There is nothing to fix and everything to experience.
When I say things like there is ‘nothing wrong with us’, ‘there is nothing to fix’, I am met with ‘that’s easy for you to say’, often coupled with an eye roll, sometimes with sheer disdain. How dare me. In these moments, many think I have lost touch with reality, or see me as disrespecting the challenges that people face. That is not the case.
One of my annoying qualities is that I see others as they cannot see themselves. I see people as strong, vibrant, beautiful, courageous, fearless, and perfect. As frustrating as this can be to some, I do not see anyone as a victim and I do not choose to focus on pain. We are all quite adept at seeing nothing but our pain, we do not need help doing that. The challenge is to look beyond what may seem obvious to what is true.
When we look at our children, how do we see them? Do we see them as vibrant, competent beings experiencing life as it shows up? Or do we see them as weak, ill equipped and vulnerable in a dangerous world? While we may not think we focus on the latter, we are often looking for diagnoses, areas of improvement and failings to fix. We call this self-improvement. I know my teachers always looked at me this way. Perhaps a little more tutoring, more practice, more medication, more socialization.
Without all the props we are afraid that our kids will be left behind. We fear for their future so we set on a course of directing, fixing and looking for weak spots. This way of approaching life is a never ending cycle. It was done to us when we were young, we do it to ourselves, our bosses and spouses do it to us and we turn around and do it to our own kids.
Relying on our fix-it mentally, which has us pretty clear about who we are not, has made us forget who we are. And this has plunged us into insecurity and fear and more fixing. Our fear also makes us forget who everyone else is as well. The miracles we all are. We see incomplete rather than whole, we see comparison instead of compassion, unsafe rather than powerful, victims rather than exercisers of free will. But in truth there is nothing wrong with us. We are not broken and we don’t need to be fixed, nor does anyone else.
What would life be like if we weren’t constantly fixing ourselves and others? In truth, we have never imagined this. We have not asked ourselves this question, we just assume that we could always be better. We think it is noble to be constantly on the lookout for ways to improve. We think humility is self deprecation and acknowledging our flaws. Just because it is the norm, doesn’t make it normal.
You cannot be better than you are, you are perfect. You can do different things, some you might think are great, others you may think suck but neither impacts who you are. Contrary to popular belief we are not our thoughts, our actions or our emotions. We experience these things, but we are not these things.
That does not mean that our life is perfect. Perfection within is not dependent on perfection without. It is purely a state of being regardless of what life may look like. If there is something in our lives that seems to need fixing, what we need to update is our perspective of who we are and what this place called earth is all about. We are here to separate fact from fiction. The fact that we are perfect from the fiction of our self-perception to date.
Embracing the novel truth that you do not need fixing nor does anyone else is a gift that keeps on giving. The mental real estate that this frees up is mind boggling. You may actually notice you have a lot more time on your hands. In addition, when you let yourself off the self improvement hook, you open up the possibility for a whole new world to emerge, one that is magical, miraculous and brand spanking new.
For Fear: The Brain Scan
Watch you brain scanning for flaws - in yourself, your spouse, your kids, your body, your parents, your siblings, perfect strangers - you get the idea…
This brain scanning is a habit, a program, that you engage in regularly.
Know that these are not actually flaws but the product of a scan, and they are not meant to be fixed.
Notice the emotions that you experience improve when you don’t feel the compulsion to fix.
Fixing fixation liberation is nothing short of life altering.
Enjoy the peace,
xoxo Jill