THE WHITE TIGER: STEPPING STONES - Part 3
Full Circle
Replacing the Motherboard series took The White Tiger full circle - back to the early posts that discussed both the importance and the impact of the 90 percent.
Before the last two critical elements of this journey are elucidated, it seemed like an appropriate time to reread The White Tiger from the beginning.
In this process, what was found were the stepping stones along this pathway. A stepping stone was pulled out from many of the posts and collected in the previous posts, Stepping Stones - Part 1, Part 2, and in this post. The original thought was to edit and rearrange, however upon reading them, as they had been lifted from each post, it became obvious that the flow is already there - naturally leading to the final two critical elements to follow. Therefore, the content is as it appears in each original post.
STEPPING STONES
Understanding Ends Fear.
The 7 Core Pains
The 7 Core Pains of the human experience, renamed as the 7 Core Fears, as iterated in Part 1 of No Longer Confused in Connection, center around the Psychological Impact of Connection.
Connection is fundamental criteria for Survival. Without it we cannot establish Safety & Security and Love & Belonging (Maslow’s Hierarchy of Need). Without it we cannot survive. (The Foundation Series - 2)
A child never indicts the Caregiver. The Child always assumes responsibility for failed/insecure Connection (aka Rejection), and will alter their (our) actions and behaviors, such as people pleasing, in an attempt to gain Connection/Acceptance, thereby ensuring suvival. Simultaneously, the emotional response will be altered in order to contain and repress the pain of Rejection, leading to maladaptive coping such as dissociation, emotional numbing, emotional suppression, and avoidance. The chosen style of coping becomes a hard wired template for future, in our case - current, relationships. Enter - The Confusions in Connection - Efforting for Acceptance, The Comfort of Chaos…, The Irons of Obligation Part 3a & 3b, Where I End and You Begin, Who is Accountable for What….
Rejection is Death
The source of Pain in Connection comes from the experience of, or the Fear of, Rejection/Abandonment. What is more painful in the human experience than Rejection? All of the 7 Core Fears circle back to this Primary Fear that determines whether or not we survive. Rejection is death - physical or psychological. Hence, the etiology of the Fear (Fight Flight Freeze, aka Anxiety) in human engagement. (The F-Word, Forgive Me Father for I Have Sinned)
Let’s look at Rejection/Abandonment a little more deeply within the context of human dynamic. If you are Rejected/Abandoned – there can only be a single reason – you were not found to be good enough. Rejection/Abandonment distills down to – when passed through the smallest gauge sifter – Not Being Good Enough.
What are the emotions when you are rejected from a social group? When you are unfriended? When you are rejected for a job that you really wanted? When you have received a scathing review? When your friends or family mock or bully you for a mistake that you made, or something that you did for which they did not approve?
How many times have you said out loud, or silently thought, “I am never good enough.” “I will never be good enough.” “I can never please him/her/them.” “Nothing I do pleases him/her/them.”
Rejection/Abandonment equals Not Being Good Enough.
Not Being Good Enough
Taking it a layer deeper, what does it mean to Not Be Good Enough?
Not Being Good Enough is a measure of your Worth. Not Being Good Enough, as Rejection, means you are not Worthy. You are not Worthy of Connection/Acceptance (of not being Rejected/Abandoned). This is why the Fear of Worthlessness is one of the 7 Core Fears.
Worth is a Construct. It is a thought. It is an idea. It is a Conditioned Belief.
Worth is a product of the human cortex. We thought it up. Step off of the Earth and out into Space—now find Worth. It doesn’t exist. The Universe exists, Impartial, Neutral, without Judgement.
Worth mandates Judgement (separating sheep from goats). It has to - by its very nature - by definition. The Universe judges nothing and no one. The concept of Worth simply does not exist outside of the Conditioned Belief structures created by our Religions, our Cultures, and our Societies.
There is no Concept of Worth in the Universe. It just does not exist.
Acceptance = Worthy - Rejection = Unworthy
Construct
Construct: an idea or theory containing various conceptual elements, typically one considered to be subjective and not based on empirical evidence.
Worth is assigned - based on perception of what is valuable and what is not valuable. Hence, the source of Worth is someone’s Judgement, which is to say - it is made-up.
You are Accepted or Rejected in our Society based on the brand and style of clothes you wear, the car you drive, the size and location of your home, the number of Likes you get, the number of Views you get, the amount of money in your bank account, your perceived popularity, and the list goes on. This is the measure of your Worth. This is what determines if you are deemed (Judged to be) Worthy or Unworthy.
This is Condemnation by Construct.
It begins for every one of us, at an early age, perhaps even, at birth. It all begins with those first early connections, successful or unsuccessful, safe or not safe. It begins the first time a parent or caregiver lets you know directly or subtly that you are Good Enough (Worthy) or Not Good Enough (Unworthy), by either Accepting you or Rejecting you - as you are. Studied more deeply, it is easily found that the assessment the parent or caregiver has made of you is, in fact, the very same assessment that was made of them, and therefore, their assessment of themselves. Learned from their early connections and passed on to you as legacy. It continues as we move through the social programming of the education system. This external assessment of our SELF becomes our internal assessment of our SELF. And so, the psychological impact of Worth begins, and endures unabated.
Making it Stop
In psychology and psychiatry, the ultimate goal, and sign, of psychological wellbeing/stability is Self Love or the Love of the Self.
The great barrier to this goal is any feeling, great or small, of Unworthiness, of Not Being Good Enough. This is always an external struggle, however the real struggle, the real barrier, the real challenge to overcome, is the internal struggle. Once you have deemed (Judged) your SELF as broken, unfixable, weird, awkward, not normal, not okay as you are, “messed up,” “f-d up,” a misfit, an outsider, socially inept, not good enough, etc., the task of finding psychological stability becomes arduous, and often, feels impossible.
There is a solution. It is real. It is tangible. It is accessible. It is doable.
It is assimilating, pulling into your SELF, embracing, wrapping your heart and mind around - the understanding that everything about Worth/Worthiness is fake. It is a meaningless made-up Construct. It is not real. It does not exist in the Universe. When we mentally step away from all that is Society, and our upbringing - what we see are masses upon masses of people who have been brainwashed (Conditioned to Believe) into believing that Worth is a thing, and a thing that matters.
You simply stop entertaining the idea of Worth - abandoning it in full - releasing your SELF from having anything to do with the topic - complete release of the meaningless idea. If you do this, what you will find is that you are standing in a space called Neutral. And the Neutrality extends both to your Self and to all Others.
What we pass through in life are experiences, and that is the whole of it. What we do or don’t do with those experiences is up to us. That is something we get to decide. However, at no point in time does any of it have anything to do with our Worth(iness).
Abandoning the whole made up idea of Worth completely clears the table and Solves The Equation for Self Love. Once it is understood that Worth is nothing, that it does not exist, then we get to make it all just stop. Self Love is released from imprisonment and is free to make an appearance and begin to grow.
Gone are the voices inside our head, telling us over and over again that we are messed up, different, not good enough. Gone are the thoughts that if we only apply ourselves harder, more, bigger, with greater effort, we will somehow, some way, someday find ourselves feeling Worthy - and somehow miraculously believe it.
If we choose to use our experiences in life in such a way as to find and live in, and as, our Authentic Self, then the question of Worth must be struck from the psyche - abandoned, abolished.
Living as your Authentic Self is true Psychological Freedom. This is the goal that we have all been trying to reach. And reach it - you can.
