A Wholehearted Life – Rev. Linda Jackson
This video features the Sunday “talk” only. Watch the full service on our Facebook page.
DESCRIPTION
When we own our stories and stop denying them, we are no longer defined by them. By taking ownership, we empower ourselves to step out of the blame and shame cycle and create new stories. Join us this Sunday as we continue our exploration of Brené Brown’s Gifts of Imperfection, to own our stories and step onto the path to living a more wholehearted life.
SUMMARY
In this transcript, Rev. Linda Jackson discusses the importance of Earth Day and the need to honor and care for the Earth every day. She also mentions the activities and resources available through the CSL Sacred Activism Committee for Earth Day. Rev. Linda then transitions to discussing the monthly theme of being resilient and introduces the concept of living a wholehearted life, as described in Brene Brown’s book “The Gifts of Imperfection.” She explores the ideas of letting go of what people think and cultivating authenticity, as well as letting go of perfectionism and cultivating self-compassion. Rev. Linda emphasizes the importance of self-acceptance and being true to oneself, and she encourages the audience to practice these principles in their own lives. She concludes with a prayer and a reminder to let go of the need to be cool and to embrace laughter, song, and dance.
TRANSCRIPTION
This transcription was auto-generated, please excuse typos, errors and omissions.
Rev. Linda Jackson (00:08):
One more time for the band… and I’ve got to get my slides going here. I am Reverend Linda Jackson. I use she/her pronouns. And before I jump into our monthly theme Being Resilient, I want to mention that tomorrow is Earth Day. And in our teaching in new thought in general, and science of mind specifically, everything in the physical realm is God made manifest. Earth is a living being. And from that place, every day should be Earth Day honoring Mother Earth, Gaia. And I’m giving a public service announcement, and I have told Connie several times, and most of you in the room, don’t start counting my 20 minutes until I get done with this. So the CSL Sacred Activism Committee is offering some special activities for Earth Day, and I think it’s important for us to know and to be related to the larger organization.
(01:20):
There’s a prayer-a-thon, all kinds of presenters, musicians, inspiration, meditation, all kinds of things. And if you go to csl.org/sacred-activism, you can see the schedule, all the different things. There’s multiple different committees participating. There’s also a PDF there of Reverend David Alexander’s article that he wrote in Science of Mind Magazine on global warming. So I think it’s important for us, or it was on climate, I guess that was the title. And I did ask practitioner Denise online to share those links with you and to share the PDF. And I’m digressing for a moment. I’m remembering when I was a kid, and I think it was Mother’s Day, and I swear my brother made me do it, made me ask my mom and dad, why wasn’t there a kids’ day? And they were like, because every day is Kids’ Day. And so I’m sort of feeling the same way about Earth Day.
(02:27):
Every day is Earth Day, right? And as I was having that thought, I received an email from Charles Betterton who is one of our online community members. You don’t see him here in the room, but he’s regularly there online. And I received an email from him about his organization where they do celebrate Earth Day every day, and they have what they call mindful earths. They have a Living Earth guide. It’s available there on their website, earth space. And Hello Charles. I’m sure you are there today, and maybe you can add some additional links into the chat. And I share all this, yes, because it’s Earth Day, but also because if we do our personal healing work, our spiritual growth work, and we begin to heal within, and then we come together collectively for this healing, I believe we heal all that ails the earth. It’s all a connection. It’s all part of us. So we’re meant to live lives of abundance, wholeness, the freedom, and this includes taking care of our earth. So that is the end of my public service announcement if you want to start timing, but it’s within our own limiting beliefs. If we talk about our metaphysical, our new thought perspective, it is only within our limiting beliefs that we experience adversity.
(04:07):
If we’re honest and willing to look at the content of our thoughts, our minds honest and willing to look at how we’re being our behaviors, who are honest and willing to change, we can live freely and fully. Yes, yes. Are you with me? Okay. So today I am talking about a wholehearted life and it’s from Brene Brown’s book, the Gifts of Imperfection. And it is an amazing guide for self-discovery every month or two when we get the different books. I just love that I get to take a dive into it. Y’all think that ministers get up here, they know something, and it’s not true. Ministers get up here because they do the deep dive in the book just like you do. And we get to out ourselves and experience growth. That’s what I love about my job. I get to keep growing.
(05:06):
So Brene says that wholehearted living is living and loving with our whole hearts, despite the risks and the uncertainty where others live halfheartedly, we bring our whole selves to the party. And I can tell you for years and years, I was really good at putting on the facade of being connected and engaged and talking with people and getting to know them and having them feel like they knew me. But the whole time I had this little wall around me protecting me from having who I really was, what was really happening inside of me. And it’s not like it’s gone, it’s just that I’m more related to it. I still had to put on my cute shoes before I got up here. I worry what they’ll think if I come up in gym shoes. I still brought my cell phone in case my laptop didn’t work.
(06:04):
I’d have my notes. I have my watch and my laptop and my phone for the time in case I lose track. So I might look like I’m a little together. I hope I look like I’m a little together, but there’s all this stuff going on and I’m sharing that this is that vulnerability that Brene talks about in the book. And I just went way off my talk. So good luck with that timing, Connie. So in order to live a wholehearted life, we have to come from a place of worthiness. And this is the third Sunday of the month, which means we’re unplugged, which really just means we’re wanting to have some engagement in the room rather than me just talking at you the whole time. So I’m inviting some participation in our people online. Denise is there to support you, and Connie will make sure if there are any comments that come in the chat that she can bring those into the room.
(07:01):
So I just want to check in and say, does the word worthy bring up anything for you? Anybody? Even just the word worthy. Yeah, shout it out. What you got? Yeah, what does it bring up? You want to hide? Okay. She’s hiding right now. Makes you want to hide? I’m not enough. Anybody else? Not worthy. Okay, great. I mean, I have never liked the word worthy, unworthy for something about it. I have an aversion to it, and now I know why. Right? Same way. I didn’t like the word boundaries. Well, I didn’t have any and I didn’t want any.
(07:48):
There’s something else I just want to address. And that is sometimes we might act worthy, even entitled, but it’s just another way of compensating for the feelings of unworthiness. It might show up for some people as that hiding, that withdrawing, that shrinking. It might show up for others as puffing up being important. I already know that, and I’m just acknowledging that because there’s so many different ways that we can all learn from this content. And what Renee says in one area may be a little different for you. And I’ve had to kind of do my own interpretation and I’m just inviting that.
(08:31):
So for me, it doesn’t show up as I’m not enough, which is how Brene Brown often references. It shows up for me as I messed up. I did it wrong, and it’s my fault I’m hearing birds squeaking or something. Oh, it’s a dog. So it shows up for me as I messed up. It’s my fault. I mean, I can tell you that sometimes I’ll be in the middle of a normal day and the phone will ring and I’ll think, oh God, what did I do? Somebody’s calling to tell me what I did wrong. So it lives in me that way. And I’ve been going through a home loan process. I’m excited. My son and I are buying a building and talk about having know your stuff come up. I mean, they even call it approval process.
(09:30):
I’ve been thinking, my God, they’ve got access to my checkbook, to my checking account. They’re watching what I’m spending my money on. Is it okay if I go to Walgreens right now? I mean, yeah, I’m that nutty folks. I’m that nutty and I’m sharing this with you to invite you into your own willingness to be vulnerable. It’s okay. It’s okay. And as the quote said, when we feel seen and heard, when we are in a conversation with someone where it’s okay to be vulnerable, that’s where true connection comes from and that’s where authenticity is, and that is the sort of counterpart to shame. But the way it shows up for me as I messed up, I did it wrong. My fault is what Brene calls guilt. So she says that researchers agree that the difference between guilt and shame is that guilt is I did something bad and shame is I am bad.
(10:32):
Again, it’s helpful to know this, but the error thoughts that I have are that somehow my being loved is dependent on you thinking I’m doing a good job and I’ve done a lot of work on this. It still lives there, but I spot it. I work with it. I don’t let it run me. It used to, right? But my particular experience is that the guilt and the shame are conflated because if I need you to think I’m doing good in order to feel worthy, then my shame comes from when you think I might’ve done something or I didn’t do it quite right. So it’s like I have both guilt and shame at the same time. I’m not sure if I’m making sense there, but it is conflated. And again, I want you to just consider when you’re reading something, there’s truth in it, but it might apply to you a little bit uniquely, right? For me, it starts usually with some kind of an adrenaline thing in my body, I feel. And that’s how I know, okay, watch yourself here. You’re letting something freak you out. And I’m just wondering, guilt. I did something bad. Shame I am bad. Any of that resonate with anyone in here or anyone online?
(12:07):
Yeah. What you got? If you have enough guilt, if you have enough guilt, it leads to shame. Anybody else? No, nobody online. All right, see y’all like it better when I just talk at you. Oh, okay. Judy says, some of us were born with a concept of original sin, so we came in feeling guilty. I can get that. And I would even say that we inherit our ancestral guilt and shame that we’re at a cellular level carrying that stuff around. So we have guilt for no reason at all. Says soon to be practitioner, Jason. That’s right. Well, worthiness begins to occur through owning our own stories according to Brene Brown and I add, it occurs through meditation and prayer and spiritual practice, remembering the wholeness and the perfection of our being. But this work on shame without doing this shadow work, looking at what’s going on in the subconscious, if we go straight to it’s all good, it’s all God. It’s a spiritual bypass. So I have a lot of appreciation that we’re bringing in this sort of spiritual psychology work to help us do the work from unhealthy ego to healthier ego so that we can deepen spiritually and really have the full experience of knowing our oneness rather than having another way of protecting ourselves with the It’s all good, it’s all God. No, I can actually know it is all good. It is all God. And that whatever that story is that’s going on with me is just a story.
(14:20):
Brene says that owning our story and loving ourselves through that process is the bravest thing that we’ll ever do in my healing work and in the work I do with others, I work a lot with the idea of the stories we make up about ourselves. And Brene is actually talking about the stories of what actually happened in our lives, the families we came from, the experiences we’ve had, the mistakes made. And I’m thinking we need to own both what actually happened and the stories we made up about what actually happened. But the focus either way has to be on loving ourselves through that process. And that is what resiliency is. And owning our stories is the beginning of the path to living a more wholehearted life.
(15:23):
In order to own our stories, we have to do the work, we have to do that self inquiry, that self-examination. And like I said, I always feel it in my body first when something’s up. That’s my signal to do the work, look inside, check in. What am I really doing? What am I really thinking? What am I really feeling? What am I making up? What’s here for me? Where’s my growth? What’s the learning in this situation? And Carl Young says, whoever looks outside dreams, whoever looks inside awakens. And when we look out here in the dream where like Reverend Jackie said that the spiritual truth with a capital T is the spiritual perfection that’s within us. Not to be confused with perfectionism that Brene Brown is talking about, which is the dream. Perfectionism is part of the illusion and the dream of what’s out here. The truth is we are whole and perfect, but we can’t bypass and go right to I’m whole perfectly complete without noticing what is this thing that is making me feel like this? What is the thing that makes me walk around acting like you know me and you don’t really know me or however it’s showing up? Just one of the ways it’s shown up for me.
(16:54):
So not to confuse the spiritual perfection with perfectionism. And when we begin doing the work of connecting and being vulnerable and sharing, there are all these people that we might encounter trying to do the work with, having an experience with, or we might be the person of someone trying to share with us. And these are the things not to say. And I am just going to run through this. If you’ve ever experienced someone doing this to you or responding to you this way, or if you have found yourself responding this way to someone, right? These just add to the shame cycle. I feel sorry for you. It’s sympathy instead of empathy, right? It empathy is, I get it. I’ve been there. Oh my God, I’ve had that experience.
(17:57):
Well, you should feel shame. I can’t believe that you did that. I can’t believe it. There’s a disappointment. You’re supposed to be the pillar of perfection. I mean, a lot of us experience that with our families. There’s the, you’ve let me down. It’s also disappointment and judgment and this feels terrible. Who can we blame? And maybe they’re blaming you or them or someone else. They want to go to this point of releasing or relieving the visceral feeling of shame. So they try tot deflect it through blame. And then there’s the, let’s make this go away. Minimizing and avoiding. I own that. I have done this with my kids. I realize this before reading this, but this is reminding me because I am uncomfortable with their discomfort. I’m wanting them not to feel it. So I’m kind of minimizing or acting like it’s not really happening, which is so unfair. It’s a different kind of abuse to minimize someone’s experience.
(19:10):
And then there’s the one upmanship, if you think that’s bad, you should hear what happened to me. And then the number seven there is don’t upset people or make them uncomfortable. And they’re referring to if you are in a position where you have held someone accountable for something, maybe someone was marginalizing someone else and you actually stood up for it, and then you get the response of, well, you should know better not to talk to your boss that way instead of saying, wow, I’m proud of you for standing up for what you believe. And then there’s number eight, I can fix this and I can fix you. Advice giving and problem solving. Anybody having anything come up here. What’ve you got, Rob?
Inaudible audience (20:03):
The thing is
Rev. Linda Jackson (20:16):
Rob is saying he has said most of these things at some place in time or point in time, but the caveat is don’t beat yourself up with this. And that is a beautiful point. We’re not doing this work to hurt ourselves and to shame ourselves and to create more guilt and shame. We’re doing this to wake up to, oh, that’s what’s happening here. What do you have?…
(20:40):
… listening as a problem solver. Great. Connie, you have something online? Yeah, Denise says that Denise online says, there are times when I just want to avoid, all right? Seems like we’re all in this together.
(21:05):
I think we have all done all of these things or experienced other people doing these things in return when we’re looking for compassion, when we’re looking for that connection, we need someone who is rooted in their own work and able to bend with the situation, someone who knows our strengths and our weaknesses and embraces us anyway. And Brene says it’s about connecting with the right person at the right time about the right issue. And a simple way that I often state this is only share with people who can hold it for you. So in the gifts of imperfection, there are 10 guideposts for wholehearted living. And this graphic is from the brane brown.com website. There’s lots of resources on there, and there’s a wholehearted inventory that’s electronic you can fill in to answer the questions and it will give you a report of where you are in relationship to each of these guideposts. All the guideposts are interconnected and all related, they sort of intertwine. And my job today is to take the first two, the letting go of what people think, cultivating authenticity, letting go of perfectionism and cultivating.
(22:37):
And I look forward to the rest of the weeks ahead where we’re looking at numbing in powerlessness, scarcity and fear of the dark, the need for certainty, comparison, exhaustion as a status symbol and productivity as self-worth. And another one that could have been for me, I won’t be surprised if I’m speaking that month too, anxiety as a lifestyle and supposed to be in cool and always in control. But the cultivating side of that one is laughter, song and dance. So we’re going to explore a little bit of that later. So again, I’m focusing on guidepost one and two. And as usual, the universe conspired to give me a guidepost that was very relevant for me. Letting go of what people think.
(23:41):
That is something I would love to say is not mine, but it is mine. And it’s so interesting because when I think about how I was raised, my mother really did do a lot of reinforcing of don’t follow along with other people. You have your own mind. Do what you think is right, follow yourself. But there was this judgment underneath it, and that’s the thing that I took on was that, oh, but if I’m not doing it right, then I am wrong. And I know that when I am doing things the way she likes it, I feel a lot more loved. So that is my relationship to all of this, and I hope y’all can hold that for me.
(24:31):
So letting go of what people think. Is that a thing for anybody else? Almost half the room. Almost half the room. And Jason says, the other half are denying themselves. Okay, here we go. What’s that? Just being cool. They’re just being cool. That’s right. That’s right. All the ways that we put up the little facade, right? Well, the counterpart or what we cultivate in place of letting go of what people think is authenticity. And oops, I have an extra capital eye. See, I’m already noticing what people might think. Authenticity is the daily practice of letting go of who we think we’re supposed to be and embracing who we are. This is a daily practice. So practicing guidepost one, I’m going to just invite you to take a moment and reflect on the areas of your life where you feel the need to conform or please others, any areas of your life where you feel the need to conform or please others. And now ask yourself, how does this desire to conform or please affect my ability to be authentic and true to myself? Anybody? How does this desire to conform affect my ability to be authentic? So if you’re conforming, you’re not authentic. It blocks true expression. Connie,
(26:50):
I started being more authentic with my family member, but it brought us a lot closer, even though I was scared to do it. This might sound convoluted a bit, I’m not sure if I know how to say it clearly, but I, what’s coming up for me is this experience that I had in the past of when I am monitoring who I am being, when I’m presenting myself in a way that I think is going to be for the presentation that you need of me, you need me to present a certain way in order for me to feel like you’re going to approve of me. There’s no way for me to actually feel loved by you, because even if you think you love me, I know that you’re loving a way that is not really the truth of who I am. You’re loving this sort of artificial presentation that I’ve given you of myself. So really feeling loved and connected requires that authenticity requires being true about what is there for you. And it’s important when we’re doing this work to remember to be kind to yourself, to explore these emotions without making yourself wrong, because just more of the shame. Anybody want to share anything about how your relationships or experiences would change if you fully expressed your true self? Any thoughts on that?
(28:38):
Yes. Nice. So emotional intimacy occurs when you push through the discomfort of showing your vulnerability, being your authentic self, taking the risk of whether the person’s going to like it or not. When you move through that together and you’re both willing, there’s more intimacy that comes. Did I get that right? Great. Thank you. Guidepost two, letting go of perfectionism and cultivating.
(29:30):
So if we project the image of being perfect, we avoid blame, shame and judgment. At least that’s what we think. Typically, that’s where perfectionism is coming from, that if I’m perfect, then I won’t have to feel those things. We try to hide the imperfect parts, but avoiding blame and shame judgment just keeps it running in the background. It doesn’t resolve it. And Amy said when she spoke a couple of weeks ago that she had a different idea of shame, and this book sort of shifted her thinking about it, changed her understanding. I’m having a similar experience with the idea of perfectionism. I have never seen myself as a perfectionist. I have dust under my couch. I have not filed my taxes yet. A perfectionist would not be okay with that. There’s a lot of ways that I can be messy in my life.
(30:35):
But the other perspective of perfectionism that I am beginning to understand is this same idea that maintaining the image of how you want to be perceived is a type of perfectionism. So the one in me that thinks my being loved is dependent on you thinking I’m doing a good job, is a type of perfection. I have to appear a certain way. And I never thought of it that way before. So I’m just sharing that, inviting you to consider how these concepts and teachings might apply to you. Oops, I’m going to see if I covered all of that.
(31:18):
I missed the one. The problem with perfectionism is that the expectations are unbeatable. And to let go of perfectionism, we have to cultivate that self-compassion. And this is according to researcher Dr. Kristen Neff. Self-compassion has three elements. So the self-kindness, having warmth and understanding toward ourselves when we suffer or when we feel inadequate, rather than ignoring or self-flagellating, I used to do a lot of ignoring. I used to feel that adrenaline thing in my body and just completely ignore it. I didn’t even realize it was a signal to tell me something was up. I just thought, oh, I got butterflies or something. I just ignore it. Now I know anytime I have that surge or feeling in my body, I need to stop. I need to do some inquiry. I need to get some kindness going toward myself. And check in this common humanity is to know and understand that shame is a shared human experience. It is not something that only I am experiencing. Everyone is experiencing it to some degree.
(32:49):
It’s something that we all go through. And protectionism won’t protect you. I’m sorry. Perfectionism won’t protect you from the feelings. So then mindfulness is that the balanced approach to the negative emotions so that they’re neither suppressed or exaggerated. So mindfulness teaches us this awareness so that we can do the checking in and we can honor how we are where we are and make a different choice. We have that choice point. We can’t ignore our pain and feel compassion at the same time. And another thing that I got from this is to not over identify with or exaggerate our feelings either. I think that is something that I have often felt because my feelings are so powerful when I feel things that I identify with it and I feel like everybody needs to know that. Or the person, what’s my son or my ex or whatever they need to know how I’m feeling.
(34:01):
It’s like, well, maybe not. Maybe I just need to work through that. And maybe it doesn’t impact them or affect them at all. Wouldn’t that be ideal? It has improved all of my relationships. I will give you that. And sometimes there are times I need to speak through things with them. I mean, I’m not saying you deny it, but it’s getting a handle on what is really mine to do and what needs to be said in this relationship. Right? So practicing guidepost two, they talk about this platinum rule. Now, we all know the golden rule. Do unto others as you’d have them do unto you. And I’m familiar with a different platinum rule, which I really appreciate, and that is due unto others as they want to have done unto them. And I just got the 30 minute sign and I got thrown off a little bit.
(34:54):
Sorry. The platinum rule that they’re talking about here from Tal Ben Shahar, do not do to yourself what you would not do to others. That’s a good one. That’s a good one. Pay attention when perfectionist tendencies kick in and choose what they are calling to be an optimist. Meaning that you’re maintaining the effort on things you can control and embracing the constraints of reality, which sounds a lot to me. Like the serenity prayer. Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change. Courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference. So I’m going to let you all off the hook with the next practice since we’re close to time here. But I just want to wrap this up with the being kind to yourself. You’re human like everyone else. Practice accepting what you’re feeling without judgment. And something that works for me is I like to imagine myself as a child. What would you offer to a child, right? So I’m going to invite you into this for your work this week to practice letting go of what people think. We’ve given you some tips on that and to cultivate your authenticity, to practice letting go of perfectionism and cultivate self-compassion. And I’m going to invite us into some prayer.
(36:40):
So right here, right now, I know there is only one thing happening. I know this as the life of God, the life of the infinite expressing itself in as and through all things, through all beings, through all of the earth,
(37:02):
All one. And as I turn my attention within, I recognize within me my access point to this unformed substance. The subjective realm of unlimited potential, infinite possibility, all that God is the generative creative nature of life available there within me. I am one with the wholeness, the perfection, the freedom, the abundance, all of it. It is the truth of my nature. And it is desiring to express in as and through me as only I can express it. And since we are individual expressions of the divine, I know it is true for each one here, each one online, each one hearing my voice. Each of us are individual expressions of the divine one, with that generative creativity, that power, that freedom, that abundance. It is the truth, and it is desiring to express itself in as and through each of us.
(38:10):
And from that place, I just speak a blessing over everyone doing this work over everyone letting go of these old ideas, these old beliefs, these old behaviors that are no longer serving. I bless those behaviors. I thank those behaviors, have gratitude for the parts of us that were in survival or coping or learning how to get through life. And I know it is no longer needed. And I step into this high idea of who I am here to be calling forward for each one, to step into the high idea of who they are, here to be, their authentic self, the perfectly imperfect self, the joy, the freedom, the abundance comes through. Clearly. There’s freedom of expression. They bring gifts that only they can bring. They are the perfect expression of the divine, exactly as they are. And I just say yes to this. I say, yes, yes, yes. And I’m so grateful. Grateful for all the good, grateful for the fulfillment of this prayer, grateful for that freedom, joy, abundance, grateful for our transformation. I let it go. I call it good. And so it is
Typhanie Monique (39:30):
And so it is? Yes, yes, yes.
Rev. Linda Jackson (39:34):
And I’m just going to say one more thing. The final guidepost that we’ll cover later on next month is to let go of being cool and to cultivate laughter, song and dance. So I say get up and dance like you don’t care if anybody’s watching.
Typhanie Monique (39:52):
That’s right. Come on.