The Woe of Being Right
If you read my recent post, ‘The Nature of Reality’, you might have been left with the question, “But HOW do I change my mind? HOW do I change my perspective?”
Expressing your truth begins with self knowledge - an awareness of what you think and how you feel in any given moment. A balanced expression of your truth also requires understanding that everyone else’s perspective is inherently different. With that in mind, communicating your perspective becomes much more effective when you consider the following:
What is your intention?
Are you talking about yourself or others?
Are you asking questions instead of making assumptions?
How clear is your mind within the conversation?
Let’s start with number one. When speaking your truth, what is your motivation? Is it to defend your sense of self? Is it because you think your viewpoint is the absolute truth? Is it because you want the other person to see things the same way that you see them? Any intention in which you want to defend your sense of self, your sense of reality or you want another person to adopt your view, is what I would call an impure intention. The reason is twofold:
1. You are trying to impose your perspective on someone else who has their own perspective, and
2. You are willing to diminish their view in order to validate the absoluteness of your own view. In other words, you are willing to put others down in order to raise your limited sense of self. (Identification with your perspective.)
With this definition, a pure intention is one that seeks to uplift all of life, including other people - not by allowing yourself to be treated like a doormat, but by refusing to treat others that way. And this can be subtle. In fact, it becomes more subtle as you go. Sometimes, expressing your opinion serves no real purpose beyond validating your sense of self or your sense of reality. Other times, withholding your perspective can diminish you, the relationship, and life itself. Speaking your truth might occasionally hurt someone’s well-being, yet staying silent might deprive them of the chance to grow. There are also times when someone simply is not willing or able to receive what you are sharing - and I have learned to respect that, for it is their choice.
There is no absolute rule to figuring out if what you want to share will be uplifting or diminishing. You have to be mindful, introspective and increase your self awareness as you go. In my case, I tend toward withholding and silence. So when I am withholding something that would serve life, I may feel a knot in my throat and emotionally guarded - yet everything inside of me is urging me to speak. For someone who tends to be open, and freely shares their thoughts and opinions: the lesson may be to examine the purity of their intent while pausing to consider the effect of sharing their perspective.
Another consideration in the expression of one’s truth is cultivating an ability to communicate about ourselves instead of other people. The tendency to attack the character of other people and name call is rampant in our culture. Talking negatively about others nullifies the intrinsic power of self knowledge and accountability. It is common in our world to blame other people and external circumstances for our own state of being. It feels like a get-out-of-jail-free card, but really, it’s an eternal-slavery card. For as long as we are not in control of our own state of being, our state of being is at the mercy of everything else. I wrote more about this in Radical Responsibility.