"Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking." -Marcus Aurelius
“...before we can weave in new thoughts, we first need to unravel old thoughts created in an unconscious state.”
As I thought more deeply about the concept of innerwoven and what it means to me, I began to realize that before we can weave in new thoughts, we first need to unravel old thoughts created in an unconscious state. To reframe our inner world, we must unravel our old beliefs one thought at a time.
From childhood, we try to make sense of our world by labeling what we see and defining experiences with the best of what we know at the time, which is limited and completely unconscious. These thoughts are created from an emotional point of reference without the ability to analytically label it in the most serving way. We adopt thoughts and feelings about things without knowing much about the world yet. And since we are young when the beliefs are created, and we are self-centered by design, we usually internalize our "negative" experiences as though there is something wrong with us. We adopt limiting beliefs, build assumptions, inherit interpretations, and our inner critic is born. We brilliantly learn to deny, avoid, numb, ignore, plow-through, fight, and hide. These are what our child mind can conjure to keep itself feeling safe when it has no power.
Once we reach adulthood, we face different challenges in our lives and begin to be shaken awake slowly over time through our experiences. We start to see more clearly how we have defined our reality. These moments are critical to leap forward from our subconscious to our conscious thoughts. In these moments, we can challenge what we once thought and replace it with a new more accurate thought that will serve us better going forward. I see this process of challenging our old thoughts as unraveling them. We must remove these thoughts before new ones can be woven into our new way of thinking.
At first glance, unraveling our thoughts may seem like a scary process; however, there is also beauty in it. As we slowly begin to reveal our limiting thoughts, we become vulnerable, but we also begin to reveal the deeper more connected side of ourselves to ourselves and the world. These are the moments that we start to recognize our humanity. Our experience here on this earth is meant to be fully human, I believe. With the advancements in our world, we have moved away from knowing what being human really means. What does it mean? To me, it means allowing ourselves to experience all the things that come with being part of this dynamic planet. The ups and, in particular, the downs are the things that inform our humanity and remind us of the fragility of our short but precious time in this life.
If we think of the process of weaving anything, every strand has its purpose and belongs in its unique place. If one strand is misplaced, it will affect the entire piece being created. It’s the same for our limiting beliefs or any thoughts that hold us back. One can affect all areas of our lives. But if we allow the process of unraveling to begin, we can slowly build in the best strand for any given area. The best strands are those that belong solely to us. They make each one of us whom we uniquely are in the world. No two are the same. No one could weave a tapestry that looks like yours. And in doing so, you recognize what you already possess, being imperfectly whole (i.e., innerwoven).
In our human evolution, we were given our emotions to guide us in recognizing danger, learning how to survive, and protecting our offspring. It’s our knee-jerk response to everything, still. But now that we do have the ability to analyze, we sometimes attach an incorrect thought based on the knee-jerk emotional reaction that we naturally experience when stimulated by some event, which is where we build judgment. Because we are analytical, we can start to recognize that knee-jerk emotional response and learn to reframe the thought of the experience with a more serving thought. In turn, the more serving thought will create a more serving emotion, action, and ultimately a more meaningful outcome. This process reminds me of one of my favorite quotes by Viktor E. Frankl which states "Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom."
I picture a chart where the X-axis is “Self-awareness,” and the Y-axis is “True Satisfaction.” The higher your level of self-awareness, the more likely you will make the best choices for you and the truer satisfaction you will experience in your life. Yes, ignorance is bliss as long as all is going your way, but as soon as an unexpected event happens that challenges your “bliss,” you are destroyed and working from a place where you have no experience or self-awareness. Being genuinely self-aware is a place where you can live in relative satisfaction no matter what events are occurring outside of yourself because you begin to release judgments of yourself and the world around you. When an event rips the rose-colored glasses from our eyes, it's the greatest opportunity for growth. If we can allow ourselves to take advantage of these opportunities to expand, we will be able to move higher up the chart of self-awareness toward true satisfaction.
We don’t know for sure what’s on the other side of this human experience, but what matters right now is what we are experiencing in this moment. This moment in front of us is the only opportunity we have to experience it fully. What do we want from this experience? How can we feel completely at peace with how we decided to live this life? What holds us back from experiencing it in the best way for ourselves, which I believe is the best way we can serve the world?
So, where do we start? We start by becoming very curious about our responses, especially the uncomfortable ones. Start paying attention to your physical responses whether it be a faster heart rate, feeling flush or hot, or a knot in your stomach. If a physical response manifests, get curious about why it's coming up. Try to remove your judgment and just notice it. What thoughts are percolating in your mind that may be causing this response? What emotions are coming up for you? If you can get to the bottom of the thoughts and feelings attached to them, you can challenge those that limit you.
Right now, in this very second, we can decide to change our distorted stories that were created from this unconscious place. We can decide to re-visit the old thoughts and replace them with new more serving thoughts that will not only fearlessly catapult us in the direction we truly want to go but also give us peace right now in this moment. We can then make more deliberate and conscious choices for our lives and leave this human experience satisfied with whom we chose to be.