Lifeletter #160: Small Courageous Acts of Change

A beautiful man I am working with in Europe told me the other day, “I want to be responsive in my relationships, not reactive. I want to be undefended. I want to be courageous enough to let another person look inside me.”

I wanted to weep when I heard this—it was such a pure expression of his authentic longing. This is not the same impulse that drives us to be ‘better.’ This is not about self-improvement at all. Our real longings, the ones that arise from our true self, our core, our depths, are not pushing us toward some kind of ‘ideal self.’ They are not asking us to strive and struggle. They are calling us to soften, to open, to be more and more fully ourselves. And to accept our limitations.

Then this man said, “I have glimpses of this new way of being, but I cannot live it. I do not trust myself, that I am able to behave like that. It’s too difficult.”

People say this to me all the time: “I’ve done some work on myself, and now I can see so clearly these patterns I fall into when I am relating. But why doesn’t seeing them help? I feel worse now– I see what doesn’t work and I still keep doing it. I’m failing every day.”

I feel there is something very important to get clear about here, right inside this sore and tender place where we feel like we are failing. The heart of what will nourish and empower us here is a true acceptance of our limitations. So let’s explore this a little, in relation to this particular context: how we relate to one another.

We human beings are not very developed in this area. The evidence for this is everywhere we turn. On a global level, we often kill each other when there is conflict. Or we retreat and build walls around ourselves. We’ve been doing this for a long time. I might think that I don’t behave like this in my life, until I take a deeper look. Our patterns of self-protection, aggression, isolation and defensiveness run strong and very deep.

I feel like a baby when it comes to communication, deep connection, and intimacy. I have so much to learn. I’ve failed in this area so many times, in so many different ways. But I don’t regret those failures. They have softened me, and given me a great deal of patience and compassion. They have drastically lowered my expectations. They have forced me to work with myself and my own limitations, just as they are. And that’s been a good thing. Not always fun or easy at all, but essential.

When this man said, “I have glimpses of this way of being, but I cannot live it,” I heard him speaking for so many of us, for hundreds and thousands of human beings, all over the world. Inside my egoic identity, I believe that it’s my struggle, my dilemma, my heartbreak. I forget that we are utterly interconnected– that our separate lives are not really separate at all, not at the root. This man’s words do not belong to him alone. The next step in our evolution often feels impossible. It’s a way of being that is beyond the capacity of who we are now. We have to grow into it, slowly, with great patience, compassion and longing.

I have felt defeated thousands of times. When I was trying to embody a new way of being with my daughter, I used to sit in my room and feel that it would be easier to stand on the window sill and fly to the tree in my back yard, than to let go of my old, deeply entrenched way of being with her.

This human realm is full of obstacles, and we feel inadequate to deal with them. That’s part of what it is to be human. But most of the difficulty comes from wanting to get rid of these obstacles. We want to get away from them, hide from them, feel better, look better. We tend to avoid the direct  experience of working with them, every day of our lives. We forget that ‘what is in the way is the way.’

Our obstacles and difficulties are our path. There is no other path. There is no golden stairway to the sky. These blockages, these frustrations, are not a distraction from our authentic life. They are not a punishment. They are not bad luck or bad karma.

We have to come right down to earth and face these things and open up our heart to our limitations. It is quite difficult for the ego to tolerate this experience. We become easily threatened and disturbed by the experience of true acceptance. It can feel like resignation, if we stop struggling and just rest where we are. We may not realize one very fundamental thing, a paradox at the heart of this whole journey: we cannot evolve if we want to be somewhere else than where we are.

If we start to understand this, then we can open to a different relationship with our difficulties.  But we have to really know it, in our bodies, in our cells. Then we won’t give up on ourselves. We’ll realize we can keep going, and that even the smallest micro-movement of change is something to be celebrated. Especially in this area of relating. To be more real, to be vulnerable, to soften our defences even a little, takes great courage.  Instead of hoping for some enormous shift, we can turn in another direction. We can open our hearts to the possibility of something less glamourous, less spectacular,  what Harriet Lerner calls ‘the small courageous acts of change.’ The moment when I am able to ask for help, in a simple and direct way. The moment when I say ‘no,’ without making excuses. The moment when I allow someone to have their own experience, without trying to fix it. The moment when I say something that is true for me, even when my whole body is shaking with anxiety.

These are the moments we may never hear about. So I want to tell you how precious they are. Sometimes the smallest things are so magnificent. I want to celebrate them with all of you, and tell you that you are not alone. We’re all in this together. And giving up is not really an option.

The guest is inside you, and also inside me;
you know the sprout is hidden inside the seed.
We are all struggling; none of us has gone far.
Let your arrogance go, and look around inside.

~Kabir

with love,

Shayla