaholics Page 17