si dawson

I realised a long time ago the truism that “What annoys me most in others is what annoys me about myself”.

This is one of the reasons I’ve come back to live with my folks for a while. I’d got about as far as I easily could peering into my own navel. Much easier to look at them to see what else is there in me. As the old saying goes: “If you think you’re enlightened, spend a weekend with your parents.” So far, it’s been about six months and boy, I’ve grown lots. Ha ha. Oh boy. Yes.

What I’ve started to realise over the last couple of days is something of a corollary to the above truism.

What I want most from others is what I’m not giving myself.

For years, the thing that has made me the most angry is if I feel someone isn’t listening to me – particularly if they’re insistently asking me something, despite my attempts to explain.

The very few times (historically maybe twice a decade) I’ve got truly “red mist” angry, that’s been the situation.

At some level, the reason it has had such a strong effect on me is simply because I feel I haven’t been listening to myself.

Isn’t it funny how it’s ok for us to treat ourselves like shit, but if someone else does it, it’s suddenly outrageously unacceptable?

So here’s the interesting bit: what the hell does that even mean? “Not listening to myself?” I honestly have no idea. All I do know is, when I healed* on not listening to myself, I felt a huge rush of energy leaving and a great peace come over me. Now, if I think back to those times when I’ve been aggressively not-listened-to (ha ha, yes), I find the situations oddly amusing.

This, by the way, is great news.

Why? Because it shows you don’t have to consciously understand what anything is about to heal it. You don’t have to figure it out. Just let your subconscious sort it out. It is, after all, the part of you faffing about and being all stroppy in the first place. It’s only fair it should pull its weight for once. Take that, inner child! Slobbing around on the sofa all day watching TV and eating cheerios!

Over the last couple of days, as a background task, every so often I’ve answered two questions:

• “What pisses me off (about others)?”
• “What do I really want (from others)?”

Often these are opposite sides of the same answer. It pisses me off when people don’t respect me. I really want people to respect me. The reason for both of these? I’m not respecting myself. If I do that, well who cares what anyone else does? The craving for it disappears.

I want people to love me? (And frankly, who doesn’t?) I’m just not loving myself.

I want people to listen to me? I’m not listening to myself.

I want people to value me? I’m not valuing myself.

This is such a stupidly simple thing, it sounds almost ridiculous to write down. All I know is, this has been incredibly helpful.

When I give myself what I want, I no longer crave it from others.

*Oh, and the silliest thing? How did I heal this? That’s the easiest bit yet. More on this in a little while, but for now all you need to know is this:

1. I simply said: “I love that I don’t listen to myself,” while releasing all the energy, physical tension, emotional responses and thoughts that arose in response to saying that.
2. I mixed it up a little with “I love that I still  don’t listen to myself.”
3. I kept going until I felt peaceful.
   
4. I then plugged in the positive “I love that I listen to myself,” “I love that I always listen to myself,” “I love that I listen to myself completely.” Again, releasing all resistance that came up.
5. I kept going till I felt peaceful and the positive statements felt true.

Really, I simply said whatever popped in my head, felt right and felt like it would push things a little further, a little deeper. I maybe tapped my karate chop point if I felt things needed amping up a notch.

If you really want to test if something’s gone, see how you feel about someone else treating you in that way. Can you say out loud (for example) “I love [person close to you] not listening to me”?

That’s all I did. It’s all I needed to do. How could I not share something so elegantly powerful with you?

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Remember a while back, I wrote about a more effective version of the Map’n’Tap? Ie, a way to quickly deeply clear everything around any given issue. Well, here’s the fastest way I’ve found if you want to do a whole bunch of maps.

Since any mind map should ideally be about a single subject, if you want to clear a bunch of different subjects, each subject will require a different map.

So, unless we want to the spend the entire rest of our lives tapping frantically, instead of, well, living (*yawn* been there, done that. BORING), you need a fast way to hammer through these. Then you can head off happily to the pub (or wherever) with the freedom of knowing that whatever-it-was that had been bothering you is now a thing of the past.

OK. SO.

My general approach (as I outlined here) is to scribble out a map, then next to each item jot if it’s about wanting or lacking Approval, Control or Security (or all three). Finally, I flick on the video & tap along, saying “I love that I lack control (etc) about..” (whatever the item is).

So, here’s the trick to clearing a lot of these things quickly. First of all scribble out all your maps, one after the other. When you’ve finished that, then go through each item on each map & put it into a/c/s (or combos). Only when you’ve completely finished, go through & tap each map.

I find when I’m in that kind of flow, it’s super easy to just flick from one map to the next, with barely a pause in between. Doing them one at a time took forever!

There’s something about not needing to context switch (writing, assessing, tapping) back & forth that makes this way much, much faster than just doing each complete map one at a time.

Anyway, have fun clearing stuff out. I’ve been doing a ton of these over the last month or so & the difference it’s made in terms of inner peace is almost ridiculous.

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I’ve talked about posture before and how strongly our mind & body are connected. How if we’re feeling crappy, we can adjust ourselves physically and our mind will follow. We can do this just with our face (in the west, often the most outwardly expressive part of us) or with our entire bodies.

What I’ve learned recently is just how subtle this body/mind interaction is.

After 20 odd years of Aikido, this shouldn’t have surprised me as much as it did.

In Aikido, we often sit in seiza. Basically, you kneel with your knees apart, your bum on your heels, back arched and head up.

This posture is well known across the universe.

Here’s Spock doing it

(From this excellent site on Vulcan meditation. Ha ha, you think I’m kidding. Oh Internet, you have everything!)

The most important part of all this? The arched back. (Spock does it well)

If you prefer more beard, here’s how it looks from the front:

Long white beard is optional. Grass, preferred. Katana, mandatory.

The basic Aikido pin looks like this:

Shake my hand would you, fool?

No, wait, like this:

No! You sit over *there*!

Ok ok, I’m joking around. It’s actually like this:

See? There’s that seiza again. And you thought we’d just been sitting like that coz we hated legs.

(a few minor corrections – most importantly knees apart will drop her centre more, but that’s actually pretty good)

Now here’s where the arched back comes in.

When you’re on the receiving end (i.e. face down, eating grass) if the person doing the pins arches their back or not makes the difference between:

“Someone’s leaning on my arm”

and

“My entire being is pinned to the centre of the earth by a large truck”

What’s even more interesting is that when it’s done correctly, zero effort is expended, and the person is not just squashing you as hard as they can – that’s actually a weaker pin.

Now, out of the dojo, and back to real life.

Here’s what I’ve noticed: When I’m healing, or hell, doing anything sitting down, if I sit just that little bit straighter, and yes, arch my back, everything goes much better and becomes extraordinarily easier.

Stuff that might have been tricky to drop or heal falls away instantly.

I feel more in control of my code, my writing, my life. Things become… possible.

Everything.

The only thing I’m changing is maybe pushing my butt further back on the chair, and arching my back, very, very slightly. Of course, this pushes one’s shoulders back and also tends to raise the head slightly – but really, it’s just a little back arch.

Such a subtle shift, such huge effect.

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I originally wrote about the Map N Tap a loooong time ago.

The basic gist goes like this: Most issues (particularly core or long-held beliefs) are like little spiderwebs. There are lots of things tied in around them – both positive & negative (ie, both attachments and aversions).

So, to clear out anything significant:

1. Get yourself in a chilled space
2. Focus on the issue
3. Do a mindmap of everything that pops into mind around it (negative and positive), no matter how trivial
4. Tap it out (bitch!) starting from the outside and working your way in

Earlier this week, I discovered a neat way to amp that up, and really clear things out, super powerfully. Huge thanks to Leslie for this one.

In short, watch the vid (fullscreen is best), tap along, but focus on your mindmap.

The great thing is, the words David is saying are all aimed at letting stuff go, so even though you may be focussing your attention on something that’s been difficult to shift in the past, he (more or less) programs your brain to just chuck it out. Because your conscious attention is on your issue, his verbal instructions side step your resistance. It’s sneaky but awesome.

He also focuses pretty heavily on sending positive energy to you (the viewer) as you’re watching. Whether you believe that or not really doesn’t matter. What he’s doing works.

Interestingly, the exercise also becomes something of an EFT/Releasing hybrid. You’re tapping, but really, you’re just letting go of it all.

Perhaps as a result, I’ve found myself shifting stuff super fast with this.

Simple stick with each item on your map, continue tapping along until it feels clear and you’re not bothered by it any more (you feel hootless!). Then move to the next item, working your way from the outside in.

Once you’ve watched the whole video once, you can prolly skip forward to 03:55, that’s where the tapping really starts. Thus, from there to the end of the tapping is only about 8 minutes. So yes, you can do two sessions in quarter of an hour. Amazing. I’ve managed to clear full page mindmaps, with more than 40 items on them, down the point where none of it bothers me any more in one single viewing/tapping session.

Also interestingly, while I’ve been tapping for, wow, maybe 5 years now (and anywhere from 5-50 things a day, pretty much every day), it’s pretty rare that I have strong physical reactions any more. Except when I’ve been using this approach. Doing this, pretty much every time I end up over-heating like crazy, in tears, snotty-nosed and/or burping loudly (yes, delightful I know). These are all signs that it’s going super deep & really ripping stuff (lovingly!) out.

Over the last few days I’ve managed to clear out a ton of super deep programs (negative beliefs). Fear of failure, fear of success, a ton of stuff about women (amazed I’ve ever had a date, with all that junk floating around in my noodle), being not good enough, not worthy, a ton of stuff around money, you name it.

I feel different. I’m thinking differently. The world feels different than it did even a few days ago. The efficacy of this technique is simply mindblowing, in terms of bang-per-minute spent.

If you have a particularly chunky map, or something that feels like there’s a lot to it, it’s a good idea to give it another bash the next day. Create a brand new map and then tap on that. You’ll be amazed how different successive maps become, as you wade down through the layers, clearing out the accumulated detritus of life. I did three maps on women (ie, intimate relationships) three days running, and there was basically zero overlap between any of them. Amazing!

How To

Here’s an example (one I did). You can see that really, you’re just brain dumping, in a semi-structured way. Just scribble (or draw) stuff down in any manner that feels useful to you. There’s no right or wrong approach.

click for an easier to read (ie, large) version

The primary advantage, I think, of writing it all down is that it frees up space in your brain to focus on the one specific tiny subsection you’re working on, at any one time. Of course, this is something that the Getting Things Done crowd have known forever. Empty brain = easier to be mindful & focused.

Some suggestions to get started (if they resonate with you):

• I must suffer
• Life is hard
• I don’t deserve to be happy
• Women (or Men, if you’re female)
• Your partner (if you have one)
• Family
• Parents
• Making money
• Having money

Just take it from there. Don’t be afraid to do them on seemingly trivial issues too. I’ve found & removed some super deep, super hardcore life stuff when the map itself started with an utter triviality. Everything is connected, you’ll be amazed what pops up.

Extra For Experts
Since everything comes back to either wanting (ie, lacking) Control, Safety or Approval, try writing a note next to each item on your map (I just jot down -C, -A or -S), then, rather than focusing so much on the specific issue, focus on letting go of wanting/lacking Control, Safety or Approval about that issue. Things don’t have to be only one of course, they can be any combination or all three.Once you’ve cleared the A/C/S, then tap/release on the issue itself (usually by then this will have already gone).

Doing this is more intense, and slightly more work while you get used to it, but really does seem to clear deeper, and faster. An additional benefit is that it more thoroughly clears you out in general, since letting go of a little wanting control in one area lets go of it from everywhere in your life, and so on.

Once you’ve worked all the way in to the centre on any specific branch of the map, then quickly scan back out to the edge again. This’ll pick up anything that may not have cleared completely.

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