Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, I contain multitudes.) Walt Whitman
Before making choices we often consider all kinds of perspectives, not only the opinions of others, but inside our own minds. While Whitman’s celebrated inclusiveness is expansive and open-armed, when we’re called to make a significant choice, how do we work with our multitude of inner voices? Which voice rings true from our deepest and highest knowing?
Is it the loudest most persistent voice because it’s power is obvious? Or is the “still, small voice,” pointed to by spiritual traditions, the one advocating the most authentic choice? Do we listen to the voice that sounds mature and authoritative? Or do we honor the enthusiastic voice of youthful innocence that incites our sense of adventure to try new things? As we age, does one voice begin to trump the other?
While the psychological sophistication that many of us have honed over years of personal growth work has offered us many boons, making choices simply is not usually one of them. Discovering what’s authentic at any given moment amidst the cacophony of our multitudes may be more complex and muddled.
Conventional wisdom in business leans on sophisticated analytical models to work through the complexity. These models step directly into the jungle to untangle it. Those of us with facile minds might find this more rational and linear approach helpful.
The spiritually inclined would quickly shy away from those methods. Instead, this group might favor an enlightened system of thinking or form of devotion to overlay on the particular circumstances they’re facing.
While each of these approaches and the various options in between offer benefits, our souls might have none of either, which returns us to Walt Whitman’s bold claim, “Very well then I contradict myself.”
But is that all we’re left with? Or are there other approaches that might carry us above, beneath and beyond our contradictions. In future blogs, I will address the three possibilities of stepping above, digging beneath and moving beyond our multitudes.
Monday, February 23, 2009
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Sources of Info to Help Choose
There are many sources of information to help us make choices. The most obvious include the abundance of information available over the Internet. Its ready availability allows us to access the expert and the historical, the contrary and the consoling, the sacred and the profane. While many of these sources offer us their perspectives, suggestions and recommendations, we can quickly become overwhelmed if we have few criteria from which to make our choices. Knowing what we value can help us choose meaningfully. The more we consciously know what we value, the more quickly we can discern our choice among alternatives. The more often we use these value criteria, the more quickly we can decide.
To make authentic choices—ones that resonate in our bones and souls—we must also have access to internal sources of information. In addition, the more unique and unfamiliar the circumstances within which we must make our choices, the more that inner access becomes necessary. What I mean by inner resources includes what is below thoughts influenced by mainstream culture, our upbringing and social milieu, what speaks through our intuition, what lies quietly inside our unsentimental hearts, and what resonates in our gut.
When we’re buying a new car, for instance, we want to research the relevant resources to help us consider options based on what we value, such as economy, style, status and comfort. Well-researched options can take us a long way towards making an effective, efficient and meaningful choice. I contend, however that making an authentic choice requires tapping inner resources to confirm that the information that help us choose one model over others resonates with our innermost being.
Many approaches can help us make authentic choices. One of the more frequent of these is talking candidly with those who know us well. Inside these friendships and relationships, we can express opinions, try on different options, listen to suggestions and mull aloud. We also risk reinforcing habitual choices and behaviors that may unknowingly limit our freedom to consider a larger spectrum of possibilities. When buying a car, that kind of limitation may not be significant. When making choices that may dramatically affect our life direction, however, this limitation can prove significant. Under unfamiliar circumstances, we might consider exploring other ways of gathering information, especially information that is inside our own minds, hearts and bellies.
These approaches include using divining devices to tap into not only our intuitive knowing, but collective wisdom around our particular circumstances. The I Ching, for instance, offers a well-defined map of the archetypal terrain within which we can learn where inside that terrain we stand. The 64 hexagrams and 384 changing lines can describe many different scenarios that can give us a more objective overview of our circumstances.
They also include tapping inner resources through hypnotherapy, dream work, Jung’s active imagination process and dialogue journal writing. In these approaches, we discover that we're more complex than what we, at first, appear to be. In our multiplicity, we have voices that sometimes conflict with one another, parts that annoy and sabotage other parts and aspects of ourselves that, though we don't know much about them, influence our daily lives to get what they want at the expense of the rest of ourselves.
To make authentic choices—ones that resonate in our bones and souls—we must also have access to internal sources of information. In addition, the more unique and unfamiliar the circumstances within which we must make our choices, the more that inner access becomes necessary. What I mean by inner resources includes what is below thoughts influenced by mainstream culture, our upbringing and social milieu, what speaks through our intuition, what lies quietly inside our unsentimental hearts, and what resonates in our gut.
When we’re buying a new car, for instance, we want to research the relevant resources to help us consider options based on what we value, such as economy, style, status and comfort. Well-researched options can take us a long way towards making an effective, efficient and meaningful choice. I contend, however that making an authentic choice requires tapping inner resources to confirm that the information that help us choose one model over others resonates with our innermost being.
Many approaches can help us make authentic choices. One of the more frequent of these is talking candidly with those who know us well. Inside these friendships and relationships, we can express opinions, try on different options, listen to suggestions and mull aloud. We also risk reinforcing habitual choices and behaviors that may unknowingly limit our freedom to consider a larger spectrum of possibilities. When buying a car, that kind of limitation may not be significant. When making choices that may dramatically affect our life direction, however, this limitation can prove significant. Under unfamiliar circumstances, we might consider exploring other ways of gathering information, especially information that is inside our own minds, hearts and bellies.
These approaches include using divining devices to tap into not only our intuitive knowing, but collective wisdom around our particular circumstances. The I Ching, for instance, offers a well-defined map of the archetypal terrain within which we can learn where inside that terrain we stand. The 64 hexagrams and 384 changing lines can describe many different scenarios that can give us a more objective overview of our circumstances.
They also include tapping inner resources through hypnotherapy, dream work, Jung’s active imagination process and dialogue journal writing. In these approaches, we discover that we're more complex than what we, at first, appear to be. In our multiplicity, we have voices that sometimes conflict with one another, parts that annoy and sabotage other parts and aspects of ourselves that, though we don't know much about them, influence our daily lives to get what they want at the expense of the rest of ourselves.
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