Edit, 25 November 2008:
So you can consider this issue solved. I wrote more it in this post. Others may still find this thread useful.
I would like some advice (from people who aim to live consciously and have more experience than me in this life area) navigating an issue I’m having so that I can ultimately reach a “place” where I’m honouring and loving both those around me, as well as my potential and capacity.
My posts should convey enough information for people who have experience in this area to see similarities between my experience and theirs. In other words, you’ll know whether or not it’s worth your time responding to my posts.
I’m pretty sure I’m accurately diagnosing this issue and that it’s not a result of something deeper or beneath my awareness, but of course, I can’t know for certain.
I’m primarily looking for advice from people who want to utilise their potential for the benefit of all and understand that their best is also what is best for everyone else and have aligned their lives so that is so, and see living consciously as the way to progressively improve their alignment.
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Info to give context:
I grew up interacting with virtual worlds, playing games and using computers and other technology. When I say that, I mean that instead of my intellect being used within standard environments (i.e. a balance of technology and people), I grew up with systems and data. As I did this, I developed in some areas more than others, giving me impressive strengths (since your brain is programmed to make you effective in whatever environment you find yourself in; it doesn’t care what environment it is, just about effectiveness and survival). But because I grew disproportionately, I was left with some glaring weaknesses.
Systems don’t need love, so love is not something I developed. I am told, however, that I was very loving when I was younger. Not sure how credible that information is since it comes from family, but I at least remember that when I was that age, I felt like I could be myself in my environment (i.e. home).
This changed when I started school. I was and always have been very different to most people (I’m not saying it’s a better or worse thing; I honestly don’t have the perspective to be able to say with any degree of accuracy. What I can say is that I know 100% that I was and am different to the majority of people I encounter). My peers didn’t really like this, and I was isolated. As a result, I interacted with systems, not people, since that’s where I was effective.
This left me with a highly developed intellect, but poorly developed intrapersonal skills. What I think is more important than the skills, though, is experience that you can use to cut through the complexity of your situation, see patterns, and make accurate predictions. Experience in interacting with people is something I lack.
Since then I’ve grown, and those who would once say I was fairly loving would no longer say that. During my teenage years I was more aligned with power than anything (truth and love weren’t really there when it came to relationships), and this had an influence on the people who I was growing up with, who to this day, choose to not live consciously. They prefer just accepting their results. This power alignment was useful, since it helped me to develop my power—something that was previously weak (i.e. I had love, but no truth or power)—but to develop power, I tossed away love (and truth, as it relates to what is ultimately an intelligent way to live; within isolated situations, I was well-aligned with truth).
Since my teenage years I’ve grown. Power in isolation no longer felt right, so I set out to reclaim what I could call “myself” and re-align with my true nature, not just a set of conditioned, reactive patterns formed over the years from positive or negative experiences. I choose to live consciously, because I wish to use my potential to have a positive impact. I want my existence to have been of consequence. I want to do this because I feel I should, and when I do it, I feel empowered and self-aligned. I’ve no question that this is the right path.
My challenge is this:
For the past year I’ve been using my intellectual strengths to branch out into the area of relationships. At first I wasn’t really effective, but I got better. I find I still interact with people on my terms rather than theirs since their terms (falsehood, fear, etc) are non-ideal. I’m not perfect, but I’ve always found openness, honesty, honour, and fairness to be a more productive set of values to align with.
Now I find myself interacting with people who don’t resonate with me completely. People who have compartmentalised life areas or many disempowering, limiting, or negative beliefs, and no real signs that they are doing anything to address that. At first I thought this was just the way things were and silently (i.e. unconsciously) approved of that situation because I knew no better.
I’ll give lots of credit to people who are in a compartmentalised state but are trying their best—even if they have limiting beliefs and the like holding them back.
I’m not perfect myself. While I have some strongly developed life areas, I have other life areas that are very underdeveloped, relative to my age and my capacity.
I always try to improve, and I’ll give people much credit if they, too, are committed to improvement and willing to improve a non-ideal situation.
Unfortunately I find myself surrounded by people who don’t want to improve, and want better results, but aren’t willing to do anything to get there, or are only open to doing things a certain way. I’m fine with people working from their strengths and in a way that lets people maintain their self-alignment, but outward “nope, not going to do anything; let’s just not worry about it” no longer resonates with me and seems ineffective.
Some relationships I seem to be able to “heal,” but the compartmentalisation remains, and I can see that, from a zoomed out perspective, that’s non idea.
I’m finding that this compartmentalisation in those I interact with is no longer serving me, and could possibly be hindering my ability to fully develop and utilise my potential, and maybe even holding me in this state, or, worse still, dragging me down. Not doing anything about that would be the ultimate way to dishonour my human configuration (i.e. my talents and abilities) and my capacity for positive impact.
I’ve looked into the issue from the lens of relationships, but I see that in general, throughout my life, the common theme is to say “yes” to compartmentalised things, even when I can envision a better future. I very frequently silently approve (sometimes consciously, sometimes unconsciously) mediocrity and compartmentalisation, even when I know I could be doing better. I simply thought that’s what you have to deal with if you want to interact with people, or to get money, etc, but now I’m starting to question that.
Compartmentalisation seems to be something you choose, and if you choose it, you must accept the results that come with it. I don’t want those results; they’re garbage and a waste of human potential.
I’m starting to see that perhaps I’m interacting with the wrong people, which ultimately hinders both them and myself, since we lock each other in our respective drama and silent approval, wasting time and potential.
My talent themes cause me to optimise my environment, so even in non-ideal situations, I feel a desire to improve them, but I’ve some isolated experiences have taught me that this is kind of a matter of “doing things right vs doing the right thing.” In other words, my efforts could be better directed elsewhere. I’ve found that some people will appreciate my efforts, and some people will say that they’re bad or unwanted and even try to diminish me. Experience has shown me that relative to their perspective and desires, both people are right. That said, I much prefer to align with those who appreciate myself and my efforts without constant drama.
Now I’m seeing that, not only on the level of relationships but with my life in general, I may be trying to optimise things on the wrong level, trying to improve already suboptimal relationships that I said “yes” to (consciously or unconsciously) at a time when I was less-developed and less-aware, and now I’m trying to hold onto them because from that situation it seems right and like something I should try to optimise, but if I zoomed out, it could be so much better if I applied my efforts optimising and developing empowering relationships, not semi-empowering relationships that don’t seem to have potential to ever become fully empowering relationships.
I’m prone to the “grass is greener” complex because my talent themes make me constantly want to improve things, but in this case, I think that urge for improvement is serving me, or at least, intelligence applied in a holistic fashion not just a biological craving. I genuinely predict that I can have a more fulfilling, empowering, beneficial, which I understand benefits not only me but everyone (through the concept of oneness, but applied on a very practical level), both indirectly and directly.
I can see that, primarily, this is about choice. It’s as simple as “whatever you’re experiencing you’ve said ‘yes’ to, whether you said ‘yes’ consciously or unconsciously, and if you want different results, say ‘yes’ to different things instead and your situation will shift.” Pretty simply, but I also understand the small print of “if you say ‘no’ to your current situation, or start saying ‘yes’ to different things, you have to accept the respective package of whatever you’re saying yes to.