The Secret of the Shadow (8 page)

I have found so often in my coaching practice that people would rather hold on to a grain of hope than deal with reality. Our 68

w h y y o u h o l d o n t o y o u r s t o r y fear of dealing with loss or pain keeps us tied to our stories and keeps us repeating the same old, same old. Some people get their fix of hope from books, tapes, and lectures. While this type of inspiration can at times be useful, if we use it to justify our current circumstances it will become no more than just another page in our stories. Several years ago I worked with Margaret, a wealthy woman who at first glance appeared to have it all. Margaret traveled all over the world visiting spas and retreat centers and had the means to afford the best advice money could buy. A self-proclaimed self-help junkie, Margaret went from workshop to workshop hoping that spending time with people she considered to be important would give her the recognition she craved. But inside, plagued by insecurity, she felt unseen and unimportant. A seemingly insignificant incident like someone not returning her call would cause her to obsess for days. Margaret spent most of her energy searching for something that would make her feel like she belonged.

During our third session I noticed that Margaret seemed to be getting weaker: Her body was breaking down, and she appeared more frantic and fearful. I suggested that she detach herself from all the groups and individuals she had been clinging to in the hope that she would one day belong. Knowing that what she sought could be found only inside herself, I gave her the assignment to withdraw from her self-help addiction and turn her attention inward. But Margaret couldn’t do it. She was too terrified of being alone, of being without all the distractions that held the promise of recognition and belonging. She continued in her familiar pattern of behavior, clinging to the hope that one day it would pay off.

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T h e S e c r e t o f t h e S h a d o w Margaret read book after book, searching for a philosophy that would justify her actions, all the while gathering evidence that supported her in staying the same. Whenever I spoke to her about the self-destructive patterns she was displaying, she would quote a line from the latest book she was reading: “Debbie, I just read a book that says we are all doing the best we can. I’m doing the best I can, too.” Margaret was very creative at coming up with ways to justify her behavior. One week she came in and told me she had been mistreated and verbally abused by her family. When I asked her what she wanted to do about it, she replied, “Everything’s perfect exactly the way it is.” I watched as Margaret continued on her painful quest, all the while grasping at the affirmations that held the promise of hope. She was more committed to the path of justification than to exploring the underlying issues that were haunting her.

I asked Margaret to make a list of all the expressions and inspirational messages she used in order to avoid dealing with reality.

This was a person who had read every self-help book that hit the best-seller list and attended every seminar that offered any promise of happiness. In her search she had gathered quite a collection of aphorisms that kept her from feeling the desperation of her situation. Here are some of the pearls of wisdom she used to feed herself hope: “It’s always darkest just before the dawn.”

“What doesn’t kill me will make me stronger.” “No pain, no gain.”

“There’s a reason for everything.” “God doesn’t give me anything I can’t handle.” “It’s a process.” “Miracles can happen.” “The Universe is working through me.” “Let go and let God.” “It’s all an illusion.” “This too shall pass.” “There’s always someone worse off than me.” “Maintain an attitude of gratitude.” “Do what you 70

w h y y o u h o l d o n t o y o u r s t o r y love and the money will follow.” “Things always work out for the best.” “What is, is, and what’s not, is not.” “Every cloud has a silver lining.” “The joy is in the journey.” “There’s gold in the dark.”

“Time heals all wounds.” “Today is the first day of the rest of my life.”

All this wisdom, which Margaret had spent years of her life collecting, had now become just another part of her story, just another attempt that didn’t work. Even though it’s been three years since we worked together, when I run into Margaret in town she still gives me poetic excuses for why things aren’t going her way and why she’s stuck. Because she is unwilling to face the underlying problems that keep her addicted to certain people and organizations, Margaret remains stuck in the same repetitive patterns she knows so well. She has convinced herself that this is the way God wants her life to be, and that if the Universe wanted more for her, somehow the doors would magically fly open.

Instead of going inside herself and asking, “Is there something in me that is causing the same things to show up over and over again?” Margaret continues to cling desperately to hope, leaving everyone around her with the hopelessness of her life.

I tell you Margaret’s story as a word of caution. If you’ve been stuck in a bad situation or a disempowering relationship for more than a year, do not allow your story to seduce you into thinking, “It will all work out for the best.” Because that is, after all, just another story.

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T h e S e c r e t o f t h e S h a d o w T h e G r e at At t e m p t

Many of us have fallen into the never-ending trap of trying to fix our stories. Some of us have spent years of our lives and too much of our energy rewriting the plot or recasting the characters of our personal dramas, hoping to transform our lives and put our Shadow Boxes to rest. But no matter how hard we try to fix our stories, we continually wind up flattened by the limitations that our personal dramas hold in place. Although making some minor improve-ments will help us look and feel better, those moments of joy are short-lived. Unless we make the conscious decision to step outside the limitations of our stories, the temporary sense of freedom we feel after reading an inspirational book or listening to a motivational tape will be replaced by hopelessness and despair.

Until we understand that the root of our problem is the mistaken belief that we
are
our stories, even the best Band-Aid is bound to fail.

Recently, I met a beautiful young woman at one of my courses.

I immediately noticed Caroline’s bouncy walk and cheerful personality. On all the breaks she walked by me, waited to get my attention, and then flashed me a big, beautiful smile. But by the second day of the process Caroline’s smile slowly began to fade and was replaced by a look of sadness, fear, and despair. Finally she approached me, asking if she could have a few minutes of my time.

She asked me if I thought this seminar could really help her and began sobbing as she told me how many approaches she had tried in an effort to find lasting peace. She had tried to keep a positive attitude, and when that failed she had gone into therapy. She had 72

w h y y o u h o l d o n t o y o u r s t o r y been to many personal-growth seminars, read hundreds of self-help books, and listened to countless hours of motivational audio-tapes. She now found herself devastated because after all those years of trying to fix herself she still felt a huge sadness just beneath the surface of her consciousness.

I asked Caroline to close her eyes and describe to me her life’s most painful incident. She told me that when she was five years old her father had come home, picked up her older brother, and then left. Caroline didn’t see either of them again for ten years. I asked her how she had dealt with the pain of that trauma, and she said her mother had told her that she had to think positive and keep a smile on her face. By the time Caroline was fifteen she was in so much pain that she began exploring every approach—from physical exercise to spiritual practices—that might offer some relief.

She kept looking for a quick fix, some bit of motivation or inspiration that she could hold on to for a day or a week. But the relief never lasted long; eventually she would slip back into the hopelessness of her story. I gently suggested to Caroline that she use the weekend to grieve the loss of her brother and her father. She stared at me blankly. “You mean, go
into
the pain?” she asked.

I drove home that night thinking about all the years each of us spends trying to change our stories, trying to pretend that our traumas or humiliations never happened, and trying to conceal the pain of our past. I reflected on the massive amount of energy we each expend trying to change the way we feel, the way we think, and the way we behave—all in the hope that one day, with enough work, our lives will transform themselves and we will finally be happy.

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T h e S e c r e t o f t h e S h a d o w Every time I lead a seminar, I have the privilege of sitting in front of a group of some of the most extraordinary people on the planet. These are people who have worked hard at their lives.

Some have studied with the greatest spiritual masters of our time; others have worked with therapists and other wise teachers to heal their pasts and make a contribution to the world. Yet still they are left with the feeling that there is more for them to know, more wisdom to be attained, before they will be whole. Their lives are driven by an internal struggle that continually keeps them searching for a better, ultimately more meaningful, life. For years I questioned why none of us can seem to find whatever it is we are looking for. Why, with all this knowledge, with all this wisdom, are we still on the hunt for something more? Why do bad things happen to good people? Why is continuous joy so unattainable? Why do our dreams always seem to be one step ahead of us? Some of us have even driven ourselves deeply into debt looking for the answers to why our lives are the way they are.

In one of my trainings we listed all the methods, techniques, and approaches we had used to try to fix ourselves and our stories.

The list was huge. We had visited acupuncturists, past-life regres-sionists, and, for most of us, more than our fair share of therapists.

We had worked on our anger, our inner child, and our inner critic, and when that failed we had tried ecstatic dance. We had tried visualizing, affirming, chanting, and meditating our way out of our pain. We had sought the advice of nutritionists, trainers, life coaches, yoga teachers, and gurus, and when those didn’t work we had sought out our internists for a prescription of Prozac. We had cleansed our chakras, sniffed essential oils, and lit scented candles 74

w h y y o u h o l d o n t o y o u r s t o r y to calm our minds. Some of us had soaked in energetically balanced baths while listening to harmonically soothing music. We had burned incense specially imported from India, put magnets under our pillows, worn amulets around our necks and mood rings on our fingers. We had picked angel cards and had our tarot cards read. We had tried volunteering our time, doing service to help people who seemed worse off than we were. Some of us had tried a rich husband or a young, pretty wife.

Our list went on and on, and even though we had a tremendous laugh over it, most of us were left in the presence and pain of the story that couldn’t be fixed. And the question that arose was simple: Is there any hope?

G o i n g B e y o n d t h e K n o w n A deep longing drives us to fix our stories. We long to return to our natural state of wholeness, to the place where we know we are the vastness of the Universe rather than the smallness of our personal dramas. In our effort to find utopia, the land of peace and fulfillment, we form relationships, build businesses, and attend retreats.

We spend hundreds of hours reading, studying, and accumulating knowledge that we hope will return us to our natural state of grace. But even when our knowledge fails us we continue our search. Deep inside we know that a return to wholeness is possible.

After all, if we truly believed it was unattainable, we wouldn’t spend so much of our lives chasing it; we would settle instead for the repetitive drama we all know so well. But most of us don’t 75

T h e S e c r e t o f t h e S h a d o w settle. That deep longing drives us to find our way home. It drives us to search until we wake up to the vastness of our eternal self, the self that is beyond our story.

When we are ready to remain conscious inside our stories, we must confront our deepest truth:
Our minds can’t take us where our
hearts long to go.
Our minds drive us to find answers, but the answers we find are often what prevent us from finding our deeper truth. For example, our society knows more about dieting and health than ever before, yet our population continues to suffer from health and weight problems. Knowing what to eat and knowing how much exercise we need
will not
give us the motivation to eat well and exercise. However, if we get in touch with the sacredness and wholeness of our inner beings and feel what it is like to be healthy and strong, we will naturally desire to feed ourselves and take care of ourselves in the best way possible. My friend Patrick says, “Knowing the way is not going the way.” Knowing is the booby prize. Knowing lives in our minds; being lives in our hearts. In order to be the “you” that you long to be, you must give up the “you” that you know. In fact, you must give up all that you know. I am constantly amazed at all the men and women who walk into my seminars who can literally recite the texts of some of the greatest spiritual books of our times. Yet they are keenly aware that, even with all this knowledge, with all this wisdom, there is still something missing.

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w h y y o u h o l d o n t o y o u r s t o r y T h e F e a r o f L e t t i n g G o
Holding on to what we know is the biggest reason we remain stuck in
our stories.
As humans, we desperately want to believe we know who we are. But thinking that we know who we are and what we’re made of is actually what seals us inside our stories. Our thoughts are limited; they live inside the identity that we believe ourselves to be. Each of us has an ego that desperately wants to know. The ego doesn’t want to know just for the sake of knowing; it wants to know so it can feel superior to the next person. This is the way of all human beings. It’s not bad; it’s not wrong. It’s just what is. Don’t spend your time trying to get rid of your ego; you can’t. Just like you can’t get rid of your story. They are essential aspects of your Divine recipe, which we will explore later on. But for now you must admit who is running the show and what motives are operating at all times in your life.