This blog post is a continuation to the following posts – please read them first for context:

Day 153: Snowy – My Mountain of Support
Day 154: Snowy – My Mountain of Support – Pt2

I explained in my previous post how I saw the particular construct I required to work with that Snowy had been showing me by living it out. I saw how the energy I was working with was ‘protectiveness’ and how the word in relation to which I would activate the word ‘protectiveness’ was the word ‘life’. I saw how there was both a positive polarity of desiring to protect life as well as a negative polarity as trying to protect myself from life.

As a child and growing up, I have always been reserved when interacting with others. Not that I would always stay in the background or be a loner or be the shy one in a group – I would make friends and have fun – but I would always be ready to ‘pull out’ in case I felt I had to. I had noticed that no matter how ‘nice’ a friend or a family member may seem in one moment, in another they can suddenly change and ‘turn against me’ – often unexpectedly, where I ‘wasn’t prepared for it’. The same with animals – in one moment a dog could be gentle and in another they could suddenly snap their teeth. The same with nature – the one moment I am playing in the garden on the grass, the next I get stung by a bee. In all these instances I felt that my sense of security was false, that I wasn’t really safe from ‘life’ as how I experienced it.

What I saw within using the tools of SRA3, is that I had defined the words ‘safe/protected’ within a mother-child relationship. You know – when you’re a child and you’re just sitting next to your mom on the couch and you rest your head on her chest, she wraps your arm around you and you can hear her breathing and her heartbeat – that experience of ‘I am protected, I am safe, nothing can happen to me’. That experience is what I desired.

So – within deciding who I would be within my life, I wanted that point of safety/protectedness to be a part of it. Of course, I couldn’t stay a child forever living with my mother – but I could become a mother myself. Because, a mother and child, I presumed, both take part in the same experience of safetyness/protectedness. Herein – my perception of mothers was also relevant. Of all the adults and their extent of participation and interaction with ‘life’ as that which I saw as unpredictable and dangerous – I thought mothers were the least exposed, because they are at home taking care of the children. Perhaps that is why I would say I wanted to become a mother of 5 kids – to make sure I’d never have the time to do anything else but be a mother, lol – but remain secluded, protected in the safety of my own home.

That was how the negative polarity to the word ‘life’ influenced ‘who I wanted to be in life’.

The positive polarity of the word ‘life’ refers to seeing life as something pure and innocent – and yet so fragile – something that can be easily corrupted, hurt and abused. From within my own fear of the ‘outside world’ – ‘life as we know it’ – I created a desire to protect this ‘pure, innocent’ life – and where I had defined this ‘pure/innocent life’ to exist was in babies and young children – the ones not yet influenced too much by ‘the world’ – who were still blissfully ignorant and under the impression that ‘life’ is welcome here. So – from the positive polarity of my definition of the word ‘life’ I wanted to be someone who protects ‘life’ in this world and of all the social roles in society – I saw that mothers taking care of babies/children were the ones to fit this bill.

So – through accepting both the fear and desire that sprung up within me from both the negative and positive polarities of my definition of the word ‘life’, I created a behavioral design of ‘protectiveness’ within me – both in relation to protecting myself as well as protecting others. That was the same behavior I saw in Snowy – where on the one hand she wanted to protect herself against Cesar, seeing him as a ‘threat’ while at the same time ‘protecting him’ through playing a nurturing role towards him.

I then went and wrote about all these points, applied my Self-Forgiveness and wrote my Self-Corrective Statements to remove the separation I had created towards the word ‘life’, to redefine the word as myself and diffuse this construct as a whole. I had shared with LJ and Leila what I’d seen in terms of how Snowy’s behavior mirroring mine. After I had done all my writing, SF and SCS – Snowy’s behavior immediately changed, lol. She was back to her ‘old self’. Leila noticed the drastic change in Snowy and asked me if I’d worked on my points – to which I said ‘yes’ with a big smile, lol. So – this was a very cool feedback point again –where Snowy showed me: you got it, girl – my work here is done. Lol. I gave her a big hug, amazed and grateful for the unconditional support that she is.
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I left off in my previous post saying:

“So, one night I realized this was carrying on for too long (Snowy’s odd behavior in relation to Cesar and her toys) and that something else must be going on. I placed my hand on her chest, breathed and then checked which person was a match for the point she was working with – which of course, was me – lol.

The next point was to see: what point is she showing me about myself??

What opened up for me was quite fascinating – I don’t know if I would have seen/realized this point if it weren’t for my Snowy-bear assisting me with such specificity – I’ll share in my next post!”

To see what point Snowy and I were working with, I kept one hand on her chest and placed the other on her side. The first thing I looked at was identifying the energy that was running – because that was the most noticeable about her behavior – as soon as she would hear or see Cesar, or as soon as she picked up a toy – a particular energy started directing her behavior – where no matter what we said or did – the energy was not moving out or diminishing and she continued to follow the energy – we couldn’t ‘snap her out of it’ or even ‘get through to her’. When identifying the energy, the word ‘protectiveness’ came up. Snowy takes her ‘protective role’ always quite seriously, but now every time she’d hear/see Cesar, that protectiveness went into over-drive.

As soon as I placed the word ‘protectiveness’ within me to check if that was the word – I could feel/became aware of ‘lines’ that together formed a particular geometric shape and that shape covered my abdominal area. Here – I remembered the article from Jack where he explained how weight in the abdomen is due to protecting fears.

So – this was getting more and more interesting – because the word ‘protectiveness’ was showing to contain more than one dimension – it was not just about protecting others, but also about protecting myself and protecting fears. So I focused in on that geometrical shape that I felt over my abdomen and saw two sides to it. On the one side I saw it relating to the symbology of pregnancy – where a baby is in the belly, protected by the uterus and abdomen – so an experience of safety/security. On the other hand I saw how the geometric shape was somewhat like the door of a prison cell – so, here I was looking at self-limitation – fear and insecurity.

I could see how that polarity had played out in Snowy’s behavior – where on the one hand she was ‘excessively nurturing’ – with her toys as well as licking Cesar all over when he would get close to her – yet on the other hand, she was seeing Cesar as a threat and tried to protect herself from him.

(If my story is sounding a bit jumbled, it’s because I’m trying to tell it the way it opened up for me – so bear with me if it’s not sounding very coherent, lol – it did kind of open up as ‘pop, pop, pop’ – I started seeing the factors at play, the ingredients if you will – but did not yet see how I had ‘cooked it up’ for myself or how it all strings together – that I looked at afterwards.)

At that point I was satisfied that I had identified the energy as being ‘protectiveness’ and that it was related to motherhood and that there was a polarity construct involved. But keeping a discussion I’d recently had with Esteni in mind, as well as the tools introduced in the SRA3 course of Desteni I Process – I could see I hadn’t ‘gotten to the bottom of it yet’ – I so far had only opened up a particular behavior and how that behavior was driven by an energy – but I had not yet identified the source point. I knew I had to identify one word – one word that contains a polarity in its definition – where ‘protectiveness’ is how I ‘live out’ the polarity of that word in my reality.

Now that word – interestingly enough, is: ‘Life’.

It was easier to see the word by looking at the positive polarity – the positive polarity being: what is it I desire to protect? So – looking at motherhood – protecting a baby – protecting innocence – I could see that it boils down to: protecting ‘pure’ life. Then I looked at the negative polarity to see if the word ‘life’ is accurate – so I checked: Is life something I fear/something I feel I have to protect myself from? And the answer was ‘yes’ – meaning: life as life on Earth as it exists today. Growing up, the world seems like a scary place – people are so unpredictable and I definitely felt insecure. So – my definition of the word ‘life’ existed within a polarity – giving rise to both a desire and a fear – and the energy and behavior of ‘protectiveness’ was driven by that desire and fear.

So now I had the rough outline of the construct. Then I looked at how I had created and lived this construct as myself – what decisions I made from within this construct and how I shaped ‘me’ and ‘my life’ from within and as this construct – I will share that process in my next post. Learn more »

This post is a continuation to the post
Day 151: When Cesar gets it ‘wrong’

In my last post I explained the scenario where Cesar is using the blocks of a ‘game’ in a way that doesn’t fall into the parameters for which the game was designed and how I would react ever so slightly and yet very distinctly when seeing Cesar play with the blocks in a way that I see is ‘moving him further away’ from ‘getting the answer’ of ‘what the purpose is of the game’ – as describing one scenario where I would react in perceiving ‘Cesar getting it wrong’.

Another scenario where I would react within myself is when Cesar is playing with the same blocks – the ones with the holes of a particular shape and the towers of the matching shapes, where the purpose of the game is to place the blocks over the tower with the matching shape – and where Cesar would take a block with for instance a triangle whole and try to place it over the rectangular tower. Lol, I’m laughing as I write it as it now seems so silly to react to it – but in the moment of observing Cesar do this, I would become uncomfortable and would ‘fight’ the urge to tell him ‘no, that one goes over the triangular tower’ to then show him how it fits.

So – in this scenario, the reaction was again stemming from trying to ‘protect’ Cesar from experiencing  what I believe he would experience in realizing the block doesn’t match the tower. So, here again I was projecting my own experience onto Cesar, where I believe he would experience frustration, anger and self-judgment in not matching up the shapes. Cesar, however, didn’t seem to ‘care’ if the shapes matched up or not, he would try to get it on, and if it didn’t work, then he would just do something else with it. He didn’t have the concept of ‘right or wrong’ – he would just observe that sometimes the shape matches and he can get it over a tower and sometimes not. I could tell him that the shape with the triangular whole will only fit over the triangular tower, but even when I did, he would try to place it over the rectangular tower – lol. So – I realized that he’s going to test it out for himself over and over until he is satisfied that it is indeed physically impossible to match a triangle and a rectangle – and there’s really nothing wrong with that. For him to ‘accept’ the fact just because someone told him will create a point of belief. And even more, if he keeps doing it because afterwards we say ‘well done!’ with a smile on our face, then we’re interfering with his learning process.

Herein I saw how easy it is to condition someone to act in a way to obtain praise – where you’ll end up only doing those things and pursuing those things of which you expect to receive positive feedback, instead of really finding out what is possible, exploring everything for yourself and see what works, what is effective and what is not. We believe we are ‘teaching’ a child something when we tell them ‘no, not that way – do it this way – look!’ – and that in congratulating them when they copy us, we feel we’re rightfully praising them for apparently having ‘figured out the right answer’ – when actually, we’re depriving them of the figuring out part – all they have learned is to copy us. The actual figuring out is a long process of testing over and over what works and what doesn’t - that is how a child will naturally learn and they won’t feel frustrated when something doesn’t work – they will only feel frustrated if we tell them they should feel frustrated, by reacting within ourselves with an experience of ‘no! not that way!’ – where every time they do something, they pick up on our reaction, and so start believing there must be something wrong with what they’re doing.

Without an outside person guiding the activity, a child will just over and over again try to fit a shape over every tower - regardless of whether it didn’t work once  – he’ll try again later – so that he comes to the understanding that – no matter when I try to place a triangular shape over a rectangular one, no matter from which angle, no matter how much pressure I exert, no matter whether the sun is shining or if it’s raining – it doesn’t work – now the child has actually learned something.
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I often babysit Cesar in the afternoons while Leila is exercising and taking care of Charlie, her other baby (her horse :) ). Cesar likes being outside and amongst the dogs the most, but when it is cold or rainy, we’ll look for things to do in his room. One of the activities he’s been more interested in recently is playing with blocs, like duplo blocks or blocks that have a hole of a particular shape in them that he ‘has to’ then hang around a little tower of a particular shape. One thing here is that it is fascinating how we take our motoric skills for granted. It seems so easy to just put two duplo blocks together and make them stick and then start building a house or a plane or a tower or just some random figure. We don’t remember that at some point in our lives, we didn’t have the skills to do that and that we walked a process of continuous trial and error that demanded a lot of concentration on our part to slowly start developing the muscles and flexibility to put two duplo blocks together and make them stick the way you want them to.

So, Cesar is now walking that process of developing these motoric skills with lots of trial and error. Now, I started noticing an interesting experience within myself when I would see Cesar struggle or ‘get it wrong’. I noticed it first on a physical level, like a contraction in my solar plexus area and I would ‘hold my breath’ ever so slightly. In looking at it more closely, I could see that fear of ‘getting it wrong’ and wanting to prevent Cesar from ‘getting it wrong’.

So – what does ‘getting it wrong’ even mean – there’s several scenarios I’m referring to with that, from where I will see his actions/attempts as ‘right’ or ‘wrong’.

One is when he is for instance playing with the blocs that have holes of a particular shape in them, that he has to pull/drop over a tower of the matching shape. So, the block with the circular hole goes over the circular tower, the block with the rectangular hole goes over the rectangular tower etc. For me as an adult, I can see at first glance which shape he will be able to pull/drop over which tower and I also understand that this is the purpose of the game, that this is what it is designed for. As Cesar is picking up the shapes and turning them around, banging them together, tossing them across the room, he is just exploring these objects and what he can do with it. But with me understanding the ‘purpose’ of the game, I see it as the ‘wrong thing to do’ and I kind of become impatient, because I just really want him to ‘get’ that he can put these shapes over the towers! Because from my perspective, he hasn’t really ‘gotten the right answer’ until he realizes that the shapes are ‘supposed to’ go over the tower, lol.

So, here – I was projecting the idea that Cesar would feel proud of himself after having figured out that he could make the pieces fit over the towers. Here, actually, projecting my own experience when ‘getting something right’ and the belief that something is not worth doing and a waste of my time. I would have to resist the urge to show Cesar how to place the blocks over the tower, lol. But those ideas, beliefs and desires didn’t exist in Cesar – he was just exploring and here I was wanting to steer and limit his activity towards only one possible option of how to play with blocks.

I’ll continue in my next post.

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For context, please read my previous blog-posts:
Day 146: The Credit is Mine!
Day 147: A Memory, a Trigger Word

In the post ‘Day 146 – The Credit is Mine!’ I saw how the prideful character is like a queen on a throne requiring subjects to come and ‘bow for the queen’ – where the bowing stands representative of others giving ‘positive feedback’ as ‘praise’. In my last post – ‘Day 147:A Memory, a Trigger Word’ I explained how I realized the word ‘queen’ exists as a polarized word within myself – having both positive and negative charges. I used a Memory to show how – when this word was used by someone to describe me – I experienced a flood of reactions as the word ‘struck’ to the heart of who I was living as within myself as the prideful character.

I had a look then at my relationship to the word ‘queen’ and I could immediately see several Disney movies and fairytales that had influenced my understanding and definition of this word. When watching the movies and reading/hearing the stories – I would admire the character of the ‘kindhearted’ princess (who will become a kindhearted queen) and I would fear the character of the ‘evil queen’ that usually plays some part in the stories as well – be it as an actual queen, or as an evil stepmother, as an evil fairy, etc. – they all embody the same character of a spiteful woman in an authoritative position.

As I moved through the story, I would identify with the kindhearted princess – because that’s who I would want to be and how I would want to be seen by others. I’m sure this is the case for most girls – I haven’t heard any girl saying she ‘liked’ the evil queen characters more than the princess characters. But fascinatingly, when having that picture of the ‘kind princess’ who is loved and revered by all who are fortunate enough to know her, in front of self as what self would like to live and experience in this world – then disappointment comes soon enough, because – guess what: people don’t love and revere someone just for who they are. In my experience, it was grades, success and good performance that got me praise – not ‘me being myself’.

And in so desperately attempting to hold on to that picture, that ideal, that feeling of being praised, of being a princess, a kindhearted queen – I split myself – because it was only on the outside, in how I presented myself towards others that I would play this character – trying to be the ‘good girl’ – but within myself, a fear and anxiety grew that turned into an obsession – because what if this praise stops or what if others stop seeing me in a good light, it would feel as though I am losing myself – so in the background, within myself, hidden from sight – would develop a different character – the prideful character – the exact character that I would fear when watching the Disney movies or when hearing fairy tales: the evil queen.

It’s interesting when looking at it, that in the Disney movies – they tend to cut the story line before the princess actually becomes a queen – or just after – you assume that the kind princess remains true to her ‘kind nature’ – but we don’t actually know, they don’t show you – what kind of queen does the kindhearted princess become? Perhaps the truth of the matter is seen as too shocking for children – what if the children would see that the kindhearted princess becomes the evil queen over time – what if they could see that the good queen and the evil queen are but two sides of the same coin? For that matter – what kind of a princess was the evil queen before she was an evil queen? Isn’t that what the movie Maleficent has contributed in showing?

Children have a degree of innocence and ‘good intentions’ when they are young and we like to believe when we grow up that we are doing good, that we are living up to those good intentions and that we are ‘doing the best we can’ – but who are we truly? Who are we within? Who are we when others leave the room and our backchat about them flourishes? When we scheme and plot to surpass and outshine others? When we throw tantrums for not being praised? When we judge other out of sheer jealousy? We’re all wanting to be kings and queens – good ones on the outside, but evil on the inside – how about we stop trying to be kings and queens? How about we learn to appreciate ourselves and support ourselves to live by principles that are best for all – and do the same for others? Do away with fear, do away with hiding, do away with manipulation and deception – is that not what we all would truly want?

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This blog-post is a continuation to:

Day 141: Pride - The Root of All Sin?
Day 142: Pride and Perfection
Day 143: Pride – Prize versus Hide
Day 144: It doesn't matter what you say, I already decided I won't listen to you

Maleficent is the name of the evil fairy in Sleeping Beauty and also the name of the new Disney movie where this classic fairy tale is told from Maleficent’s point of view. Without going into a debate about whether it’s a good movie or not or whether it is cool or not that the story was told from the villain’s point of view – I found the movie depicting the point of Pride quite nicely so will use it as a reference from that perspective.

In the story, Maleficent starts out as an ‘innocent’ fairy. She’s revered by the other creatures in her domain for her large wings, her expression, her devotion. At some point, she is ‘betrayed’ by a friend, a human, that she had trusted with access to ‘fairyland’ to call it that – I don’t recall the exact terms. In any case, her human friend cuts off her wings to bring them to his dying king so that he may ascend to the throne after the king’s death. When she realized the ‘betrayal’, she decided to take revenge and destroy what is most precious to him – his daughter.

In that moment, it seemed like the right thing to do – she felt justified in her decision of avenging her loss and betrayal. As the child grows up on the country-side under the stewardship of the ‘three good fairies’ – Maleficent keeps an eye on her and on occasion steps in to make sure the child is not harmed. As the child grows older, her and Maleficent start to develop a relationship – the child thinking/believing that Maleficent is her fairy godmother. It becomes clear how Maleficent starts to see the child in a different light – no longer just ‘the most precious possession of my enemy and therefore my target for destruction’ – but a child in her own right, with her own expression, her own life. More and more you can see the doubt in Maleficent in terms of the decision she had made and the curse she had placed on the girl, Sleeping Beauty. But she wipes away the doubt and the regret, because ‘she made that decision and in that moment, she felt so right and righteous about it, she cannot, she won’t, reconsider it. Then of course, she will only admit her mistake when it is too late and the curse takes effect.

Another way in which the prideful character is so nicely depicted in Maleficent is her total disregard for everything and everyone around her. Whereas she used to care and nurture, she starts to poison and harm – in the movie, she literally casts a ‘dark cloud’ over her land and ‘sucks the joy’ out of everything around her. The only thing on her mind is her revenge, her path, her point of view – nothing else matters – everything can be sacrificed for her self-interest. And anyone who tries to point it out to her is shut down.

Oh, how far we are willing to go to protect our self-interest. Would it not be easier to admit the mistake? To take a step back and see the consequences one is busy creating, for oneself and for everyone else involved? To see that: okay, I am experiencing some very strong emotions here and I reaaaaaallly want to stick with my point of view – but that is all it is: my point of view – am I really choosing the optimum path here? Is this really a solution? Whom does this benefit, whom does this harm?

In the movie, of course, all magically ends well, but we all know how, in real life, when our mistakes catch up with us, we don’t just get a ‘happily ever after’ handed to us – the consequences are already created and now have to be faced and walked through. Is our pride really worth it? Superimposing an experience over reality, superimposing ourselves over others – to what end? To eventually have to realize the same thing: 'crap, I made a mistake'. Learn more »

I ended off in my previous post with saying how I started internalizing ‘pats on the back’ – in that, if I felt I had done something well, I would ‘congratulate myself’ and ‘feel proud about myself’ in relation to what I’d done. As well as the other side of trying to hide the mistakes I made, not only from others, but from myself as well.

Now, where I find the Prideful Character to be most apparent is in moments where someone makes a suggestion to me or points out that something I did could have been done differently. How I experience my reactions in such moments it that there is a sudden jolt of anxiety in my solar plexus area, as though the anxiety is coming from all over my body and centers in the solar plexus. And, you know, how anxiety is experienced like a ‘current’ – like a wild river suddenly rushing in – well, with the anxiety centering in my solar plexus, I first experience it as that fast moving energy, but only for a split second – and then it’s like I harden it into a rock. Like – if you’d have molten lava, and pour icy water of it and then it turns to hard rock. So, in those moments, there is first anxiety, which I then immediately transmute into that hardness/toughness, which you can call stubbornness, arrogance, righteousness. And then, from within that experience, I reply with justifications.

Now, this reaction pattern moves very fast and very automated. I had previously looked at the point, but there was a dimension I was missing. In opening up the Prideful character, I saw a new dimension. I had already seen the point of taking it personally, the fear of making mistakes, the self-judgment and the polarization from inferiority to superiority – but there is a specific dynamic that I had overlooked. And that dynamic is that – the action for which a person is giving me suggestions/comments/criticism – I had already congratulated myself on that, I had already classified it as a good thing or the right thing to do, and from there, given myself a pat on the back for doing that – and then, of course, I felt proud about myself. So, afterwards, in someone suggesting I could/should have done it differently – I’d feel I have to ‘give back’ that ‘pat on the back’ that I gave myself – and… well… I didn’t want to – lol. In slowing down the experience, there’s a thought of ‘no, no, no! I already made myself feel proud over that decision/action, I already validated myself through that – no, I don’t want to reconsider that at all!’

And of course, herein I am completely limiting myself – because all I want to do is stick to my opinion, the perception I had of myself in the past in terms of what I did and what I considered within making that decision/performing that action. I am unwilling to re-evaluate myself – let alone take responsibility for my mistakes.

If I allow myself to stick to that stance within myself, of righteousness, stubbornness, arrogance – then we get to that ‘other meaning’ of the word ‘pride’ – where a person takes on a stance of superiority to justify what self is doing, in spite of what is common sense or best for all. And so we’ve come full circle in the base design of ‘Pride’ and how it starts off seemingly innocent - ‘just a pat on the back’, but dependent on one’s relationship with these gestures – one can develop pride in the sense of arrogance, righteousness, spitefulness, self-centeredness and total disregard for others – which, fascinatingly, are characteristics described to whom? To female villains! Have a look at the evil queen in Snow White, the evil witch in Sleeping Beauty, the evil step mother in Cinderella – each of them are the Characterization of PRIDE – look at the stance, look at the facial expressions, look at the obsessions – they are all expressions of pride.

I’ll continue in my next post by using the movie ‘Maleficent’ as a reference of the play-out of the pattern of pride, as it is quite clearly depicted there. Learn more »

So, my relationship with pride was one of polarity. On the one hand there was this desire of being acknowledged, validated, appreciated, encouraged and admired. And within the belief that the only thing ‘adults’ liked and appreciated me for were my ‘performance levels’ – I started defining myself/my value entirely in terms of people being proud of me and me being proud of myself. So, that energy of pride became a ‘necessity’ – if there was no pride, either from others or from myself, then how did I matter?
On the other hand – any miss-step, any mistake, or the possibility of a mistake became huge fears, and these were parts of myself I would try to hide at all cost.
So, on the one side I was trying to be visible/seen/noticed, but on the other I was hiding and isolating myself.

So – within this Pride Character I found myself participating in two ‘opposing’ forces – an outward one and an inward one. And, interestingly, in looking at the word ‘Pride’ – it reflects this duality. Within the sound of the word ‘Pride’ one can see the words ‘prize’ and ‘hide’. ‘Prize’ in terms of winning, being the best, getting to be on the stage an in the spotlights. ‘Hide’ then of course, the opposite of wanting to hide in the shadows and not allow people to see one’s mistakes/failures or even the fact that one is capable of making mistakes or fail.

This dynamic started playing out within myself as well – meaning – I would start giving myself pats on the back when I thought I did something well and I would hide my mistakes from myself – trying to convince myself that I was innocent in the matter or any other forms of self-manipulation consisting of excuses and justifications so I wouldn’t need to admit and face up to my mistakes.

I’ll continue in my next post. Learn more »

This blog-post is a continuation to the post 'Day 141: Pride - The Root of All Sin?', please read it for context.

In my previous post, I mentioned how I connected pride to ‘being proud’ when having accomplished something, where when I had done something ‘well’, I was placed in the limelight for a moment as a congratulation on my success.

Within my childhood, these moments were frequent. It started when I was in my ‘3rd toddler class’ – the year before first grade. In that year, my brother had started to teach me how to read. I’m not entirely sure how it started, but I think I was just fascinated by the things he was learning since he was 4 years older than me and I probably asked him to teach me how to read, or he just proposed to teach me. So, when we had time, he would teach me how to read letters and I started learning to read one-syllable words. In third toddler class, you mostly just play all day, but I started sitting with a piece of paper and try to write words. I would practice the ones that Gabriel, my brother, had taught me and I would try new ones on my own. I asked my teacher to check it once and she asked how it is I knew how to read and write, so I told her my brother had taught me some. One day she gathered the whole class and together we went to the first grade class. She said ‘I have something to show everyone! Maite here can read already! You don’t have to believe me, I’ll show you’. They had a train with letters and she started taking pieces of the train to form words, I was anxious, because, well, I only knew so many words, so I was hoping she wouldn’t make a word I didn’t know how to read. She made the word ‘sun’ and asked me to read it. I was relieved, I knew that one, so I said ‘sun’. Then she did a few others, and I knew them all. Everyone clapped and I felt a bit awkward. For one, because I wasn’t sure why they were making a big deal out of it – I just had an interest and did it for myself, I enjoyed it. Second, because I couldn’t REALLY read, I only knew one-syllable words and not even all of them, so I felt like a fraud.

From then on, I created a reputation of being ‘smart’. For my first graded report in 1st grade, I had the maximum marks on all tests and so had 100% on my report. That day, I had taken a ride with my friend to ballet class and my mom had gone to pick up my report, so I didn’t know what it said. When I came home from ballet class, I found my mother in tears. I thought ‘oh no, was it that bad!’ Then she came and she hugged and kissed me and I still didn’t understand what was happening. My brother came and showed me the report and said: ‘you have 100%!’ I looked at the report, and it showed all the tests and the marks, which were all the maximum ad then the ‘sum’ of 100% at the bottom. I thought, well, yes, I knew all the answers, so it makes sense, no? Again I didn’t understand why it was such a big deal, because I just did what they told me to do and answered the questions on the tests. I understood everything, so I could answer everything. But it seemed, from how they were behaving, that this wasn’t normal. I wasn’t sure why they were proud of me, because I didn’t ‘do’ anything special, I just ‘did it’.

And it continued like that mostly throughout my school years, I didn’t have any problems with anything really. When I got to 4th grade, my mom started becoming worried about me. I’m not sure why, but she thought I was changing and she thought I must be bored in school. She asked me if I was and I said ‘maybe, I suppose’. She asked the principal if it would be possible for me to skip a year and I did. I struggled initially when I was trying to catch up with the material from the year before on my own time, but by Christmas I had gone back to top of the class grades.

In anything else I did outside school, I seemed to be ‘naturally’ proficient as well. Whether it was drawing school, ballet, music, flute – I was always in the ‘top of the class’ and each time I was told I was ‘gifted’.

So, within my childhood years, I had many moments where I was placed in the limelight, where people were ‘showing off’ with me or using me as an example to others. Although I enjoyed those moments, because they made me feel good about myself, at the same time I was not happy with the way people saw me and the expectations they had. I felt pressured to perform well in every area of my life. It started to think that people, and specifically adults, liked me only because I was ‘successful’, to call it that. Within this I started becoming more insecure and afraid about making mistakes, because if I wasn’t able to keep up ‘the good work’, then people might start rejecting me, or stop loving me.

Herein I specifically remember a situation in 2nd grade where we were learning the multiplication tables. We would do tests almost every week and then the teacher implemented a system where, after the test she would grade everyone and those with the highest grades would then play the multiplication game. Where, basically, we each started at the back of the class, lined up horizontally and the teacher would state a multiplication calculation and then the first one to should out the answer could take a step forward, the first one to reach the front of the class wins. I was usually part of these games, but I absolutely hated them due to the amount of anxiety and fear I would experience. I would be totally shaking inside and didn’t know how not to feel like that. I would start dreading these games to such an extent, that I decided to just do bad on my test. I felt it was a dilemma, because I was expected to be one of the ‘gamers’. Anyway, I thought the trade-off was worth it. So, I deliberately made mistakes on my test so I wouldn’t be part of those playing the game. And now, that time, of course, the teacher didn’t wait to grade the tests, but just called up the same people who always participate, to do the game. After the teacher had graded the paper, I saw her comment under my mark saying ‘!?!?’

What started happening within all of this is that I started trying to hide my mistakes for fear of letting people down. What people seemed to be expecting was perfection or near perfection, so that’s what I would try to project. ‘I don’t do mistakes’. But within myself I was the total opposite, I was anxious and insecure, and would go into absolute rage when I didn’t get something right. Learn more »

When working with the tools introduced in SRA2 course of Desteni I Process, you’ll be pushed to see those aspects of yourself that you have lived out as yourself to such an extent that it is hard to identify them.

For me, the point that was revealed in this way was ‘Pride’. Someone had mentioned it to me before, that pride is one of my defining characters/characteristics – but I couldn’t relate to it AT ALL. Even when writing about it, what I was able to uncover was very superficial. It was only within using the tools I had learned in SRA2 and someone pointing at one sentence showing how that was a statement/expression of pride, that I could suddenly see it. It was literally as though I was blinded to that part of myself – but once it was shown to me how I lived pride in one specific moments, I could suddenly see it all over my writing, my behavior, my relationship with myself and others – like a veil lifting and for the first time meeting this part of myself – and then being astounded at seeing it to be one of the main characters I participate in and live out that in fact creates conflict and separation, but which I assumed was simply ‘a part of myself’ or that I had justified to such an extent that I couldn’t see it for what it was.

My understanding and ‘opinion’ of pride has always been that it is harmless. In Christianity, pride is one of the seven deadly sins – pride is even called ‘the root of all sin’. But why? What was so terrible about pride that it gained that status? For me, pride was about ‘being proud of myself’, especially when I had accomplished something successfully – then I’d be proud about what I had achieved and feel good about myself. What’s so bad about that? Others were proud of me when I had done something well, and would say ‘well done’ or ‘I’m proud of you, girl’. So, why shouldn’t I be proud of myself? Isn’t it *just* me congratulating myself, giving myself a pat on the back? Lol.

It seemed to be that pride was something desirable – it’s something I believed was how I was supposed to reward myself, in the same way I would be rewarded by parents and teachers whenever I had done something ‘right’ or ‘good’ or ‘well’ – then you get to be placed in the limelight, on a pedestal for a moment – with everyone admiring and congratulating you for what you’ve done. It was so much part of my world that I never questioned it, let alone regard it as ‘the root of all sin’.

But there is another ‘meaning’ of pride that is referred to when talking about pride as a sin. In that context, it seems to be more about a person being self-centered and looking down on others – where pride stands in the way of cooperation and communication, of working together to find solutions that are best for all.

So, in my blogs to come I’ll be exploring the dimensions of how I have existed and Pride and what the relationship is between pride in the two meanings of the word as I introduced in this blog. Learn more »

This blog-post is a continuation to:

Day 131: Who Am I in a Group?
Day 132: Who Am I in a Group? Clashes of Cultures
Day 133: Who Am I in a Group? - Nothing Left but Memories
Day 134: Who Am I in a Group? Dance Company - Pt1
Day 135: Who Am I in a Group? Dance Company Pt2
Day 136: Who Am I in a Group? Dancing with a Ghost
Day 137: Who Am I in a Group - Self-Forgiveness Pt 1
Day 138: Who Am I in a Group - Self-Forgiveness Pt 2 
Day 139: Who Am I in a Group - Self-Forgiveness Pt3


When and as I see myself participating in fear/anxiety/worry in relation to being introduced to a new group and not knowing what I will be experiencing, facing, be exposed to – I stop, I breathe – I realize that actually, that which I am afraid of is my own potential future reactions where I assume that I will not be able to direct myself within reactions - where this fear is based on memories in which I didn’t know how to direct myself within our without when experiencing inner turmoil as I did not yet have the tools to assist and support myself to do so – and so any scenario I would step into where I couldn’t predict exactly how I would experience myself/how I might react in moments, I started dreading – and so I commit myself to live self-trust in realizing that I am here, I have the tools and no matter what happens, whether I react or not, I am able to assist and support myself and expand myself through being in a new environment, with new individuals – allowing myself to open up and face points I might previously not have the opportunity to transcend.

When and as I see myself participating in the pattern of first keeping to the background in an observer-mode when introduced to a new group in order to be able to observe what kind of personalities are appreciated and accepted by others so that I am able to take on such a personality in order to be accepted in the group – I stop, I breathe – I realize that this pattern stems from a fear of not being accepted/being rejected and that within participating as a personality I am compromising who I am within the group as I am pretending to be someone I’m not, wherein I’ll later feel trapped in not knowing how to be myself without disappointing everyone else in no longer participating in a personality as well as creating guilt towards the others in the group for having participated within deception towards them from the very start – and so I commit myself to stop the fear of rejection and embrace myself within self-acceptance within the realization that it doesn’t affect me if another does not accept me and I push myself to participate as myself.

When and as I see myself separating myself creating the idea of a ‘group identity’ and ‘group feeling’ to which I assign either a positive or negative charge – I stop, I breathe – I realize that I am projecting my own experiences upon ‘the group’ wherein I believe that ‘the group’ is ‘making me feel’ a certain way or ‘giving me something’, when actually the ‘group’ is a collection of individuals and what each experiences within the group is about self and of self – and so I commit myself to bring back any energetic experiences that come up in relation to a group back to myself so that I can see how I am creating these experiences and can make the necessary alignments.

When and as I see myself changing myself in order to increase the likelihood of experiencing positive feelings within a group – I stop, I breathe – I realize that I am participating within the group based on energy, wherein my starting point for participating in the group is pure self-interest and where, eventually my experience will move to the opposite polarity of negative emotions as energy always moves between the poles – and so I commit myself to stop using groups for self-interested purposes of making me feel good about myself, but align my starting point to be me in self-honesty where I see how I am able to connect with other beings and develop relationships of mutual support.

When and as I see myself comparing a new or current group I am participating in to my experience of previous groups – I stop, I breathe – I realize that I am using my memories of participation in previous groups as a reference point for what will happen in the future, wherein I believe that what has happened before will happen again and that whatever has not happened before cannot happen – wherein I create the experiences of fear and hope within my participation in the group in reference to my previous experiences, thus not actually being here and participating directly, but instead I am influenced through these subtle experiences of hope and fear – and thus, I commit myself to let go of the past and realize that I created the past based on who I was in the past and I create what I experience in the present moment based on who I am in that moment, and so – to align myself within self-honesty to see what is real, what is relevant and walk accordingly.

When and as I see myself wanting to have a group last forever – I stop, I breathe – I realize that this stems from a pattern of participating in groups from a mind-experience starting point, wherein I would want my positive energetic experiences that I ascribed to the group to last forever and therefore would want the group to last forever - and so I commit myself to align who I am within the group in terms of what is supportive in self-honesty and clarify for myself what the purpose is for the group and to what extent the existence of the group is relevant or applicable, so that, if the group becomes irrelevant, I simply let go and move on. Learn more »