The temptation to believe some version of the story “There is something wrong” can be very powerful. It keeps you feeling as if you are missing something fundamental at the core. It keeps you striving to improve yourself, always looking for some better version of yourself in the future and looking for others to change so that you can be at peace.
The story, “There is something wrong with me,” lies at the core of who we think we are. It’s insidious, showing up in so many different forms, which try to trick you into believing that you aren’t there yet, aren’t valid, aren’t loved, aren’t important, or some other story along those lines.
These thoughts arise throughout the day in very unconscious ways. Sometimes we don’t even see them. Yet they are there, operating within the mind, running the show of our lives. They are like branches of one central tree trunk. I call that trunk the core, deficient self. If you can let each one of those branches blow through present awareness like a breeze that blows through the air, and then feel directly the emotion that arose with that thought, you cannot help but love yourself, others, and life. This is because love is very natural. You don’t have to cultivate or act in loving ways. If you do that, you are most likely trying to fit yourself within an image of what love looks like or what it does. Love is much too unpredictable. It can’t be pinned down into a code of conduct. Love means loving everything, including the darker energies of anger, sadness, and fear that arise with some version of “I’m not good enough.” We act lovingly and selflessly, very naturally, by seeing through the core stories we tell about ourselves. The only thing really obscuring that love is the constant clinging to these various branches that tell you that there is something wrong with you.
Be the air. Let each breeze blow by. Love yourself that much. If you refuse to follow these thoughts, and instead rest without thoughts each time you see some version of the story “I’m not good enough,” you begin to realize a perfection, love, and wholeness that is not intellectual. It is your experience. This is the most profoundly healing thing you can do for yourself. Start now. And welcome anyone who criticizes you. Take what they say personally. Let yourself feel the hurt within the body that arises. Don’t entangle yourself in the thoughts. Let the thoughts come and go. But feel the anger, the fear, the sadness directly, without labels. Let that energy arise fully. You will see that even that energy is love. The mind cannot grasp this. It has to be experienced to be known and appreciated.
The more you do this, the more you are convinced of your natural perfection and of the natural love that is your experience. Do this for yourself and watch your relationships automatically harmonize themselves. Most disharmony in relationship comes from the belief that you are deficient in some way. And so you look for others to cure or fix that deficiency. But others cannot give you this profound healing and transformation beyond self. They are only a mirror for you. Let their hurtful words, their angry stances, and their fear-inducing stories act as a catalyst for your own awakening.
Literally dismiss every thought you have about yourself that is some version of “there is something wrong with me.” In that seeing, you come to see that there is nothing wrong with you. And there is nothing wrong with others. They are doing the best they can, often dealing with their own stories of deficiency. Don’t worry. Without the story, “There is something wrong,” you will still be able to function, take care of your body, go about your day, be fully and intimately in relationship, and even leave relationships that are toxic and unhealthy. “There is something wrong” is not a necessary story for living and, in fact, it is a lie. Why live a lie? Let that lie breeze through you. Be that open. Be that vulnerable. Be that intimate with life as it appears instead of telling yourself that there is something wrong with what is appearing. There is nothing wrong. Life is simply living itself. It is only a thought that says “There is something wrong.” To believe that there is a part of life that is wrong and that this part is YOU is horrendous and life-denying. To live the full expression of your own individuality without the story “there is something wrong with me” is quite wondrous and joyful. I highly recommended it!
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