OVERVIEW
Does it ever seem like it is randomly happening to you or that you are being victimized or punished in a way? Have you ever asked yourself the question “why is this happening” or “why is this happening to me?” The truth is we all have those moments in all parts of our lives. What do we do when those moments happen? This Sunday we begin our exploration of the “10 Rules of Letting Go” which are spiritual practices and ways to manage our thoughts which allow us to let go and Trust that there is a higher plan unfolding.
TRANSCRIPTION
Good morning everybody. How are ya on this rainy morning? You gonna bring some good energy this morning? Okay. I was up late, so I need a lot of good energy. <laugh>. I was up at Earth, wind and Fire and Lion Richie people. It was fun. So we’re gonna party. I’m sorry. Okay. So our theme this month is, the universe always has a plan, but I think we’ve all had times in our life when we did not believe that that was true. And 2007 was one of those years for me. My mother was 84 years old and she was really declining cognitively, and we were struggling to get someone to come care for her at home. And at that time it was much more difficult to find people than it is now. And it turned out she had this neurological thing, and I have had five siblings at the time, but for some reason I was in a new job.
But for some reason I was the one who had to do every doctor’s appointment. And you know, it was just a really hard period. And then I had been dating someone. We go on this great vacation, he flakes out on me when we get back. While I was gone, my dog got a hotspot on her tail. My nephew decided to shave it and she bit the end of her tail off. So the dog had to have the tail amputated. And my blood pressure was through the roof. Through the roof. And I, in the middle of that, I was just kind like, what the f right? Like what the F is going on here? It’s like, could anything else possibly go wrong right now? But you know, the universe does always have a plan because if you fast forward three months, you know, my mom had gotten an operation, she was better.
The dog settled into her new life with a shorter tail. You know, the flaky boyfriend was still around. But in the midst of that, I was offered the job I always wanted. And it wasn’t here in Chicago. And I remember going through the process, ’cause in my mind my relationship was over. So I was like, well, is it a problem if I move, if my relationship’s always over? And I remember my oldest brother said to me, aim, you have to do this. It would be such a mistake for you not to do this. And in that moment I said, you know what? The universe did have a plan. And I look back on it now, and I think, you know, that time in DC even though I chose to come back, I learned so much about the world. You know, I had people that I worked with who were from all over the world.
Our clients were from all over the world. I began to understand some different religions because we had a lot of people who were from different parts of the world. They were Buddhists, they were Muslim, they were other things. And I began to have an appreciation of different paths. And I also began to understand how other countries saw America, because the bank I worked for was, um, an international bank. And so I think the universe did have a plan. And then while I was there, you know, it, it was weird to move away from all my people, right? It was really weird. And it took, I would say my last year I finally had real friends. But like, I so deeply missed being here. And I realized during that time I started ministerial school, I realized I wasn’t in alignment with the energy I was working in.
You know, I just was, I was wired differently. I was trying to be someone that I really wasn’t. And so, you know, the universe had a plan there, but I didn’t know what it was ahead of time. I didn’t know that all those things were gonna happen. That I was gonna have these experiences that would cause me to grow and to wake up, which is what we do when we’re conscious. We grow and we wake up. So that’s what it means for the universe to have a plan. But as Matt Conn in our book of the month talks about, we have to let go to let that happen. We have to let go. And I loved the the song Let Go and let God have its way. And even if your word’s not God, let’s source, let Spirit let the universe use your own word.
It’s a beautiful song because it’s about like, you know, just let me see what is gonna happen. Let’s see what wants to happen. And what happens when we let go. We get emotionally free, right? We free ourselves emotionally. It’s easier to adapt and thrive and change. We become more patient and compassionate with ourselves and others. And put spiritually, we’re in this flow of current, this current of unconditional love. We’re really surrendering to that and letting that nourish us. And what happens when we go with the flow? We’re just letting reality happen instead of trying to control it. But what do most of us do, right? We assume the universe doesn’t have a plan. ’cause we have our own personal plan and we like vice grip it. Like it needs to look like this. And when it doesn’t look like that, we think that there’s no plan.
But maybe our, maybe there’s a better plan than our plan, right? We have to let go of our need to control though, so that we can see the plan that’s emerging. Like what doors are opening for us, what doors are closing for us, instead of making ourselves wrong. Like, why didn’t that door open for me? Am I not good enough? We can say, oh, that door was not supposed to open. That’s interesting. Maybe a different door is supposed to open. And I think too, like one of the things I’ve learned is if things flow easily, it’s for me. And if I have to push it, it’s not for me. Right? Right. And so just noticing, where am I pushing, you know, where am I trying to make something happen?
So our encouragement this month is each Sunday you’re gonna learn a few, um, he calls them golden rules of letting go. And you have a handout. ’cause I really love for people to go at home and do the, you know, do some more with this. So I’m gonna talk about what they are. And if you want a pen, Linda’s got pens, waves, she’ll give you a pen. Um, and Matt Conn is kind of a radical. Um, he’s, you know, we were joking around at being weird spiritual people. And, um, he says he calls himself weird. Like his whole life. His family thought he was weird. They just didn’t understand him. He was just wired differently. And he says he’s a spiritual myth buster. So I’m gonna talk to you about a few of the spiritual myths. Um, he wants us to bust. So our first three golden rules.
Number one, you’ve done nothing wrong. Number two, anyone who blames you isn’t happy. And number three, hardships can be fast tracked through thankfulness. So let’s look at each of these. So golden rule number one, you’ve done nothing wrong. You know, who grew up and you believed that you were doing stuff wrong all the time by because of the reactions of the people around you, right? You still do <laugh>, <laugh> things are hard. Some things are hard to let go of. But like he thought, what Matt Conn says about himself, which I relate to, is that he decided what was right and wrong based on what people, how people reacted to him. And so that created in him that, you know, I have to please other people. I have to anticipate what other people want, who relates to that I do. Right? And it can really still hold us hostage as adults, even though we know better, right?
So that’s what we’re gonna break down here. And you know, when I first read it, you’ve done nothing wrong. I’m like, well, I’m quite certain I’ve done some things wrong in my life. But that’s, that’s not what he’s talking about. He’s, he’s looking at it spiritually, okay? And, you know, we’re looking at it from a higher level. So of course we’ve all done things in our life that, you know, could have been better. And I always say, if you knew better, you would’ve done better. But he gives an example of his mom and how he learned, um, that the reactions of others don’t indicate how aligned or misaligned he is with his spirit. And so his mom would have these eruptions of like, anger. You know, she wasn’t patient. She was stressed, she was upset with every, everybody. She was blaming everybody in her life.
And what he realized as he more empathetic toward her, was that she was really unappreciated. She was overgiving and she was, you know, she felt frustrated. She felt disempowered. She felt a lot of things that we can all feel sometimes, right? Um, but she took it out on him. So he would walk on eggshells. And you know, we’re particularly susceptible to this when we’re little. ’cause we haven’t learned anything different yet, right? And so if you still carry a little of it, you probably picked it up when you were little, like you were picking up the energy of the people around you, right? And so just notice it. Um, but if we think of life as a spiritual journey that is here for the purpose of us becoming more conscious, becoming more aware, then we can see with our spiritual eyes. So like the reactions of someone else, it’s not really about us.
It’s like what Don magwell ru tongue tied Ruiz says in the four agreements, don’t take it personally. People’s reactions are not about you. And you know, if we look at it from a spiritual level, like our ego might not like when things go a certain way, but our spirit is excited for us to have a growth opportunity. Funny little sense of humor that spirit has there. But what does our ego do? Our ego sees judgment, self, self-criticism, right? Where we might criticize ourselves, we might keep score of what’s wrong with us or other people, by the way, right? That’s what we do. But if your life is divined designed by your spirit, that, and then just recognizing there’s a higher plan that’s happening. Like, who am I meant to be evolving to, right? Like, what’s the higher plan here? Whatever our experience is. And I wanna talk for a second about when we do something we regret, who has things from their past that still come up in their consciousness and you’re like, God, it was 40 years ago and I still regret that.
Sad to say, but you know, when we regret something, we need to have self-compassion, right? We need to give ourselves compassion. If you had known better, you would’ve done better. And in that moment that it comes up, and this is true for any kind of stress in our life, I’m just gonna have you do this right now. Think about something you regret, okay? Or something that causes you stress, okay? And I just want you to close your eyes for a second. And I want you to just first of all, like lift your shoulders up to your ears and then just relax ’em down. And then I just, let’s take a couple deep breaths together, just breathing in and breathing out, breathing in and breathing out. And just ask yourself quietly, am I safe right now?
Am I okay? You know, what does your spirit have to say about whatever this is? Just allow the energy to just dissolve. And whenever you’re ready, just open your eyes. So we can all do that during the week when we get triggered, you know, if something triggers us or if we’re having a moment where, you know, does this happen at, it’s the middle of the night when I get the regret flashbacks when I can’t sleep. It’s like, why am I thinking about this right now? <laugh>, it’s just ridiculous, right? But to breathe, to breathe through it and just to say, you know what? I’m okay. My spirit’s okay. I’m safe, right? Everything’s good. And if you feel like you need to call in some forgiveness for yourself or for somebody else, you know, we could all say that we’ve been betrayed, neglected, abused, you know, make your list not appreciated.
And so it’s okay to feel those feelings, but like, just be easy with yourself. You know, Matt Conn talks a lot about self-compassion. And so, you know, when there is something we need to forgive in ourselves and others, sometimes we’re not quite ready to do it. And that’s the truth of our human experience, right? We’re not ready. There’s something in us that isn’t ready to let it go. And so just be compassionate with yourself until you are ready. But really what we wanna do is we want to, um, really be focused on what is the spiritual contribution of the situation to my life, right? Like, if we were betrayed, you know, what came from that for us, right? Did we learn more self-love from that? Did we make a different choice? You know, what did we learn from whatever happened? And Matt Conn says, forgiveness isn’t a matter of saying any betrayal, neglect, or abuse was deserving.
It’s a matter of acknowledging that those who have made an indelible impression upon your history have only set you in a direction toward the arrival of your highest destiny. Can an, can anyone see that as a threat in your life? Like the worst thing that you think happened to you ever, that now you can see, oh, okay, there was a gift there. And that’s really the in invitation. We need to be willing to do it. And he doesn’t say this in his book, but you know, if you’re in your mind, if there’s someone you need to forgive, but like, maybe you don’t even really wanna talk to the person, right? Like maybe they’re not a safe person to have a conversation with for you. Or you just don’t wanna invite the energy into your life. You know, the whole o pono pono, which we talk a lot about here is really a good forgiveness prayer for that.
And the words of that are, I love you. I’m sorry. Please forgive me. Thank you. I love you. I’m sorry. Please forgive me. Thank you. And I didn’t put this in the handout, but you can Google it. And it’s really beautiful because you bring, if you bring the person in mind, or maybe the person is yourself, but if you bring the person in mind, you’re clearing the energy. ’cause what I don’t want for any of us is to be camped in a land where we’re holding unforgiveness. We don’t wanna camp there. It’s not, you know, resentment, all of that. It’s just, it’s not physically good for us actually, but it’s, it’s really putting us in a, a space that’s not supportive of where we wanna go in our lives. So I’m gonna skip, is spiritual myth busting? ’cause I wanna be aware of time. So number two, anyone who blames you isn’t happy. That’s golden rule number two. So those who blame you aren’t happy. And when we blame, we’re not happy. So anyone who blames us isn’t happy. So can you open your spiritual heart, you know, to the person? Just be aware. It’s not, it’s an awareness. It’s not a judgment of the person, right? Like, oh, I’m noticing so and so is blaming Oh, oh, you’re holding up the time. Thank you <laugh>. Thank you. I have it up here too. And on my hand. What?
Oh, okay. People who are happy. ’cause they’re blaming people all the time. Well, they’re actually not happy. I don’t think they’re actually happy. And if you have someone in your life who’s blaming you all the time, maybe you just wanna change your relationship with them. You know, Matt Conn has a great story about this. His uncle, I’ll jump ahead to this. His uncle, um, you know, as I said, everyone in his family thought he was weird. And so when he would go home, he had moved away from where they all lived. He would go to like, I think he moved to Oregon. So when he went home for the holiday, you know, he took a lot of snipes from people ’cause they thought he was weird. He was a healer, you know, whatever. So his uncle, one of his uncles comes up to him at a party and he goes, you’re weird.
I mean, who makes a, a living as a healer, right? And instead of like reacting, he just said to him, you know, maybe you’re not someone who needs to be healed, but there are other people who do so thank you. He just said thank you to him. And, um, and you know, that’s what we can do, right? We, we can be grateful. So I’m hopping ahead in my talk, so I’m gonna come back to that. Can I put a pin in it? Um, so you know, if someone says that you’re a reason for their unhappiness, that’s a projection of blame, right? And haven’t we all done that? Like <laugh>, I’m unhappy because so and so did such and such to me. Um, but what’s happening when we’re blaming someone is we’re attaching to an outcome, right? We’re attaching to an outcome. Someone didn’t do what we thought they should have done, right?
So we’re blaming them because we’re unhappy ’cause we wanted it to go a different way. But when we let go and let our soul be the guide, we can make a conscious choice to not be in a relationship where there’s a lot of blaming happening, right? That’s how we can, you know, show more self-acceptance for ourselves. But the other thing is, when you are more emotionally free, where other people are doesn’t impact you as much, right? You can just notice like, oh, okay, they’re blaming me right now. Thank you for the feedback. Like, there’s nothing wrong with getting feedback. And those of us who are pleasers, how many of us do we have in the room? Yeah, if you’re a pleaser, that’s really hard for you, right? It’s hard to not feel responsible for someone’s reaction. But the truth is, you are not. That’s their reaction.
Doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try to be in a conversation and relationship and get, you know, get curious about it, but you’re not responsible for their, um, relationship or their reaction. So here’s what I want you to notice this week. I want you to notice who you blame this week. I want you to really notice, um, you know, what are you doing that is causing you to blame others or where do you notice you’re getting blamed, right? And I’m gonna go through your homework at the end. So, um, I’m gonna come back to that then. Okay, so the next one, which we sort of got into ahead of time is hardship can be fast tracked through thankfulness. So, you know, I talked about Matt Kahn, you know, has this thing with his uncle. And he just learned at some point his spirit said to him, what if you just said thank you?
Anytime someone insulted you, judged you or spoke harshly to you, what if you just said thank you? You know what, if you just said thank you for your feedback, I’m, I’m in what you have to say. It doesn’t mean you need to like take it. I think with feedback, you know, you can always go home and think about it. I remember when I was in my twenties, if I got criticized at work, I would take it so personally and I would go home and beat the crap outta myself. Be like, I’m not perfect. And rich is probably watching going, you’re still that way. <laugh>, yes, per it’s possible that, that, that resembles me. But right. Um, but we have a choice in our consciousness, right? We have a choice in our consciousness, what we do, just say thank you. Whether it’s a compliment or whether it’s a criticism, just, well, thank you for telling me.
I appreciate knowing, right? I appreciate knowing and you know, maybe you learn something from what they say to you about how you’re impacting them or maybe it is about them and you have to discern that. But, you know, just to be open, like not to, not to let it like slime you, you know, remember Ghostbusters, they got slimed. You don’t wanna get slimed by what people say to you, <laugh> that just came up. I don’t know where that came from. So the vibration of gratitude, that’s where we wanna live. We wanna be in relationship of gratitude. And when I sit with Matt Kahn’s material, it, it really reminds me to simply be the observer in my life. Am I the observer? That’s an eastern thought, right? That’s a big thing in Buddhism and other paths. What is the universe trying to do with my life?
What is trying to happen, right? Just to be curious about it, you know, and also the observer of where others are in their lives and their interactions. To me, it doesn’t mean you excuse bad behavior or not don’t speak up for yourself, but just noticing, you know, where, where am I in my interaction with this person? But most importantly, observe your own consciousness. You know, if we’re observ observing unfairness, it might or anything else, any unwanted situation, right? It’s really calling up a different quality in our consciousness. We would say it’s a spiritual quality, right? If I’m feeling unappreciated, maybe when I’m calling in as appreciation, right? We could say that about everything has, its opposite, right? So when you’re experiencing something unwanted, what you’re wanting to call in through your spiritual work is its opposite. And that’s, you know, that can really be the gift.
Especially if we’re out whack. You know, when you’re outta whack in your life and you’re just kind of like, oh, where am I going? I don’t know what’s happening right now. Sometimes actually the things that happen, a gift, because you’ll be like, well that’s it, that’s it. I want freedom. I don’t feel free, huh? You know, I’m not expressing enough creativity in my life. I don’t feel free to do that. Oh, that’s what I want, right? It’s like whatever the unwanted thing is points to the wanted. So we teach the kingdoms of consciousness here, and this is before I give you your homework, this is where I wanna end. And you know, there’s four kingdoms of consciousness. The first one is the victim, right? I’m the victim, things are happening to me. The second one is by me. So I’m the manifester, things are happening by me, I’m doing it.
The next one is through me. So like I’m the channel through which spirit is flowing. And the last one is being consciousness. So as me, things are happening as me. And you know, you might live in different kingdoms in different parts of your life. You might find that like your money kingdom, you’re in victim or by me and you’re, you know, in your creativity or self-expression you’re in through me or as me. But just be aware of where you are, right? Just think about where am I right now and is there any place that I wanna shift, right? Like that’s the invitation. Where would I like to be having a shift? Because it’s really about cultivating a greater sense of inner happiness, right? How do you create more inner happiness That’s by being connected to your spirit. Like all these things are just tools, right?
To help you point in the direction of what’s your spirit wanting. So I just really invite you to think about who do you want to be? So the universe always has a plan. So if you’re online, this is, um, in the Sunday program and it’s also, I think Patrick was gonna drop it in, um, in the chat. But Matt Khan gives us some work to do at home. So I wanna share this work for you to do at home. So the first thing is golden rule number one, you’ve done nothing wrong. And I’m gonna make you speak the affirmations and mantras out loud. Just a warning. Okay? So the first affirmation is, in order to be who I was born to become, life couldn’t have happened any other way. Okay? So you’re gonna say it along with me out loud, big Sunday voices <laugh>, in order to be who I was born to become, life couldn’t have happened any other way.
I love that. And so your homework is to think about what you did wrong, things you did wrong, and what do you hold against yourself? And you’re gonna try to unravel the case against yourself. So to spend some time contemplating how was what you did wrong ac actually right for you with where your life turned out. Like how did it help you turn a or whatever and journal on that at home. So that’s the first one, okay? Golden rule number two. Anyone who blames you isn’t happy. I especially love that one. That’s my favorite. Okay? So the mantra is, I allow those who blame and have wronged me to be forgiven in forgiving others. I am set free. So, okay, come on. Big voices read along. I allow those who blame and have wronged me to be forgiven in forgiving others. I am set free.
Okay? And then your homework on this one is to make a list of who’s blamed you or people in the world suffering more than you are. And then send them blessings of forgiveness. I like that. That’s a good one. Okay, so number three, hardships can be fast tracked through thankfulness. So this one’s easy, this is easy to remember. You don’t need a cheat sheet on this one. Thank you for this gift. Okay, let’s say it out loud. Thank you for this gift. Okay? And your homework is, and this reminds me of Byron Katie, you’re gonna cultivate the opposite. Okay? So you’re gonna ask yourself a few questions. How do I feel as a result of the hurt? What’s the opposite adjective? So we’d call that the spiritual quality. And by the way, if you wanna call something in, please get prayer at the back of the room at the end.
And then, um, and then thank you for helping me cultivate this quality of my soul’s potential. That’s the process. So as we move toward going into prayer, I just want you to think for a second about one thing you’re gonna focus on this week. And I want you to share it with your neighbor. This is a quick share. It’s like a one minute share. Share it with your neighbor. One thing you’re gonna focus on, I wanna say I’m gonna give a shout out to Jason. ’cause last week at the practice Sunday we did something similar and he walked up to me this morning, he goes, how’d you do on that this week? I’m like, thank you for asking me <laugh>. That was awesome. He is holding me accountable. Okay, so one minute share with your neighbor. What are you gonna do this week? What, what inspired you and you talk that you’re gonna focus on this week and I forgot to say, if you’re online, type it in the chat. Okay? About 30 more seconds and you can go have coffee in the hallway and let them. Um ha that’s funny. You can have coffee in the hallway and talk about it later.
Um,
Okay, let’s come back together. And I had a funny chat that John just called me, <laugh> brought up to show me from Rich, saying you resemble that remark. So thanks Sonny. Okay, so <laugh>, okay, so let’s take this into prayer. Let’s give us a little underscore to start. Let go and let Gods have its way.
Let’s
Turn within, just close your eyes and connect with your spirit and just know that this presence and power of love is surrounding and supporting you.
That always and everywhere you are, one with this divine current of spirit. That you are never separate from it. That this loving energy is the truth of your being. And that there is always a plan that is happening in as and through your life. And you are absolutely on point and on purpose. So I just know and declare for each one of us that we are open to receive spirits calling for us. I just know and declare that we are led, that we are led to our greater yet to be. And I just know for each of us that we are letting go. We are allowing ourselves to be free, to be free in spirit, to be happy, to allow love to express in As and through us. I say yes to this. I just know this prayer is fulfilled. I’m so grateful for it. And with so much gratitude, I simply say, and so it is. Amen.