Anger lurks behind people-pleasing rules

All that overthinking to maintain the rules actually keeps you tired and uncomfortably numb, and full of anger.

Once you’ve:

Life isn’t this outside-in nightmare that feeds off your constant dread…

You start to see:

How much of your life is built around human-invented rules that you’ve taken on so as not to pee anyone off.
How much headspace and energy you use up DAILY on keeping those rules.
How much ANGER you feel at times, when you’re trying to hold it all together.

Someone disapproving (that includes you) means discomfort to you.

Discomfort means an unnecessary use of energy, according to your brain that wants to keep you safe…

BUT all that overthinking to maintain the rules actually keeps you tired and uncomfortably numb (genius Pink Floyd).

And full of anger.

Because the thirst for approval is insatiable. We’ve equated it with safety.

There are 3 simple ways to pick up on those rules:

(And infinite ways, don’t make these new rules :D):

1. When you notice the voice in your head says things like:

I should, I should(n’t) have, I need, I’d better, I have to, I must…HeShe should, should(n’t) have, needs to, had better, has to, must…

When you notice thoughts about what your words/actions will make another person think/feel about you:

(or what you will think about yourself)

”I need to make the prospect feel good so that he/she likes and trusts me.”

No. Get out of the way, get present, and speak and act according to what makes sense!

2. When you notice your body tensing up when there are no tigers coming:

”Ruley” thoughts are bound to feelings. The body goes into protection mode.

If we can just let them in, as Rumi’s “Guest House” poem invites us to do, we create a little space around the tension and we get to see beyond them.

3. Touching that space beyond rules.:

The physical and creative reality of this present moment.

You can:

Pop out of your conceptual, over-processing brain and be with what is actually real right now, at any moment.
Sense an alive stillness somewhere in your body or in the space around you, amidst whatever appears to be going on in the outside world.
Remember that you are SAFE and built to have an energetic experience.

(It’s only if you worry about your current experience that the resistance and tension build up).

In this space, the rules become BLATANT, as they smell like gone-off milk compared to the salty sea air of the fresh and new.

Aren’t you fed up of gone-off milk?

Discover more over the coming weeks in our “Finding You” series. Start reconnecting you to the YOU underneath all the noise.