Episode Transcript
We Americans enjoy a wonderful and powerful way of life, but internally and in relationships, we may wish for better. Join me as we look beneath the surface and gain insights to transform every aspect of your life. My name is Dr. Anne O'Hare, and this is The Spiritual American. Hello everyone and welcome to the Spiritual American. My name is Dr. Anne O'Hare and I'm your host. And today we are going to be talking about trust. Revisiting, actually, if you have been following the podcast, the very first episode was about trust. So now we're going to revisit that. But basically today I'm going to talk about trusting yourself. So I came across a quote from Tina Turner yesterday, which I really It really touched my heart and actually when I looked it up, I was looking it up again and I found another one. So there are two here. I'm going to read them. So the first one is Tina Turner saying, my legacy is that I stayed the course from beginning to the end because I believed in something inside of me. That's her legacy. How wonderful. And the second quote is, I believe that if you stand up and go, life will open up for you. I really like those two quotes, especially the first one, because she's talking about a legacy, but she's talking about her attitude and how she approached life as her legacy. Wonderful, right? I think that part of the reason that we have problems, I can only speak for myself. And I know that there are probably people out there like me who grew up like me, who have the same kind of mental landscape as me and maybe we were in relationships that were not very good for us or maybe we had a lot of bad circumstances happen or painful circumstances and maybe our home life was tumultuous or something growing up or whatever it was and maybe coming from that environment maybe my conscience and the way I feel about myself is not very clear or not very helpful. That was my experience. And I'm not blaming anything because that was the way it was. And there are some people that come from that experience and maybe don't have the things that I have. In terms of maybe insecurity or feeling like I can't trust myself or don't even know myself. Don't even Trust myself or know what I really want let's say. Sometimes I I know that maybe it's just for women But I know it can't be just for women, but I know a lot of times women are very outward focused we're focusing on other people and we're focusing on other people's needs and we're not really in touch with our own. And In terms of trust if you don't know what you need And you're constantly thinking about other people. How can you trust yourself? And I really find that that was a big deal with me because as I'm doing this Raja yoga meditation journey and the spiritual journey, I'm married to a person that's the closest relationship, right? So I'm married to a person who's also on a spiritual journey and he's very independent and I'm very independent. But every time I come across one of these conditionings, maybe that makes me disempowered. Like, let's say I don't stand up for myself or I don't take care of myself or something. He doesn't take advantage of that. Okay. He'll encourage me to take care of myself or he doesn't react or whatever it is, but he's not going to take advantage of that lack of confidence or lack of understanding or lack of clarity in me. So think about that for a minute, that if I have a lack of clarity, or a lack of understanding of myself. Wouldn't that affect my ability to make decisions? Wouldn't that affect my relationships? Wouldn't that affect how I feel about my life? So one of the things that I had to learn. Was to trust myself and I'll give an example. Whereas in the past, and it's not totally gone to be fair, and to be honest, it's not totally gone. But when I step out and say something, I'm kind of waiting for the response. I'm waiting to see, was that okay? Was it not okay? You know, I'm waiting for the feedback to kind of tell me if it's okay or not. The, it's a lot better than it was. Let's say if that, if that tendency was at a 10 before, now, maybe it's at a two. So much better, much less intense. The other thing is that searching for myself or searching for my worth or searching, one of the ways that I used to do that was to reread all my emails, like writing an email at work and whatever it was, and then I would go back and reread it to get some kind of feedback. Interesting, right? That I'm looking outside for the feedback to tell me who I am. Can anybody relate to this? You could put it in the context of maturity, like as a child, we're kind of looking for feedback because we're trying to learn how things work in the world, right? But let's say based on, not blaming anybody, because everybody's coming in with their own stuff. So let's say my parents or whatever, or anybody that I grew up with, my teachers. The society, when I put myself out there, I got a negative response, or I got no response, or I got a, no, you shouldn't be like this, you should be like this. Because of that, wouldn't it make sense that I would have a little confusion as to who I am and what I need and everything like that? So I wrote down a couple of things here. Trusting yourself and your feelings. trusting God or you could say your aim like I want to get better or I want to be a better person or It could be about God if you're spiritually minded or it could be religious minded It could be about God. It doesn't have to be and then the third one is trust in the world This is the one that I had the most problem with trust in myself comes over time. I'm gonna say if you put yourself in a situation where people around you are not abusing you or taking advantage of you or making you feel bad. Then you have a chance or an environment where you can discover what your feelings are, what you like and don't like, what you need, what will make you feel good, what doesn't make you feel good? And when I discover that, that will help me to make decisions and also will help me figure out how I'm going to live my life. So the first thing is to surround myself with a situation that I feel comfortable and I feel safe so I can start discovering what it is going on inside myself. And each of us is going to have a different thing that's going to look different for each one of us. That's why in the other episode I said I'm not giving advice. Because I can't say, okay, everybody go move to this state and get this kind of a house and do this exercise regimen and eat this kind of diet and what, no, I'm not going to talk about lifestyle. I'm talking about paying attention to myself. For one person, it might be living in Alaska. For another person, it might be living in New York City. For another person, it might be they're just fine where they are, but it's the relationships that are the issue. And they have to work on them. So when we start looking at, okay, I need to create a safe environment for myself so that I can start understanding how I feel and what I want and what I need. Once you start doing that, then the trust comes in. I have to start to trust myself, meaning. I'm stepping out there now, not waiting for people's approval, not waiting for people to say anything. I'm trying with courage, trying not to be addicted to people giving feedback, but I'm putting myself out there and that's it. In other episodes, I mentioned the westerns, like the Clint Eastwood westerns and things and I used to make fun of them because I didn't understand what was going on. You have like eight men standing in a, in a, in a town, like a ghost town, a western town, and they're all looking at each other and you see their eyeballs, you know? They close up of their eyes, close up of their eyes, and they're all standing there looking at each other and nothing's happening. And I used to like kind of make fun of it. But now I understand. What that's all about. It's about self respect and it's about being able to stand on who you are What you are what you need how you feel and that's it and you're gonna trust yourself. And if something bad happens, you'll deal with that. And that was one of the things that helped me, too Like I was afraid that something bad was gonna happen if I said this or said that and then I just said, you know I got some help there was some help around and they just said look you'll be able to fix it. Trust yourself You'll be able to handle it, whatever happens, but you got to take a chance. So have courage, create an environment where you can start to understand who you are and what you need and everything like that, and then take a stand. Yeah, this is how I feel. No, I can't do that. Yes. I would like to go to the, to the lunch with you or no, I don't want to, or I'm going to stop talking to you because I don't really want your friendship anymore. Not to be nasty, but you have a right to pull away from a relationship if you don't want it anymore. That's fine too. Second thing is trust in God or your aim, your spiritual aim. Spiritual could mean actual spiritual, like you want to be godly or something religious, or it could mean you want to have a better personality. You want to be a better person. It could be that you want to calm your mind. It could be that you want to be healthy. You want to get your body healthy. You want to use your mind to help your body get healthy. Those are all aims. Those are all personal. And I'm going to call them spiritual aims because In my experience, the best way and the only way really to transform all these areas is to get in touch with the truth of the spirit, which is I'm a soul and my nature is peace and I am living consciousness. So that spiritual aim, that spiritual part of our life to trust that also, and to lean on that and have faith in that, like that Tina Turner quote, my legacy is that I stayed the course. Because I believed in something inside of myself. So she stood her ground and she stuck with it. She stuck with herself. I find that very inspiring. Coming from a place where I didn't know who I was, or I didn't feel like I did, or I was so sensitive to everything outside myself, to hear Tina Turner say, I'm saying her name, but it could be anybody, but we know her, right? We've seen her, we know who she is, but her legacy is that she believed in herself. Very powerful. So the God and the aim, by the way, she did take on a spiritual practice too. She took on Buddhism as a spiritual practice and chanting and mantras and things like that. She took on that as a spiritual practice and that helped her to develop this outlook on herself and the world. The third one is trust in the world and the universe. And the second quote from her kind of fits into that. I believe that if you stand up. and go life will open up for you. So what is that principle? The principle is that whatever I'm putting out there, that's what I'm going to get back. Period. That's called the law of karma. That's it. So wouldn't it be better if I'm putting myself out there authentically, like the real me, wouldn't that be better than at least what's coming back is what's really mine. I remember watching TV shows and things where and even in life, like you spend your whole life living up to somebody else's expectations. I remember watching a show where, sometimes people are married for 20, 30 years and then they wake up the midlife crisis thing, right? Like they wake up and they say, you know, what, what, how did I get here? What's going on? And then they, then they decide, well, I'm going to go after this in my life and they make a change, right? Sometimes, not all the time with the midlife crisis, but sometimes we make decisions in our life based on what we have absorbed as other people's expectations or society's expectation, but we really haven't tapped into what we really want or who we really are. So we're getting back the return of other people's influence and then we're unhappy. So think about that just for a second. So I've made decisions based on this kind of outward feedback mechanism where I'm going to please this one and I want to please this one and I want to be the good daughter and I want to be the good wife and I want to be the good husband and I want to be the good son. And so I'm going to make decisions based on that, but I'm not taking my individual, authentic, unique feelings into account in those decisions. So when the feedback comes back, when the karma comes back, all of a sudden I'm like, well, I don't like my job. I don't like my body. I don't like, and I wonder why. The law works no matter what. So whatever decisions I made and whatever attitude I had and whatever I did my whole life, that's the return I have. So how do we change it? Well, I got to change what it is that I'm thinking, how I feel and everything like that. And I say, I'm saying, find out what you feel, find out what you really think. Take on a spiritual practice that makes sense to you so that there's some kind universal access. You're gaining some kind of universal energetic access, whether it's God or meditation or spirituality, some kind of religious practice, something that may it's beyond you. So taking on the spiritual practice and then finding out what's going on with me and then making decisions. And then what you get back is yours. It's like I decided and now I'm getting it back. Then you can start trusting yourself because the feedback you're getting is at least honest. At least it's you. At least you made the decision. I did an episode on authenticity the other day, happiness and authenticity. And I was saying that authenticity is in a way better than happiness because happiness can come and go. But authenticity means that it's like, I did it. I created it. I'm in charge of my life. That feels much better. Than being, feeling like a victim or feeling out of control with my life. And where does the trust come in when you start doing this, and I'm gonna say from my experience, meditation is, is the, was the best way for me. I've seen others in other religious practices do wonderful things, so I'm not, anything that feels right to you is right for you. For me, meditation worked. Raj yoga meditation worked because it's about me. It's about getting me back and having the courage to face my mind, which was in the last episode, having the courage to face the internal and external consequences of everything else I had done before. Once I do that, I can start trusting myself because I'm facing the consequences. And also getting in touch with who I really am, how I really feel and letting myself have a voice at the table. Obviously we're going to have influences here and there. I'm not going to do something that's like totally off the wall. We have to follow social norms. We have to follow some things we have to follow, obviously, but at least if I'm trusting myself and I'm getting in touch with myself, then my real feelings are part of the decision making process. And then we can start becoming proud of the return that we get and proud of myself. So I'll leave it there. I hope that gave you some more to think about and to understand that a spiritual practice is a method to open up yourself to more energy, but also it's equally important to get in touch with yourself and believe in yourself and trust yourself. Like Tina Turner was saying that quote, but wouldn't it be wonderful? Isn't it wonderful to think that I could just trust myself and make decisions for myself. And then what comes back is right for me. So I'll leave it there. Remember our slogan is heal, empower, and serve. And until next time, take care. Um, uh,
