lessons and arbinger

a few days ago while i was exercising i was also reading the bonds that make us free. i actually have never read the entire book before, but i really love arbinger in general and terry warner! there are so many good parts but something that i wanted to share in particular is about the process of progression and selfishness. here's what he says...


some of us who are seeking to maintain ourselves in our new, more open way of being get tripped up by our anxiety to measure our progress [so true! i know i do that:)]. we want to know how we're doing. but worrying too much about such things means we're probably still too self-absorbed to maintain whatever change of heart we may have experienced. . . .


there's nothing wrong with goals so long as we don't pursue them to prove we're something we're not. but turning the maintenance of the change of heart into a project with measurable steps of achievement usually requires a pretty heavy focus on oneself. this produces a counterfeit of change. 


what then do we focus on if not a goal? part of the answer is we do not think of ourselves as a "force on the move" toward some important objective. instead, we feel still, inwardly still.


ask yourself, who is the person i really need to be? is it a being who can come into existence ONLY by determined, gritty effort? No. on reflection it is more likely we will see the person i need to be is who i am already--or MORE accurately, who i will be IF i cease trying to display myself as worthy and acceptable and thus make myself into a grotesque distortion of who i really am. . . . we become most ourselves, without distortion, when we relax our frantic effort to justify ourselves and allow ourselves to simply be still.


i love arbinger. it's so wise and so right on with things. i don't know a better way to describe it and i don't really feel a need to bc i think "the things speaks for itself." :) another law school thing, sorry i can't help it. it just comes into my head.
you should read this! :)