THE WHITE TIGER: THE STUMBLING BLOCK
The greatest trap in our life is not success, popularity or power, but self-rejection - Henri Nouwen
I had a dream about a month or two before the decision to begin writing The White Tiger. It was only the third time that I have dreamed about my father, that I can recall. In the first two dreams I killed him. In this dream, he was choking on a golf ball. I had the conscious and clear option to save his life or let him die. I did not hesitate. I administered the Heimlich maneuver. He started vomiting a heap of slime covered golf balls. In that instant, I understood exactly what the golf balls represented.
Every golf ball is something someone has said, or done to us, that made us feel not good enough, rejected, and unworthy. We swallowed each one, and now they sit in our stomachs - heavy, hard, painful, nauseating.
In the swallowing begins the believing…you are not thin enough (gulp) I am not thin enough…you are not pretty enough (gulp) I am not pretty enough…you are not smart enough (gulp) I am not smart enough…you are not popular enough (gulp) I am not popular enough…you are not _______(fill in the blank, no matter what they all add up to…) good enough (gulp) I am not good enough.
External rejection of Self, accepted and swallowed, now becomes Internal rejection of Self. It is now a belief. In the believing, we reject our very SELF. We can now tell our Self, with confidence, that we are unbeautiful, broken, and unworthy, and we have a belly full of golf balls to prove it.
I know an 88 year old woman who recently recounted that her father used to always call her “bb brain.” (a bb being the tiny round pellet used in a bb gun). That golf ball has sat in her tummy for the best part of 88 years. It is still making her sick.
What golf balls have you swallowed?
Until you vomit up your golf balls, they will continue to sit there, and make you feel very unwell and very uncomfortable. Vomiting is just the release, the letting go…the reversal of belief.
For the antidote to the suffering of the human psyche is Connection, which offers an opportunity for Love, Belonging, and acceptance - and there will be no connection to other, if we cannot first connect with our SELF. Without Love, Belonging, and acceptance within, and for, our SELF, rejection of Self will remain a painful and bruising stumbling block in our search for the path to Psychological Freedom.
You are not broken…there is nothing “wrong” with you…you just have a belly full of golf balls. The path to Psychological Freedom begins with NEW LEARNING. Gaining this new wisdom and understanding is the beginning of being able to release, to let go, to reverse the belief.
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The White Tiger is written sequentially. To gain the greatest understanding it is recommended, and helpful, to read The White Tiger beginning with the original post forward. All preceding posts can be accessed by clicking this link https://substack.com/@thewhitetiger
