The Tao of Influence. Karen McGregor

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СКАЧАТЬ Our energies were invested in hanging on to our unhealthy needs and our ego desires to protect ourselves from not being enough. Most people stay in this kind of resistance and hang on to old habits, behaviors, circumstances, and relationships for years, if not decades. But true influence can’t happen when we resist letting go, in any areas of our lives. Others sense that we’re not living our authentic truth, not genuinely present.

      What do you need to release? What are you hanging on to that no longer serves you? What power struggle are you engaged in that drives you to stay exactly where you are as you store all your mental and emotional baggage of the past? How does the way in which you see the world distort your natural and pure love? The Buddha said that we see through the eyes of fear, and this perspective becomes so real that we forget we are living an illusion. The minute we are trapped by the illusion of fear and the needs of the ego, we buy into the illusion, and it becomes seemingly impossible to let go, surrender, and be in the flow of life that is the Tao.

      The Law of the Impersonal

      The Sage is like Heaven and Earth. To him, none are especially dear.

      —Tao Te Ching, Verse 5

      Several years ago, I had the privilege of taking human behavioral specialist Dr. John Demartini and a friend sightseeing in beautiful Vancouver, British Columbia, my homeland. It was a nippy spring morning, and as the hours went by, I noticed that no matter what we discussed or what we encountered that day, John was absolutely grounded in peace, stillness, and overall happiness. Even when we spoke of tragic personal events, he didn’t alter his state. I had never met anyone like him before, and I realized that he was living the Way of the Tao and embodying the Law of the Impersonal. He didn’t see any individual event as better or worse than any other. And as a result, he didn’t suffer. He put it this way, “Suffering is expecting the world to be only one way and then being surprised when it’s not.”

      Nature is a great role model for us when it comes to the Law of the Impersonal. Nature does not hold anyone or anything “especially dear.” It does not give to only a few, nor does it protect just a few from tragic natural occurrences. Nature does what it does, whether it’s a fire, a flood, a tornado, or a new life. Nature simply creates and destroys. Humans are the only creatures on the planet that take every act, word, and thought personally. Most of us feel we cannot exist in an impersonal world. Even when it comes to concepts of the Divine, most of us take it personally, and that is why we suffer. Believing that if we are good, then bad things won’t happen, we are surprised to realize that no matter if our behavior is good or bad, “good” and “bad” things will happen. No one is immune. It’s not personal.

      In my own life, a dear friend passed of cancer, leaving behind young children, three of my clients passed away in the past few months, and the son of a friend just died in an auto accident. It’s tempting to ask, “Why?” In our Western world, we worship our intellect as having all the answers to life. Our civilization has come up with the answers to most everything, so why not this, too? We want to know why. But it’s not personal.

      Two animals died in my backyard this summer. I was shaken to see the remains of a rabbit attacked and killed by a hawk. A week later, a bird hit my front window in the early morning, and I watched it die within seconds of falling to the ground. I felt helpless. There was nothing I could do to stop it. Tears welled up in my eyes as my prayer to return this bird to life “failed.” So often, we want to control what we perceive as “not good,” even when it has to do with death, and even when we know that death is part of life. It is a natural law; all that is living will die. And yet we resist. We suffer. But it’s not personal.

      Our refusal to accept the impersonal nature of life can increase our suffering and contribute to the distortion of our power. Instead of allowing ourselves to feel the emotion of sadness, we become bitter, for example. We dwell on the same unanswerable questions over and over: Why did this have to happen in my family? Why are we cursed while others are so blessed? Some give up on God. Some decide not to grow or evolve. Some people sever their relationships with others and stop pursuing new ones. When we take the impersonal personally, our positive influence comes to a halt. Taking it all personally, some people end up feeling sorry for themselves, considering themselves to be the perpetual victim, and telling their sad story to anyone who will listen. Others become full of rage and hurt others with their words and actions. All of this suffering occurs only because they demand that a personal universe give them reasons for why things happen as they do.

      Part of the disconnect is simply because the mind is a reasoning tool that cannot comprehend how the same Source that loves and supports us doesn’t consider us special at the same time. It doesn’t make any effort to treat us as special. For most, it is incomprehensible.

      When I’m guiding budding entrepreneurs to share their message and sell their products and programs, I remind them that one of the best mindsets in business is to learn to expect and accept challenges as they arise. This is not about being pessimistic; it is creating a foundation for the acceptance of natural laws. It’s not a matter of if those challenges will happen, it’s when. That perspective empowers people to withstand challenges, not out of fear, but out of love.

      What it comes down to is this: expectations will immediately or eventually bring suffering. The need to always have things turn out the way we expect will ultimately create unhappiness; the unmet expectations then turn love-power into distorted power. Harboring expectations fuels the ego’s ploys to make us feel safe, to let us see only the threats in life, to look for refuge in what we have, to get what we want—rather than look for challenges and risk losing what we have to evolve or grow.

      When people take the world personally and don’t like the cards they’re dealt, they blame others, God or the Universe, for things not going their way. Some people become aggressive as they try to control the outcomes, insisting that they are special and deserve special treatment. This ‘specialness’ builds into a sense of entitlement—a common form of distorted power. Feeling entitled, they perceive that the universe, their community, and the people in their lives owe them something. It’s all a result of the inability to see the impersonal nature of life.

      The solution? Stop using your mind to figure things out. Fully accept the Law of the Impersonal, this intrinsic law of nature, and accept the entirety of what life brings. As Lao Tzu wrote, “Sometimes you’re behind, other times ahead, sometimes strong, other times weak, sometimes with, other times alone; to the Sage, the movement of life is perfection.”

      Reflections

      Draw your attention to how your ego fights your acceptance of your current situation and the present moment. (And it will—every day.) Combine this attention with the daily practice of gratitude. Learn to see every moment as a moment of grace. Gradually the acceptance of an impersonal world will become more commonplace than the ego’s fight for specialness and personal meaning.

      Choose a new favorite journal to begin recording insights from your journey with The Tao of Influence. Like this one, each chapter will close with an opportunity for you to reflect on and integrate your learnings.

      Ask yourself: Which of the three laws of nature do you flow well with? Which one do you feel most at peace with? How does the acceptance of this law enrich your life? How has your acceptance of this law affected those around you? What steps can you take to help others activate this law of nature in their own lives?

      Ask yourself: Which of the three laws of nature do you resist? How has your resistance to the law contributed to your personal suffering? How has your resistance to it affected the lives of those around you? What steps can you take to more fully accept this law of nature and let it flow in your life?

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