Who Do You Think You Are?: Recent Episodes
Chad Prevost
Who Do You Think You Are? is a daily podcast featuring a challenging or inspiring quote, a thought about the quote, the transformative book from which the quote came, and a question for reflection. Every single day Chad Prevost takes you on an adventure in thought leaders. From psychology and philosophy to poetry, essays, biographies and autobiographies, memoirs, dictionaries, treatises, and great literature, we want you to learn from, or just be reminded by, what others have already spent lifetimes achieving. Learn more at bigselfschool.com.
“Don’t just put in your time. That is not enough. You have to make great effort.” When the shine wears off the habits we’re trying to form, when we begin to merely show up rather than put in the hard work of consistent, effortful focus, we lose hold of the very skill we’re trying to develop. Trusting the process implies patience and that you’re aware you’re taking a long-view approach. But it also implies that you take very seriously the small micro-task in front of you. Do each step of the journey with your whole attention. While sometimes it is enough to just to “show up,” it’s a good reminder that on the path of personal transformation, you have to work at it. This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. If you have been a part of the growing community from around the globe (30 countries by last count) that are following these daily meditations and ideas, we love your presence and are so glad you are listening. I hope that the process is making a difference in your life. If you would be so kind as to help our online visibility by giving us a review on Apple iTunes we would be deeply grateful. We’re starting this podcast from scratch and are bringing content and value to our listeners every single day without exception. Your support in even this one small way would make a big difference. Thank you!
“Normally a job, fortune, or reputation has to be lost, a death has to be suffered, a house has to be flooded, or a disease has to be endured.” Rohr is pointing out a clear pattern that one of the primary ways we are ushered into the second half of life, of falling upward, is to experience failure or setback. It’s a part of life, and it is good to be reminded that these experiences will happen. What we do with them is the real story. Another way of stating it, “Before the truth sets you free, it tends to make you miserable.” This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. If you have been a part of the growing community from around the globe (30 countries by last count) that are following these daily meditations and ideas, we love your presence and are so glad you are listening. I hope that the process is making a difference in your life. If you would be so kind as to help our online visibility by giving us a review on Apple iTunes we would be deeply grateful. We’re starting this podcast from scratch and are bringing content and value to our listeners every single day without exception. Your support in even this one small way would make a big difference. Thank you!
“I don’t think we did go blind, I think we are blind, Blind but seeing, Blind people who can see, but do not see.” The quote speaks for itself, but the book it comes from is an allegory for the breakdown of society, which is fueled in large part to our failure to “see” each other. The year 2020 has seen a global pandemic, and calls for increased attention to the issues of systemic racism. In large measure, we are called to perform radical empathy. Many refuse because it is too hard, uncomfortable, or threatening to their power. They remain blind. This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. If you have been a part of the growing community from around the globe (30 countries by last count) that are following these daily meditations and ideas, we love your presence and are so glad you are listening. I hope that the process is making a difference in your life. If you would be so kind as to help our online visibility by giving us a review on Apple iTunes we would be deeply grateful. We’re starting this podcast from scratch and are bringing content and value to our listeners every single day without exception. Your support in even this one small way would make a big difference. Thank you!
“Not finance. Not strategy. Not technology. It is teamwork that remains the ultimate competitive advantage, both because it is so powerful and so rare.” Our meditation focus is often on the self, and that is no doubt where the work begins. But a huge follow-up step is naturally how we engage and work with others. We all want to succeed and we can’t do it without others. In fact, we spend so much of our time working with others to accomplish our very own goals, it’s important that we are able to work well with others on teams. Most of us want to collaborate. We are ready to share our ideas and work with others, and most of us don’t want conflict. This quote focuses on the power of a good team — but perhaps more importantly, that it is rare. As Henry Ford once said, “Coming together is a beginning. Keeping together is progress. Working together is success.” This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. If you have been a part of the growing community from around the globe (30 countries by last count) that are following these daily meditations and ideas, we love your presence and are so glad you are listening. I hope that the process is making a difference in your life. If you would be so kind as to help our online visibility by giving us a review on Apple iTunes we would be deeply grateful. We’re starting this podcast from scratch and are bringing content and value to our listeners every single day without exception. Your support in even this one small way would make a big difference. Thank you!
“The Enneagram is a tool that awakens our compassion for people just as they are, not the people we wish they would become so our lives would become easier.” Knowing my Enneagram number has deepened my self-awareness, and given me practical and specific tools for growth. It has also helped me better understand people who are wired entirely differently than me. The idea here is to also realize that for as much as we don’t like it when people have agendas for us, neither should have agendas for other people. Easier said than done of course, especially when it comes to our children, with greater understanding comes greater compassion for self and others. This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. If you have been a part of the growing community from around the globe (30 countries by last count) that are following these daily meditations and ideas, we love your presence and are so glad you are listening. I hope that the process is making a difference in your life. If you would be so kind as to help our online visibility by giving us a review on Apple iTunes we would be deeply grateful. We’re starting this podcast from scratch and are bringing content and value to our listeners every single day without exception. Your support in even this one small way would make a big difference. Thank you!
“In the morning he would sit down to work, finish his allotted task, then take the little lamp from the hook, put it on the table, get his book from the shelf, open it, and sit down to read. And the more he read, the more he understood, and the brighter and happier it grew in his heart.” There is a quiet simplicity in the life of the cobbler. He would perform his duties, and then he would read. There is no ostentation, no needing to share what he read, just the reading and the growing understanding or enlightening. As Joseph Campbell said, “Sit in a room and read — and read and read. And read the right books by the right people. Your mind is brought onto that level, and you have a nice, mild, slow-burning rapture all the time.” This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. If you have been a part of the growing community from around the globe (30 countries by last count) that are following these daily meditations and ideas, we love your presence and are so glad you are listening. I hope that the process is making a difference in your life. If you would be so kind as to help our online visibility by giving us a review on Apple iTunes we would be deeply grateful. We’re starting this podcast from scratch and are bringing content and value to our listeners every single day without exception. Your support in even this one small way would make a big difference. Thank you!
“Care of the soul is a fundamentally different way of regarding daily life and the quest for happiness.” Recognizing the soul within us helps us connect the spiritual with the material, the ineffable with concrete striving for the bottom line, it helps us examine our motives, and find joy in the ordinariness of our moments. Care means cultivating. Moore sees the soul as a bridge between ourselves. The care the soul needs begins deep curiosity about the ways our psyche reveals itself in ourselves in others. This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. If you have been a part of the growing community from around the globe (30 countries by last count) that are following these daily meditations and ideas, we love your presence and are so glad you are listening. I hope that the process is making a difference in your life. If you would be so kind as to help our online visibility by giving us a review on Apple iTunes we would be deeply grateful. We’re starting this podcast from scratch and are bringing content and value to our listeners every single day without exception. Your support in even this one small way would make a big difference. Thank you!
"The most apparent thing that I noticed was how most of the people in this study derive their sense of identity and well-being from their immediate surroundings rather than from within themselves, and that’s why they broke down — just couldn’t stand the pressure — they had nothing within them to hold up against all of this.” This study revealed that the real source of resilience and strength comes from within. This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. If you have been a part of the growing community from around the globe (30 countries by last count) that are following these daily meditations and ideas, we love your presence and are so glad you are listening. I hope that the process is making a difference in your life. If you would be so kind as to help our online visibility by giving us a review on Apple iTunes we would be deeply grateful. We’re starting this podcast from scratch and are bringing content and value to our listeners every single day without exception. Your support in even this one small way would make a big difference. Thank you!
“With lovingkindness for myself I allow all the feelings of the irrational, perplexing, agonizing relationship to wash over me. Suddenly, I see it clearly: my whining, my sense that I’m trapped by this relationship, my seeming powerlessness over the irrationality of the Other are reenactments. And with that observation I’m suddenly free from the burden, the trap of trying to make the irrational rational. Not only is it completely irrational to argue with the Irrational Other, it’s irrational to try to alter them so that they make sense to me.” We all have an “Irrationational Other” in our lives. We have a choice to make when it comes to how we experience that person. We can remain stuck and let that person continue to provoke us or keep us locked up, or with love and self-understanding, we can wake up to the repetition, we can move past the pain or fear or shame and take a step on the path to awakening. This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. If you have been a part of the growing community from around the globe (30 countries by last count) that are following these daily meditations and ideas, we love your presence and are so glad you are listening. I hope that the process is making a difference in your life. If you would be so kind as to help our online visibility by giving us a review on Apple iTunes we would be deeply grateful. We’re starting this podcast from scratch and are bringing content and value to our listeners every single day without exception. Your support in even this one small way would make a big difference. Thank you!
“Hope is not a lottery ticket you can sit on the sofa and clutch, feeling lucky. It is an axe you break down doors with in an emergency.” We explore hope as optimism, as necessity, as beacon shining a light forward. One thing it should not function as is an “opiate for the masses.” Hope, like love and faith, is not a passive condition. I love the idea of how it can be a call to action in a time that should be viewed as an emergency. It asks us to look at situations with urgency rather than bland acceptance and resignation. This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. If you have been a part of the growing community from around the globe (30 countries by last count) that are following these daily meditations and ideas, we love your presence and are so glad you are listening. I hope that the process is making a difference in your life. If you would be so kind as to help our online visibility by giving us a review on Apple iTunes we would be deeply grateful. We’re starting this podcast from scratch and are bringing content and value to our listeners every single day without exception. Your support in even this one small way would make a big difference. Thank you!
“What I know now is that when we derive our worth from the relationships in our lives — the intimate ones, the social circles we belong to, the companies we work for — we give away our power and become dependent upon external validation. When that is taken away, our sense of value, and identity, goes with it.” This reaffirms a theme we explore from a variety of angles throughout this podcast. The idea that you are good enough for who you are, regardless of the relationships outside yourself, is important. It’s all the more impactful when it comes from someone who is achieving great success within those relationships and as an African American woman. It’s a message for everyone. This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. If you have been a part of the growing community from around the globe (30 countries by last count) that are following these daily meditations and ideas, we love your presence and are so glad you are listening. I hope that the process is making a difference in your life. If you would be so kind as to help our online visibility by giving us a review on Apple iTunes we would be deeply grateful. We’re starting this podcast from scratch and are bringing content and value to our listeners every single day without exception. Your support in even this one small way would make a big difference. Thank you!
“Being human is not hard because you’re doing it wrong, it’s hard because you’re doing it right. You will never change the fact that being human is hard, so you must change your idea that it was ever supposed to be easy.” The mindset that life is supposed to be easy gets a lot of us in trouble. We want to avoid pain and struggle and as a result (perhaps ironically), we suffer. It may not be easy to embrace the struggle of being true to yourself, but in the end you will live a more fulfilled, joyful life. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test). Thanks for tuning in today.
“I cannot make you understand. I cannot make anyone understand what is happening inside me. I cannot even explain it to myself.” Sometimes our struggles transcend words, or our ability to articulate what is going on inside ourselves, whether or not we’re having a good day. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test). Thanks for tuning in today.
“The technocratic illusion is that poverty results from a shortage of expertise, whereas poverty is really about a shortage of rights. The emphasis on the problem of expertise makes the problem of rights worse. The technical problems of the poor (and the absence of technical solutions for those problems) are a symptom of poverty, not a cause of poverty. In some ways it states the obvious, but it is an argument you rarely hear in today’s discourse on systemic racism, whether or not it exists, and why various impoverished communities remain with so few resources, opportunities, or people who rise from such conditions. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test). Thanks for tuning in today.
“You can’t know where you’re going until you know where you are.” Pretend this book is a map, and you are looking at the point that says: You are here. That’s where you’re starting really all the time, from where you are. It doesn’t matter where you come from, where you think you are going, what job or career you have had or think you should have. You are not too late, and you’re not too early. But where are you? Strategic thinking can help you build your way forward from wherever you are, regardless of the life problem you are facing. But before you can figure out which direction to head in, you need to know where you are and what problems you are trying to solve. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test). Thanks for tuning in today.
“We are triggered not by their behavior, but by our own unresolved emotional issues.” “Do you see me?” This is the big question your child is asking every day. “Can you recognize me for who I am, different from your dreams and expectations for me, separate from your agenda for me?” Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test). Thanks for tuning in today.
“If you are distressed by anything external, the pain is not due to the thing itself, but to your estimate of it; and this you have the power to revoke at any moment.” This book teaches the powerful and resonating lesson that our perceptions create our reality. There are external events outside of our control that happen all the time. We can do nothing about that part of life, but the part we have complete control over is how we respond to circumstances. It is a mindset approach to all of life, and can lead us to how we respond to and handle failure, amongst other things. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test). Thanks for tuning in today.
“Totally without hope one cannot live. To live without hope is to cease to live. Hell is hopelessness. It is no accident that above the entrance to Dante’s hell is the inscription: ’Leave behind all hope, you who enter here’.” There is a lot of darkness in our current historical moment, but there remains tremendous goodness. We live with the hope of a more just and equitable culture. Hope brings us to life. There are scientifically-based studies that investigate the concept of hope in people’s lives. It is also helpful to know theologians have done their own systematic research into the concept of hope. To hope is to want a better outcome. It makes the present situation more bearable, and motivates us to create the conditions for a better future. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test). Thanks for tuning in today.
“It is by tracing things to their origin, that we learn to understand them; and it is by keeping that line and that origin always in view, that we never forget them.” Paine had a provocative and idealistic sense of what we often should see as “self-evident” truths. It seems he was already tracing things to their origins, such as the basic rights of a peasant child compared with one of royal pedigree. If only these ideals had become reality through the Founders in the first place. For our purposes, too, we should think about how this quote applies to the self. Keep sourcing yourself for the core questions and you will get somewhere. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test). Thanks for tuning in today.
“Grief is the conflicting feelings caused by the end of or change in a familiar pattern of behavior.” The emphasis is on feelings. Grief involves emotions, however intense the grief may be. Six common responses to loss that completely ignore emotional needs: (1) Don’t feel bad; (2) Replace the loss; (3) Grieve alone; (4) Just give it time; (5) Be strong for others; (6) Keep busy. Each of the misconceptions is examined in the book where this quote comes from and revealed for the damage it does. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test).
“With every breath, the old moment is lost; a new moment arrives. We exhale and we let go of the old moment. It is lost to us. In doing so, we let go of the person we used to be. We inhale and breathe in the moment that is becoming. In doing so, we welcome the person we are becoming. We repeat the process. This is meditation. This is renewal. This is life.” This is a summary of the simplicity and process — and beauty — of meditation. It induces calm, acceptance, and compassion. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test).
“Addictive behavior is often a search for safety rather than an attempt to rebel or a selfish turn inward.” This is a good reminder, especially when we see it manifesting in our children’s behaviors. Of course, it doesn’t take long for addiction to manifest in rebellion or a self-interested turn inward, but that often has as much to do with the punitive responses to the addictive behavior. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test).
“If you celebrate your differentness, the world will, too. It believes exactly what you tell it — through the words you use to describe yourself, the actions you take to care for yourself, and the choices you make to express yourself. Tell the world you are a one-of-a-kind creation who came here to experience wonder and spread joy. Expect to be accommodated.” By contrast to a lot of the resistance and fear that we can experience when moving into ourselves, this quote is saying tell the world who you are and the world will respond in kind. Just like overcoming fear, this takes courage. It’s a mindset shift, and I don’t think it’s necessarily “a law of attraction” type of thinking. Live out who you are freely and in expectation. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test).
“Whereas the truth is that fullness of soul can sometimes overflow in utter vapidity of language, for none of us can ever express the exact measure of his needs or his thoughts or his sorrows; and human speech is like a cracked kettle on which we tap crude rhythms for bears to dance to, while we long to make music that will melt the stars.” This quote says something to me about longing. We long to express the intensity of our experience. There are things we want to say that we can’t put words to, feelings without descriptions. Our spirits and imaginations want magic, want many lives, yearn for thousands of experiences, but our time is limited, our language is limited, and we come down to earth as it were, faced with the realism of one ordinary moment turning into the next. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test).
“A stationary body will stay stationary unless an external force is applied to it.” Force is equal to mass times acceleration, and a change in motion (change in speed) is proportional to the force applied. For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. Think about these laws in relation to your own life. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test).
“Are you paralyzed with fear? That’s a good sign. Fear is good. Like self-doubt, fear is an indicator. Fear tells us what we have to do. Remember one rule of thumb: the more scared we are of a work or calling, the more sure we can be that we have to do it.” When you come across this quote at the right time it can be such an encouragement. It’s true, for all the assistance and encouragement you’re like to find when you first strike out into the wild frontier of trying to learn more about who you are, it starts to get scary when you start taking action. But much like the idea of the “obstacle is the way,” so is that fear resistance we’re almost certain to have. Push through it, and know you are on the right path. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test).
“The wonderful paradox about the truth of suffering is that the more we open to it and understand it, the lighter and freer our mind becomes. Our mind becomes more spacious, more open, and happier as we move past our avoidance and denial to see what is true. We become less driven by compulsive desires and addictions, because we see clearly the nature of things as they are.” You hear about this approach a lot when it comes to compulsions and ingrained bad habits, even anxieties. Look them in the eye and stay with them. Mirror back to them an acknowledgment that you see them. You are aware of them. Neutrally. You aren’t afraid, but neither are you trying too hard. You’re not hunting them down. You’re letting them know you know they’re already there, and you’re not running. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test).
“Perhaps the biggest tragedy of our lives is that freedom is possible, yet we can pass our years trapped in the same old patterns...We may want to love other people without holding back, to feel authentic, to breathe in the beauty around us, to dance and sing. Yet each day we listen to inner voices that keep our life small.” The biggest regrets the dying often report were the chances they didn’t take, the things they wish they hadn’t lived enslaved to but felt they had no other choice. We do have choices. We do have opportunities for greater freedom and fulfillment. We need to slow down and begin reflecting. We need to know who we are. Then we need to get out there and do something about it. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test).
“Like lost children we live our unfinished adventures.” In the ways that we don’t know ourselves, you could say we haven’t grown up. We haven’t grown into the mature self we can be, who we, in fact, are. And so we are like children, and in that way we relive and reenact the parts of ourselves that are unfinished. When our unconscious minds go unexplored and unpursued, they end up dictating much of the terms of our behavior. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test).
“The happiness which comes from long practice, which leads to the end of suffering, which at first is like poison, but at last like nectar — this kind of happiness arises from the serenity of one’s own mind.” While we’re tackling one buried treasure after another, here is more ancient wisdom. For as much disdain as we have for the past, the past has a lot to tell us. It’s like on a surface level we realize there were great thinkers, but another part of our brain tells us that we are collectively superior. We’re bigger. We have electricity and planes and the combustible engine. We have bombs. We can talk with people across the globe in real time at any time. But that has nothing to do with our wisdom, our knowledge, or self-knowledge, or our ability to morally reason. This quote has much to tell us. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test).
“The man who moves a mountain begins by carrying away small stones.” I especially love this quote because it captures so much in such an aphoristic statement. To move a mountain may be a miracle, but it’s a miracle that comes through incredibly hard and persistent labor and (self) belief. It’s a lesson on habits. It’s a lesson in persistence. Go to Big Self School.com and take the stress test to find out just how stressed you really are. https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test (https://www.bigselfschool.com/stress-test).
“The praise of the wise few is more important than the mockery of the foolish many.” I suppose also the praise of the wise few is more important than the praise of the foolish many. The mockery of the foolish many would still hurt, even if we knew they were foolish. The thing about the foolish is they don’t usually understand that they’re foolish, and they’re validated by each other in their collective misunderstanding. Plus, it can feel like they’re gaslighting when they start telling you that you are actually the fool. But the point is, don’t worry about them if you are pursuing higher ideals and bolder thinking. This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. Go to Big Self School.com and get your free checklist: 7 Soul Needs You Must Meet To Avoid Burnout. Thanks for tuning in today.
“The great affair, we always find, is to get money.” We’ve explored this concept before in our readings, but it bears a point of return from time to time. There is the self-interested part of our lives that is focused on what we can get for ourselves and our families. To some extent, of course, it’s required. We have to earn our way, and to some extent this self-interested participation in the open market is good for the collective whole. At least in theory. This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. Go to Big Self School.com and get your free checklist: 7 Soul Needs You Must Meet To Avoid Burnout. Thanks for tuning in today.
“If you’ve never done anything wrong it’s probably because you have never tried anything new.” You learn to walk by falling. You become a better mountain biker by crashing (within reason). You could even go so far as to say you literally learn by failing. It is the curious minds who pursue answers for themselves that come back with valuable findings. This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. Go to Big Self School.com and get your free checklist: 7 Soul Needs You Must Meet To Avoid Burnout. Thanks for tuning in today.
“I see no good reasons why the views given in this volume should shock the religious views of anyone.” Darwin amended his original 1859 text in a previous edition in response to religious critics who believed that the Creator had an intentional and guided hand in the development of all creation. He turned to a famous author and clergyman, Charles Kingsley, and said: “I have gradually learnt to see that it is just as noble a conception of Deity, to believe that he created primal forms capable of self development into all forms.” This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. Go to Big Self School.com and get your free checklist: 7 Soul Needs You Must Meet To Avoid Burnout. Thanks for tuning in today.
“It is as reasonable to represent one kind of imprisonment by another as it is to represent anything that really exists by that which exists not.” I read this as there are lots of ways to be imprisoned. It’s also a matter of perspective. You can be imprisoned by the beliefs you are chained to, as well as by fear and anger. Any recurring pain or emotion that you are controlled by (and not in control of) is imprisoning. Some things that we cannot see are real and some are imagined, and what’s hard about a plague is that it is devastatingly real and cannot be seen. This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. Go to Big Self School.com and get your free checklist: 7 Soul Needs You Must Meet To Avoid Burnout. Thanks for tuning in today.
“I have no idea what’s awaiting me, or what will happen when this all ends. For the moment I know this: there are sick people and they need curing.” This is a quote from the protagonist doctor in the novel, and it sounds almost exactly like so many of the healthcare workers we hear from today regarding the COVID-19 pandemic. No one knows how long it will last, or how long the hospitals will be filled, or when an effective and mass-produced vaccine will be available, and yet day after day they doctors and nurses and other healthcare professionals go in on the front lines and tend to the sick and dying. It is courageous work. This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. Go to Big Self School.com and get your free checklist: 7 Soul Needs You Must Meet To Avoid Burnout. Thanks for tuning in today.
“One of the things that you realize when you see the nature of the self is that what you do and what happens to you are the same thing. Realizing that you do not exist separately from everything else, you realize responsibility.” If we do not recognize our role in our misfortune, we are unable to change the conduct that led to it, which almost guarantees that it will happen again. Part of why we emphasize focusing on your “self” first and foremost — to be the change you want to see in the world — is for the very reason stated in this quote. What you do and what happens to you is essentially the same thing. This should help you take a little more responsibility in how you treat yourself and others. This episode was brought to you by Big Self School. Go to Big Self School.com and get your free checklist: 7 Soul Needs You Must Meet To Avoid Burnout. Thanks for tuning in today.
“Mindful breathing is the vehicle that you use to go back to your true home.” Mindful breathing is a meditation technique that seeks to reduce the size of the emotion or thought in the brain. The idea is to get perspective, to listen to your body, and to let the experience of conscious breathwork do its work to calm. In a calm state you can make better decisions. You also achieve greater control over yourself and your responses to things that you can’t control. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Go to Big Self School.com and get your free checklist: 7 Soul Needs You Must Meet To Avoid Burnout.
“One of the most surprising things I’ve noticed during my experiments in productive disagreement is how quickly things go off the rails precisely when people stop speaking from their own perspective and try to speculate about other people’s perspectives.” There are some interesting takeaways from this research. It seems a large part of disagreements are the formed assumptions we have of other people’s thinking. We seek certainty, so we seek to categorize, so we can evaluate and ultimately, judge. And we judge the “other” as wrong, and, therefore, especially when it comes to trying to get things done, as our adversary. Partly, this is why empathy is so important, and that only comes from lots of listening and in relationship. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Go to Big Self School.com and get your free checklist: 7 Soul Needs You Must Meet To Avoid Burnout.
“Rarely in our life is money a place of genuine freedom, joy, or clarity, yet we routinely allow it to dictate the terms of our lives and often to be the single most important factor in the decisions we make about work, love, family, and friendship.” There are a lot of unconscious obligations we experience as a result of money. Rarely do people feel they have enough of it regardless of their wealth. We often give it the highest status in our lives. Often we are enslaved by the dictates of money. But why? Time is also something we don’t have much of, and you could say is always a declining balance. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Go to Big Self School.com and get your free checklist: 7 Soul Needs You Must Meet To Avoid Burnout.
“People who have recently lost someone have a certain look, recognizable maybe only to those who have seen that look on their own faces. I have noticed it on my face and I notice it now on others. The look is one of extreme vulnerability, nakedness, openness. It is the look of someone who walks from the ophthalmologist’s office into the bright daylight with dilated eyes, or of someone who wears glasses and is suddenly made to take them off. These people who have lost someone look naked because they think themselves invisible. I myself felt invisible for a period of time, incorporeal.” As she also writes, “A single person is missing for you, and the whole world is empty.” This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Go to Big Self School.com and get your free checklist: 7 Soul Needs You Must Meet To Avoid Burnout.
“We know, if only vaguely and inchoately, that our finest and most memorable experiences may never, and indeed, ultimately will never, happen again. That is why we cherish them so.” Emily Dickinson said the same thing in her distinctive way. We focus on death like we should focus on any reality in our life, with clarity. It doesn’t mean you have a “morbid fascination” with death to think about death. No one gets out of this alive. We’re all in this together. As a matter of fact, by calmly recognizing the finitude of life we will reduce our anxiety in our day-to-day living. It is what the authors of The Worm at the Core articulate so clearly and with great depth. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Go to Big Self School.com and get your free checklist: 7 Soul Needs You Must Meet To Avoid Burnout.
“Isn’t it important for your friends close by and far away to know the high cost of these insights? Wouldn’t they find it a source of consolation to see that light and darkness, hope and despair, love and fear are never very far from each other, and that spiritual freedom often requires a fierce spiritual battle?” I think that’s the motivation behind the book, to serve as an example for others who may not have the platform, privilege, or courage to put his struggles on display. We have explored faith’s tenuous relationship to doubt in previous readings. This puts the paradoxical battle and the intensity of the inner work in a different light. It is in fact necessary to have the struggle if what you’ve achieved afterwards is to have any value or depth. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Go to Big Self School.com and get your free checklist: 7 Soul Needs You Must Meet To Avoid Burnout.
“We are unknown to ourselves, we men of knowledge — and with good reason. We have never sought ourselves — how could it happen that we should ever find ourselves? It has rightly been said: ’Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also’; our treasure is where the beehives of our knowledge are.” Merely knowing a lot does not help you to know yourself. We can see that through many people of higher learning who are still petty and foolish, arrogant and vain. I like the sentiment here because he puts it forth very clearly as to why: You don’t value it and therefore you don’t pursue it, and moreover, you never will until you do. He also would seem to include himself among their number. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Go to Big Self School.com and get your free checklist: 7 Soul Needs You Must Meet To Avoid Burnout.
“Dissatisfaction and discomfort dominate our brain’s default state, but we can use them to motivate us instead of defeat us.” That’s the very challenge, though, isn’t it? We can choose to make this default state of our brain’s into something motivating. Step one is a mindset shift, which tends to be a process, and is a skill that can be developed. The second part of choosing is simply to understand our brains and feelings. If we expect nothing less than dissatisfaction and discomfort, we can learn when and how to identify the experience and figure out our own methods and approaches for keeping focused and motivated anyway. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“Emotional intelligence is your ability to recognize and understand emotions in yourself and others, and your ability to use this awareness to manage your behavior and relationships.” Research has been showing for quite some time now how important emotional intelligence is in the workplace. Really, it’s important in all social aspects of our lives, which means in all aspects of our lives. Managing ourselves through increased self-awareness, leads to better interpersonal skills, and that leads to better management and leadership. It also makes you a better team player, which helps all the more as the best teams become increasingly diverse. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“So much of the pain of loneliness is to do with concealment, with feeling compelled to hide vulnerability, to tuck ugliness away, to cover up scars as if they are literally repulsive. But why hide? What’s so shameful about wanting, about desire, about having failed to achieve satisfaction, about experiencing unhappiness? Why this need to constantly inhabit peak states, or to be comfortably sealed inside a unit of two, turned inward from the world at large?” I love the directness of these questions, and I love the questions themselves. I sometimes wonder these things too. What are we so afraid of? Why are we always performing impression management? Why the constant need of so many to portray only their smiling, happy selves on Facebook? This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“If you care about something you have to protect it – If you’re lucky enough to find a way of life you love, you have to find the courage to live it.” Owen Meaning has so many wise sayings, and all in that irritating but endearing voice in ALL CAPS throughout the entire book. One of the more memorable characters in modern literature. He says this to the book’s narrator, John Wheelwright. I love the quote in and of itself for the threefold wisdom it offers. First, if you care about something you have to defend it, care for it, keep it safe. Basically, it’s the same way as saying the second part, “if you’re lucky enough to find a way of life you love.” Yes, it doesn’t just come from willing it, there’s some grace involved, some parts that are outside yourself that come into play, which we could call luck. Finally, though, it takes courage. From first realization, to defense, to gratitude, to courage. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“But those things aren’t you. They are just things about you, not the real, the core you. Look at the center of you. What do you want to change there?” It’s not easy to just “look at the center of you,” much less to see yourself so clearly without blindspots so that you can answer the question of what you would change once you do. That is why this quote is a challenge. It’s implied that it’s hard to do, but it’s also implied that it is essential that you perform the necessary tasks to in fact look at yourself for who you are. It’s essential that we can continue to ask ourselves what we’d like to change. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“Everyone has a supremely low moment somewhere along the AT, usually when the urge to quit the trail becomes almost overpowering. The irony of my moment was that I wanted to get back on the trail and didn’t know how. I hadn’t lost just Katz, my boon companion, but my whole sense of connectedness to the trail. I had lost my momentum, my feeling of purpose. In the most literal way I needed to find my feet again.” It’s a great metaphor for regaining your purpose. A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail by Bill Bryson has a way of maintaining three difficult things at once: (1) getting to the heart of a hiker, (2) the history of the Appalachian Trail, and (3) doing it with laugh-out-loud humor. His writing is affable and encouraging. It’s also a beautiful, surprisingly complex story. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“According to Buddhism, the root of suffering is neither the feeling of pain nor of sadness nor even of meaninglessness. Rather, the real root of suffering is this never-ending and pointless pursuit of ephemeral feelings, which causes us to be in a constant state of tension, restlessness and dissatisfaction.” Due to this pursuit, the mind is never satisfied. Even when experiencing pleasure, it is not content, because it fears this feeling might soon disappear, and craves that this feeling should stay and intensify. People are liberated from suffering not when they experience this or that fleeting pleasure, but rather when they understand the impermanent nature of all their feelings, and stop craving them. This is the aim of Buddhist meditation practices. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“By judging others we blind ourselves to our own evil and to the grace which others are just as entitled to as we are.” It reminds me of the idea that an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind. It’s also a statement directed at those practitioners of religion who do nothing to advance humanity, but only divide us further. The truth behind religion, what Jesus preached and practiced, was a compassion based on empathy and grace. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“Stepping out of a normal routine, finding novelty, being open to serendipity, enjoying the unexpected, embracing a little risk, and finding pleasure in the heightened vividness of life. These are all qualities of a state of play.” We have understood how fundamentally important play is to our fulfilment and to “becoming who we are” from the likes of D.W. Winnicott. Now, much more recent research is proving why. This quote suggests the “how” we are to achieve it. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“Success, in the words of Winston Churchill, ’consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm’. The greatest barriers to success so far have been the fear of failure and the failure to learn from mistakes.” It would seem it is time to make some dramatic changes to our archaic financial systems. Where there is a will there’s a way. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“Change the language in the tribe, and you have changed the tribe itself.” It’s similar to changing the story, or changing the script you’ve been following or telling yourself. It applies to groups every bit as much as to individuals. The application here for Big Self is to realize that while so much of the work of transformation and growth begins with you — the self — we are also always in relationship with others. The next step beyond the self is the “other” and we know ourselves through others and how we present ourselves to others, as well as our awareness of how others present themselves to us. Many of us are in, or have been in, professional organizations at a variety of degrees of health. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“Courage is not simply one of the virtues but the form of every virtue at the testing point, which means at the point of highest reality. ” The demon, Screwtape, is speaking to the demon, Wormwood, who is on his first mission. He is observing how powerful courage is in whatever virtue his “patient” possesses, and isn’t just a virtue in itself. It’s an interesting point to consider. Whatever healthy habits or actions we’re taking in our lives — whether the work is inward or outward or both — we should consider the place of courage within what we are doing. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“If, with a warm heart and patience, we can consider the views of others and exchange ideas in calm discussion, we will find points of agreement. It is our responsibility — out of love and compassion for humankind — to seek harmony among nations, ideologies, cultures, ethnic groups, and economic and political systems.” You would think these aspirational thoughts would be entirely possible. It sounds so easy, yet when faced with reality feels so discouragingly impossible. The least we can do is try. We can hitch up our pants and realize it is our responsibility to have compassion for others. It always begins with ourselves. Who do we think we are? This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“Expect change. Accept death. Enjoy life. As Marcus Aurelius explained, the brains that got you through the troubles you have had so far will get you through any troubles yet to come.” I like the direct way she states each considerable and challenging idea. All this is easier said than done, but it is worth saying, and it is worth striving for, all of it. Don’t worry about what’s to come. Meantime, enjoy yourself. You got this. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else is the greatest accomplishment.” America’s most eloquent champion of individualism, Emerson acknowledges at the same time the pressures of society in American life. How do you remain true to yourself even when virtually everyone you know wants you to be, to do, to believe, something? What does it mean to be yourself? Well, that’s part of the journey and part of the reason for this book and all the readings and meditations. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“She would’ve been a good woman,” said The Misfit, “if it had been somebody there to shoot her every minute of her life.” First, it’s ironic enough that the one who murders the grandmother is the one to make this statement. Of course the strange truth is that it speaks to the human condition. We’d all be better if we felt pressured to be, if we were literally under the gun. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“The empirical fact is that self-actualizing people, our best experiencers, are also our most compassionate, our great improvers and reformers of society, our most effective fighters against injustice, inequality, slavery, cruelty, exploitation (and also are best fighters for excellence, effectiveness, competence). And it also becomes clearer and clearer that our best ’helpers’ are the most fully human persons. What I may call the bodhisattvic path is an integration of self-improvement and social zeal, i.e., the best way to become a better ‘helper’ is to become a better person. But one necessary aspect of becoming a better person is via helping other people. So one must and can do both simultaneously.” It’s a powerful summary of what makes for an actualized and good human. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“It is facile to imply that smoking, alcoholism, overeating, or other ingrained patterns can be upended without real effort. Genuine change requires work and self-understanding of the cravings driving behaviors.” There are no quick fixes. Let’s quit chasing them in case we are. There is only one way out of bad habits, and the way is through. Yes, one day at a time, and yes habits are micro-efforts that over time lead to big results, and yes it is all a process. The hard truth: it doesn’t just take work, the outer results begin from the inner work. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“Studies by Andrew Newberg and others have shown that long-term practice of meditation produces significant alterations in cerebral blood flow in parts of the brain related to attention, emotion, and some autonomic functions.” Changes do occur in the brain through meditation, and also through gratitude practice. We don’t yet know all the effects, but we do see the changes. Similarly, there is increasing evidence that transcendent experiences can also be chemically-induced and performed in a safe environment. Humans need to transcend, transport, escape; we need meaning, understanding, and explanation; we need to see overall patterns in our lives. We need hope, the sense of a future. And we need freedom (or at least the illusion of freedom) to get beyond ourselves. We need detachment and engagement. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“Where id is, there shall ego be.” The ego is not only the ally of the id. It is also a submissive slave who courts the love of his master. The ego has to mediate the desires of the id but, at the same time, it sits between the superego and the events of the external world. When people argue that the ego should be killed, and that we’d be better off free from ego, we may be arguing semantics, but in the end, what you need is a healthy ego. You need it in its place, but you can’t rid yourself of it. It’s part of your consciousness, and always will be. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“In this way, moral formation is not individual; it is relational. Character is not something you build sitting in a room thinking about the difference between right and wrong and about your own willpower. Character emerges from our commitments. If you want to inculcate character in someone else, teach them how to form commitments — temporary ones in childhood, provisional ones in youth, permanent ones in adulthood. Commitments are the school for moral formation. When your life is defined by fervent commitments, you are on the second mountain.” This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
Things Hidden Since the Foundation of the World is a profound, but also very challenging text. Girard is trying to do nothing less than create a Copernican revolution that merges historical agency, metaphysics, psychology, and anthropology into a combined construct. ’Things Hidden’ is Girard’s most famous work on Mimetic Theory. Mimetic Theory’s key insight is that human desire is not an autonomous process, but a collective one. We want things because other people want them. As more and more people want something and when that “thing” remains scarce, there is conflict. Most conflict then is not because humans want different things, but because they want the same thing. An astonishing work of cultural criticism, this book is widely recognized as a brilliant and devastating challenge to conventional views of literature, anthropology, religion, and psychoanalysis. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“Gratitude is an antidote to negative emotions, a neutralizer of envy, hostility, worry, and irritation. It is savoring; it is not taking things for granted; it is present oriented.” Gratitude is actually a radical act. It is bold, not passive. There is also loads of research that shows the brain works different when active gratitude is practiced, and that it leads to deeper fulfillment. Gratitude is potent, and we’re only just beginning to truly explore what it can mean for our lives. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. Check out our gratitude challenge for the month of November at bigselfschool.com/gratitude.
“Depression demands that we reject simplistic answers, both ’religious’ and ’scientific’, and learn to embrace mystery, something our culture resists. Mystery surrounds every deep experience of the human heart: the deeper we go into the heart’s darkness or its light, the closer we get to the ultimate mystery of God. But our culture wants to turn mysteries into puzzles to be explained or problems to be solved, because maintaining the illusion that we can ’straighten things out’ makes us feel powerful. Yet mysteries never yield to solutions or fixes — and when we pretend that they do, life becomes not only more banal but also more hopeless, because the fixes never work.” Parker Palmer can identify strongly with those who have undergone (or are going through) clinical depression. He went through a long period of it in his 40s, and even long after he had come out of it — and he isn’t sure why he was able to climb out of it while many are not — he wasn’t able or willing to share his experience. Depression is the “ultimate state of disconnection.” While Palmer doesn’t wish the experience on anyone, he does believe that it now marks a pivotal passage on his pilgrimage toward self-hood and vocation. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“Playing big doesn’t come from working more, pushing harder, or finding confidence. It comes from listening to the most powerful and secure part of you, not the voice of self-doubt.” I also believe that listening to that powerful and secure part of you does increase confidence. Playing big — for women and men — means finding that inner wisdom, and that feedback from others tells us at least as much if not more about the person giving the feedback as it does about the content we’ve put out there. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“You have a substance to your life if you’ve felt pain. You’ve got understanding, that’s where compassion is. It makes you a deeper, richer human being.” The novelist Iris Murdoch once wrote that paying attention is a moral act. Paying close attention to tragedies can feel like staring at the sun. It scares you, yet you want to see what happens if you don’t look away. It’s not that it is ever easy to endure suffering of any kind, but at least you can come out the other side enriched if you can endure it mindfully. At least there is restoration and hope that transcends the suffering, and that not only can you learn from it, but you can now have deeper empathy, and possibly even compassion (which some define as empathy combined with action) for others. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“The best bridge between despair and hope is a good night’s sleep.” While there is a certain wit to this statement, it’s all the more powerful because it’s true. So much of our literal suffering comes from inadequate sleep. Some people glibly say, “I’ll sleep when I die,” but the truth is you’re going to die a lot sooner if you don’t sleep adequately and you won’t let your brain repair appropriately along the way. He also notes, “Inadequate sleep — even moderate reductions for just one week — disrupts blood sugar levels so profoundly that you would be classified as pre-diabetic.” This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“The biggest enemies of willpower: temptation, self-criticism, and stress. These three skills — self-awareness, self-care, and remembering what matter most — are the foundation for self-control.” We clearly live with the first three enemies more than we do with the latter three. This quote is helpful in laying bare the foundations of what you need to ground yourself. Often, part of transformation isn’t about taking big, bold leaps, it’s about being able to assess what we want less of and controlling the parts of ourselves that want to override the system and function on autopilot. The three skills for self-control, however, are all about processes. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“And here comes in the question whether it is better to be loved rather than feared, or feared rather than loved. It might perhaps be answered that we should wish to be both; but since love and fear can hardly exist together, if we must choose between them, it is far safer to be feared than loved.” This famous quote is powerful at face value. It’s also powerful to consider why then we still often choose to be loved over being feared even though it is in fact less safe. So, in the world of power, it is safer to be feared. Although in the end it is silly to lead with fear only. To be loved is less safe, but we are willing to risk it with the ones whom we love. For the thematic purposes of this book, I also like this quote: “Everyone sees what you appear to be, few experience what you really are.” This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“True humility, we believe, consists of two things. The first is knowing our limitations. And the second is getting the help we need.” Not everyone necessarily wants humility, but humility is ultimately about maturity. Why? Because like knowledge, the more you know, the more you realize you don’t know. Many men who still act like boys in grown up clothes, certainly don’t want to know or accept their limitations. Even when it is painfully clear what some of these limitations are, the idea of getting help for them is a huge leap. The ones who need help the very most are likely the ones who will never pursue it. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“When we donate to a good cause, it ’says’ to our associates, ’Look, I’m willing to spend my resources for the benefit of others. I’m playing a positive-sum, cooperative game with society.’ This helps explain why generosity is so important for those who aspire to leadership. No one wants leaders who play zero-sum, competitive games with the rest of society. If their wins are our losses, why should we support them? Instead we want leaders with a prosocial orientation, people who will look out for us because we’re all in it together.” What I take from this quote is that even the most basic animal-like instincts want to see others playing cooperatively as leaders. In a strange sense, it is a hopeful statement because we can expect idealism to generally come from our leaders since it’s what we want to see from them. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“Women who love themselves are threatening; but men who love real women, more so.” Genuine people are threatening to the people who are committed to keeping the fantasy and ensuing power and privilege alive. The men who love real women are perhaps more threatening because men are still generally in positions of power, though this is slowly changing. Change could happen faster with recognition of the subtle and overt power exchanges, but that cuts to the very core of why people are threatened. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“Early on in my tenure, I was given a cartoon that circulated widely at the UN. The cartoon showed dozens of people listening to a speech. In the first panel, the speaker asks, ’Who wants change?’ and all audience members enthusiastically raise their hands. In the second panel, the speaker refines his question, asking, ‘Who wants to change?’ This time, each audience member looks toward the ground, demurring.” It’s human nature to want things to be better, to ask for more of this and less of that. It’s also human nature to expect someone else to do the work. Sometimes we feel resigned that we are too small, and the things we want changed too big. Sometimes we simply feel entitled. Change within ourselves takes hard work, and so does collective change. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“Self-doubt in moderation is animating and motivating, not paralyzing. Leaders who have purged themselves of all self-doubt will not be leaders for long and, in my view, are dangerous while in command. I learned, over time, that self-doubt is my friend, and arrogance my enemy.” This also reminds me of the famous quote by Lord Acton from the 19th century, “Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Self-doubt keeps us honest to ourselves. No one has all the answers. Humility is, ironically enough, what the greatest humans possess. Arrogance is always a form of insecurity. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“He allowed himself to be swayed by his conviction that human beings are not born once and for all on the day their mothers give birth to them, but that life obliges them over and over again to give birth to themselves.” The simple, but profound way that this idea is about transformation and renewal. It’s an interesting thought. We aren’t even reborn just once or twice, but that throughout the changes necessary to keep ourselves alive as it were, we must continually rebirth ourselves. It also suggests that we need to be our own best parent, our own best mentor. Sometimes even when we’re in a close, loving relationship, we still need to care for ourselves better than anyone else. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“A self is not something static, tied up in a pretty parcel and handed to the child, finished and complete. A self is always becoming.” Because in some sense that is why the need for this very book exists. We are always in process, always growing, always becoming. Unless of course we’re not, which would mean we’re foreclosed and we’re already unconscious and dead to ourselves. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“Human nature dictates that it is virtually impossible to accept advice from someone unless you feel that that person understands you.” Which is why it’s so important to have close relationships, even though all long-term relationships are fraught with challenges. It also explains why advice is rarely taken, and we would do well to consider more listening in our relationships, and less prescribing. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“When parents don’t take responsibility for their own unfinished business, they miss an opportunity not only to become better parents but also to continue their own development. People who remain in the dark about the origins of their behaviors and intense emotional responses are unaware of their unresolved issues and the parental ambivalence they create.” So many parents sideline their own growth for so many reasons. Sometimes we feel that we don’t have time because we’re simply too busy providing and tending and maintaining. Other times we feel that we are now living for our children and we lose our personal identity as merely being “super” mom or dad. That does a disservice to ourselves and our children. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“Neuroscience research shows that the only way we can change the way we feel is by becoming aware of our inner experience and learning to befriend what is going inside ourselves.” First, I’m always attracted to research and science backing up what we call the “inner work” because so many want to dismiss it as subjective or just something you choose to believe in or not. No doubt, for the vast majority this type of defensiveness is a refusal (conscious or otherwise) to have the courage to self-reflect and therefore become who they are. More importantly, something is going on inside ourselves whether we want to acknowledge it or not, and it is having an impact. We can choose to be at war within ourselves or come to peace. No one said it would be easy. Life is not easy, but it is necessary for growth and what we could call renewal. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“I’d like to repeat the advice that I gave you before, in that I think you really should make a radical change in your lifestyle and begin to boldly do things which you may previously never have thought of doing, or been too hesitant to attempt. So many people live within unhappy circumstances and yet will not take the initiative to change their situation because they are conditioned to a life of security, conformity, and conservatism, all of which may appear to give one peace of mind, but in reality nothing is more damaging to the adventurous spirit within a man than a secure future.” Chris McCandless gave this advice to his friend Ron that he met during some of his travels before he finally went as far into the wild as he could possibly find, namely the Alaskan wilderness, where he eventually died. While McCandless’s story is a cautionary tale in some respects, there is also much to be admired in his strength of character and desire for boldness and search for truth. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“Education is thinking, and thinking is looking for yourself and seeing what’s there, not what you got told was there.” We have heard that a true education meets knowledge with character from MLK Jr. Now we get a perspective of education with an emphasis on looking for yourself. That is the broadening and enriching experience of travel. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“Begin by answering this question in a single, memorable sentence: Why do you get up in the morning?” A conscious sense of purpose can plant the seeds of habits and rituals that lead to unconscious positive self-regard and life satisfaction. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“Through my English teacher, I started to sense that words not only convey some thing, but are something; that words have color, depth, texture of their own, and the power to evoke vastly more than they mean; that words can be used not merely to make things clear, make things vivid, make things interesting and whatever else, but to make things happen inside the one who reads them or hears them.” Buechner expresses gratitude for turning points in his life when the influence and guidance of another showed him things that made a difference. Then, the idea of the power of words. Similarly, Marcus Aurelius begins in just the same way with an extended discourse on specifically each important person in his life that has made a difference or taught him something singular and important. It is important to begin with gratitude for mentors, guides, coaches, teachers, and others along life’s path of self-transformation. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“The necessary thing is after all but this; solitude, great inner solitude. Going into oneself for hours meeting no one — this one must be able to attain.” It’s not just for a young poet to go deep into one self and “disconnect,” as we say today. It’s good for all of us. We’re social creatures, but that is not the problem. We are always social. We live on social media. We live constantly in and around the interruptions and urgencies of others and life’s demands. It is healthy and necessary for self-integration to go deep inside oneself, at least for intervals, at least from time to time. Rilke also writes: "Nobody can advise you and help you, nobody. There is only one way. Go into yourself." This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“Thus Western man enacted an extraordinary dialectic in the course of the modern era — moving from a near boundless confidence in his own powers, his spiritual potential, his capacity for certain knowledge, his mastery over nature, and his progressive destiny, to what often appeared to be a sharply opposite condition: a debilitating sense of metaphysical insignificance and personal futility, spiritual loss of faith, uncertainty in knowledge, a mutually destructive relationship with nature, and an intense insecurity concerning the human future. In the four centuries of modern man’s existence, Bacon and Descartes had become Kafka and Beckett.” A powerful, complex thought, and one that may also be examined in The Denial of Death along these same lines. This quote gives us a wide angle lens to consider the shift in our worldview regarding our purpose and identity in this world. We need the optimism in our potential. We need reminders of the world within us and how that informs us as we move about in the world. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“One of the best ways to make yourself happy is to make other people happy. One of the best ways to make other people happy is to be happy yourself.” It’s easy to think of happiness as merely trite, shallow, or at best impermeable. Or even that happiness is fake, but what we really need is joy or wisdom or satisfaction. From Mother Theresa to Gandhi to the numberless and nameless who care for others, there is a tremendous amount of research and biographical detail about the power of compassion and service to others as being a key source of happiness and life satisfaction. The beginning of wisdom is to know yourself, and have compassion and understanding for yourself. The next step in that journey is to focus outwardly on others. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“I have one outstanding trait in my character, which must strike anyone who knows me for any length of time, and that is my knowledge of myself. I can watch myself and my actions, just like an outsider. The Anne of every day I can face entirely without prejudice, without making excuses for her, and watch what’s good and what’s bad about her. This ’self-consciousness’ haunts me, and every time I open my mouth I know as soon as I’ve spoken whether ’that ought to have been different’ or ’that was right as it was.’ There are so many things about myself that I condemn; I couldn’t begin to name them all. I understand more and more how true Daddy’s words were when he said: ’All children must look after their own upbringing.’ Parents can only give good advice or put them on the right paths, but the final forming of a person’s character lies in their own hands.” The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank is as haunting as her insights were precocious. As Jews in Nazi occupied Holland, Anne and her parents and sister Margot, fled their home in Amsterdam to escape capture. From 1942-1944 they occupied rooms in an old office building, which they called ’The Secret Annexe’. Anne’s diary details daily life within the confines of their safe house. The diary was left behind and found by the office cleaner. After being interned in two concentration camps, Anne and her sister Margot were finally sent to Bergen-Belsen where they both died. Anne was just 15 years old. Only Otto Frank, the girls’ father, survived, and the diary was returned to him. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“The place to improve the world is first in one’s own heart and head and hands, and then work outward from there.” Change begins within your own self. It’s a message we hear in a variety of contexts and from a diverse array of thinkers time and again. Here, it’s expressed interestingly about beginning with your heart (feeling), your head (thinking), and also your hands (actions). The Big Self School is about doing the inner work, which will eventually lead to an outward manifestation and impact in the world. This is well expressed here. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“Ask anyone what she means when she says ’God’ and chances are that you will learn a lot more about that person than you will learn about God.” As meditation practices go, they tend to open the door to open-heartedness and a lack of defensiveness. Such practices are a kind of maturity, even if guides and mentors and deep thinkers are still necessary for direction. This thinking demonstrates a maturity of both. It is a thought representative of deep meditation and guided reflection. This idea connects me to Sharon Salzberg’s idea of deep, personal faith as really being about what goes on deep in the privacy of your innermost self, not from holding tightly to rigid and unexamined beliefs. This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“Failure, when it comes to future risk-taking, is a gift. Successful risk-takers are often motivated by failure — it’s what tells them that they aren’t done preparing yet. It’s inspiration to work harder, to train better, and to learn more.” I love the optimism and clarity this idea has. When something isn’t going right, when I am effectively failing at something, I want to deny it, get angry at it, possibly quit it, feel embarrassed, etc. What was I thinking? How silly? I might tell myself. Who do I think I am? But when I know I’m on the right track, when I know it’s something important, or meaningful, then ideas embodied in this quote remind me to listen well and respond well. Take it as a gift means I’m receiving feedback that is valuable. Feedback is an opportunity to learn, and learning is a gift. What are you struggling with, frustrated by, or failing at? How can you see it as a gift, an opportunity for feedback? How can you take the information and reframe and make it better? This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“In order to change conditions outside ourselves, whether they concern the environment or relations with others, we must first change within ourselves.” This is a concept we learn from a wide variety of sources. From Socrates’ “Know thyself” statement when asked to summarize the aggregate of all the work philosopher’s do, and on down the line into every strain of eastern and western thought. When it comes to awakening, transformation, the metamorphic process of changing and growing into awareness, it all begins with gentle but courageous work on the self. In what ways do you seek satisfactions in things outside yourself, like food, comfort, sex, or success? This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“I’ve never done anything but dream. This, and this alone, has been the meaning of my life. My only real concern has been my inner life.” If we are considering identity and the transformation and exploration of the self through the inner life, one of the most profound thinkers and writers of the 20th century — and all time for that matter — would be none other than Fernando Pessoa. While there is a tendency toward entropy in Pessoa’s work and self-conscious self-examination, the inner work that he does is often revelatory. Here is someone constantly peering through the veil of perceived reality and calling it out. What is the meaning of your life? Would others agree or disagree? Does it matter what others think? We are building books, workshops, inner circles, and a healthy and whole community at the Big Self School. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character – that is the goal of true education.” We should always be learning. We learn about others. We learn about ourselves. I have known highly educated people with little character. When I worked with selfish or egotistical ministers or narcissistic and small-minded professors with their Ph.D.’s and specialties, I was always surprised, sometimes disillusioned. There is more to learning than facts and the accumulation of knowledge that goes into building true knowledge. Perhaps that is why you’re here, visiting this book regularly. What does it mean to live a virtuous life? This podcast focuses on self-exploration and personal identity -- to help you construct who you are, and how you want to feel, think, believe, and behave for yourself. The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“Abiding faith does not depend on borrowed concepts. Rather, it is the magnetic force of a bone-deep, lived understanding, one that draws us to realize our ideals, walk our talk, and act in accord with what we know to be true.” This idea impresses on us the importance of our connectedness to everything and everyone around us. We won’t see this unless we are willing to get up close, close to ourselves and our experiences. She also says, “It’s not the existence of beliefs that is the problem, but what happens to us when we hold them rigidly, without examining them, when we presume the absolutely centrality of our views and become disdainful of others.” When you think of the genuine people you know, are they people of faith? What makes them stand out from the people you think of fake or inauthentic? The book Who Do You Think You Are is also available at all major e-retailers, and you can find it at bigselfschool.com/store. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.
“The courage to be happy also includes the courage to be disliked. When you have gained that courage, your interpersonal relationships will all at once change into things of lightness.” There are certain threads that you can pull and all at once numerous things fall away and a new reality can be experienced. While many aspects of growth are long processes, sometimes you can hit upon something that immediately lifts you onto a higher plateau with a greater vision. In my personal journey over the past several months, shifting career paths and fields of study, as well as speaking out more about injustice and the rights of others, I have discovered how very real it is to want to be liked, and to fear rejection. If we are authentically finding our courage, we will feel lighter. If you are completely honest with yourself, what choices do you make on a regular basis that are about pleasing others? We are building books, workshops, inner circles, and a healthy and whole community at the Big Self School. Check out our two-hour classes on how to build resiliency, how to discover what you want, how to like yourself more, how to find calm, how to bounce forward after failure, and many more at bigselfschool.com.