This is a part of the “Ask Jane” Series,
in which Jane answers questions
you email to her that of concern to you.
(Names are changed to protect your privacy.)
Just go to the “Contact Jane” page
and ask your question in the contact form.
This question is from Jered in San Diego, CA (Real names are never used.)
Jered: As we all know, the head of BP Oil is being crucified in the press. From my perspective, his personal comments to the public and Congress are the sincere truth. His people are working around the clock to solve the problem. He goes home to the UK for personal family time and to get a few hours of fresh air. Certainly, his mind is preoccupied. Yet no matter what he does or says that is truthful – the public is unsatisfied. How does one handle these situations? It’s as though the truth is insufficient as compared to a carefully postured response.
Jane: We don’t really know the character of Tony Hayward, the CEO of BP, or really what responsibility he does or doesn’t hold for what occurred. But I agree that he may very well be saying the sincere truth, but that many people want a scapegoat. They want someone to emotionally pay for their suffering, as if that would make them feel better.
The whole idea of sharing the suffering seems to be very strong in people. If I am suffering, then you ought to be suffering also — or you don’t care, you are selfish, you are a bad person. But this has nothing to do with any real solutions, or any easing of human pain.
This is a triggered kind of emotional response, and not reality-based. Whether Mr. Hayward is outwardly suffering or not, has no actual benefit to anyone who is suffering because of the oil spill. It won’t have any effect on solutions being found any faster, or people getting compensated any faster.
People who are invested in finding scapegoats for their suffering are looking in the wrong direction for any real solutions, and are invested in holding in place vibrations of misery, hatred and pain. As a result, I would guess, this is only one of many sources of misery in their lives, as this is what they would attract.
To answer your question more directly, about how to handle this kind of situation: Rather than the focus being on how other people might respond to us, as if that is the source of our well-being, and trying to cater to them, the real dialog is between oneself and a larger perspective, beyond the limited human scope of things. In other words, specifically in relation to Mr. Hayward, I’m sure there are lessons for him to learn, or he wouldn’t have found himself in this kind of situation in the first place. For example it is possible that he might have an emotional defense system of keeping himself at a distance from getting emotionally or personally involved in general, believing that that will keep him safe. This experience could rock that defense system, and be a huge wake-up call for him. Perhaps if he had been more personally involved, he may have prevented what happened.
* Limiting Decisions: Unconscious decisions, usually made before the age of 6 or 7, such as “I am bad,” “I am not good enough.” “People can’t be trusted.” They are always some form of deciding that life doesn’t work, and usually that there is something inherently wrong with you.
Question from Manny from Rancho Santa Fe (real names are never used):
Manny: What does the evolved person think about in a situation in which they are being physically attacked, besides trying to physical ward off one’s attacker or escape without harm?
Jane: That depends on where you are in your personal journey, what you have the capability of doing. The main challenge is to get yourself out of an emotionally triggered state (caused by limiting decisions*), which most people would be very much in. You want to get yourself, instead, in a resourceful state, in which you are relating to the actual reality of the situation, rather than the distorted one the attacker is representing. So in other words, instead of entering into the attacker’s distorted world, you connect with what is actually true in reality. So it’s just a question of how much your internal world resonates with the attacker’s distorted world, and how much you are able to bring yourself out of his world and into a positive and resourceful one. That determines how well you’re likely do in that situation, and what resources you’re likely to be able to tap into. The objective is to get so strong in orienting your reality around a larger truth that you don’t get pulled into this kind of distorted illusion of reality.
Being a victim is a state of mind, not a physical circumstance, and is not determined by how physically strong you are or aren’t. It is not about whatever you might experience physically, but the state of mind you get into, in whatever the circumstances you find yourself in.
The illusion being created by the attacker it is not about the actual possible physical harm that could be imposed. It is about the hateful, fearful, separating, substitute world that he is representing. This world is holding in place the illusion that hate and negativity are more powerful than love. It is about the distorted meaning that is attached to whatever physical action is happening. And that distorted meaning is really what the attacker is invested in. If you are not buying into that distortion, it is less likely you’ll end up being physically harmed. And if you are physically harmed, it will not be so traumatic to you emotionally. And there will be some learning in there for you that will move you forward on your evolutionary path.
What the evolved person does in his or her mind is ask for inner or Divine guidance, in all situations, especially including ones in which there appears to be no solutions, such as what you are describing. They call upon the larger truth, universal wisdom, a perspective beyond their own limited human perception, and beyond their limiting decisions.
The totally enlightened person is always in contact with their Guidance, which guides every moment in their lives. And so they are always being guided to the best place for them to be in for their highest good. They are so much in their power that everything that happens to them is in alignment with the larger truth.
* Limiting Decisions: Unconscious decisions, usually made before the age of 6 or 7, such as “I am bad,” “I am not good enough.” “People can’t be trusted.” They are always some form of deciding that life doesn’t work, and usually that there is something inherently wrong with you.
Manny: What causes an evolved person to be caught up in a physically violent situation?
Jane: We are complex beings, made up of many aspects, some representing who we are in our essence, and some representing unhealed or unevolved aspects of ourselves. Each aspect has a particular vibrational energy that we radiate. When an aspect of ourselves resonates with an aspect of someone or something else, it gets amplified. And then we feel affected by that aspect of the person. Other people who resonate with different aspects of that same person may have a completely different kind of relationship with him.
Negative vibrations, such as fear and hatred are extremely common in people, even if they don’t tend to initiation relating in that way. When someone does something very hateful toward a person, in most cases, it elicits that same kind of response in that person in response. People generally feel justified in attacking if they feel attacked. Someone who has done some horrendous crime generally elicits the response of hatred from others, even from people who consider themselves to be good, loving people. The people who do these kinds of hateful acts, are like lightening-rods. They serve as an outlet for the kinds of emotions that people don’t generally find acceptable in themselves.
As long as there is that kind of vibration in you, it can be elicited in you by someone who lives in that vibration, and you can be drawn into that world.
Whatever vibrations you have in yourself has to do with the perception of reality you are holding in place. And whatever that is, has influence in the world around you.
This is a part of the “Ask Jane” Series,
in which Jane answers questions
you email to her that of concern to you.
(Names are changed to protect your privacy.)
Just go to the “Contact Jane” page
and ask your question in the contact form.
Part One of a Three Part Dialog.
Question from Manny from Rancho Santa Fe: (Real names are never used.)
Manny: Even with the most enlightened of us, there are times that, by chance, things happen that put us in danger, such as a wrong turn to a dangerous neighborhood or a robbery takes place where you are shopping. Isn’t there a time when even the more evolved of us has to regress to the physical for survival, for those times when truth, love, enlightenment, etc, will unlikely have an immediate role in survival?
Jane: Being in an evolved state of consciousness does have an immediate role in those kinds of situations. The kind of state you are in determines whether you are able to be resourceful or not, are empowered or disempowered, are aware and conscious or not. That doesn’t mean you can’t also take some form of physical action. But it does mean that whatever kind of action you do or don’t take, will be from a more conscious and empowered place.
The purpose of the attacker is to reinforce a reality in which physical violence dominates.This is the kind of world he believes he can win in, because he has given up on getting what really matters to him, such as love, significance, personal empowerment, and so on. In some form he believes himself to be a loser or a victim in the real, commonly-shared world that he doesn’t control.
When an attacker does violence to another person, there is an emotional reason why he does it, which is a result of limiting decisions* he has made, such as that he is powerless or valueless or is bad. When he does this kind of act, he is immersed in a substitute, unreal world, or he couldn’t do it, because it would be against his real self. It is a world most likely of enemies, hatred, violence, and invulnerability. And because he feels powerless to fight this world internally, which is the actual source of it, he is creating symbols for it externally, and then he attacks the symbols. He is trying to impose this substitute world on whomever he attacks. It’s a state of insanity, disconnected from who he really is, and disconnected from reality.
What people are pulled into when someone physically attacks them is not the physical world. It is the non-physical distortion of reality that that person is representing, which is their substitute world. And because it is a non-physical world, you always have a choice of whether or not to participate in it.
If you have a limiting decision* that is activated by the reality the attacker is representing, then you will most likely be pulled into that world. If, however, you are firmly in your present moment experience, and not being triggered by a limiting decision*, you can’t be pulled into the world of the attacker. If you do not have a limiting decision* that is activated, you will be able to relate to the person outside of the substitute world he is trying to uphold, and outside of a state of fear and disempowerment. In that case, you would be an unlikely target in the first place.
*Limiting decision: A decision made in early childhood that is some form of that life doesn’t work, and usually that there is something inherently wrong with you — such as “I am powerless,” “bad,” “without value;” or “The world is a dangerous place,” “People can’t be trusted,” and so on.
This is a part of the “Ask Jane” Series,
in which Jane answers questions
you email to her that of concern to you.
(Names are changed to protect your privacy.)
Just go to the “Contact Jane” page
and ask your question in the contact form.
This question was from Fiona in Oceanside (Real names are never used):
Fiona: I’m always sacrificing my own welfare for the benefit of my husband and my parents, in order to make them happy. They seem to be so unhappy and have so many difficulties in their lives. And so I end up not doing what’s good for myself. I don’t know what to do about this.
Jane: You are not responsible for another person’s suffering. Each person is on their own personal path in life. And if they find themselves in the position of suffering, it’s because of an unhealed issue, a limiting decision that they made, not because of the nature of life. For instance a person might make the limiting decision that there’s not enough to go around, and as a result of having made that decision, they always find themselves in financial difficulty. The unconscious mind is invested in proving that our limiting decisions are true, which is the reason that people keep finding themselves in the same kind of life patterns over and over again, even when they know better. From what you’ve previously told me, your parents have locked themselves into a very limited and controlling way of living their lives, in which they don’t allow anything in that doesn’t fit what they are used to. And by doing this, they are holding in place their unhappiness. And then they are expecting their children to compensate for that.
This is most likely a pattern for your family that has been going on for generations, and keeps perpetrating the idea that suffering and sacrifice are necessary. It is representing a paradigm of reality that life is about suffering. And now, as an adult, you are attracting into your life similar kinds of people, so you can play the same role in relation to them. You taking on other people’s suffering, in order to relieve them of it, is reinforcing this mistaken idea. It is not helping. It’s coming from a limiting decision in you. But you coming into joy and working on your own life, and clearing these issues for yourself, and getting into a place of joy and happiness, and not taking on suffering — is representing a paradigm of reality that is helpful for all of those around you.
*Limiting decision: A decision made in early childhood that is some form of that life doesn’t work, and usually that there is something inherently wrong with you — such as “I am powerless,” “bad,” “without value;” or “The world is a dangerous place,” “People can’t be trusted,” and so on.
This is a part of the “Ask Jane” Series,
in which Jane answers questions
you email to her that of concern to you.
(Names are changed to protect your privacy.)
Just go to the “Contact Jane” page
and ask your question in the contact form.
This question is from Laura in Encinitas, in the process of her TimeLine Session with Jane:
Laura: What if in 5 years, my boyfriend decides he’s done with me? Then I’ll be single and 47. My fear is that then that will happen again, and again, and again with all of my relationships with men after that. I’ll be good enough for a while until they get sick of me.
It is similar to how my father treated my mother. My mother always put a lot of energy into looking good for him, but he never noticed her. When the family went to a restaurant together, he wouldn’t pay attention to her or to me, but his attention was, instead, on blatantly flirting with the waitress. And the message was, “he’s a man, so he can do whatever he wants to.”
Jane: The way you interpreted this, then as a child and now, has to the with limiting decisions you made, which had to do with your father having all of the power and value; and you and your mother having none and being valueless. But how you interpreted it wasn’t in reality.
Since your father was making such a big effort to make himself appear to be so important and have the power, no doubt he was compensating for a limiting decision in himself, something along the lines that he doesn’t have power and value. And so he was behaving the way he was, not for the thing itself, but for the symbolism of it. He’s trying to feel like a man, basically. And the only reason a person has to do something like that to feel like a man is when they don’t really feel like a man. He’s trying to compensate for an unhealed issue.
So it’s not about the girl that he’s flirting with. It’s not about any of it. It’s really about that there are unhealed issues in him that he’s not dealing with or doesn’t know how to. And in truth what he is doing is as painful for him on a soul level, as it is for his wife and children, because he’s essentially betraying himself. When a person does something like that, he is reinforcing the limiting decision, even though it feels to him that he’s compensating for it.
The reason it’s such a big issue for you, is because when you have a limiting decision such as men can’t be trusted, to you that’s the way men are, and you then believe you have no choice about men. And so then you’re a part of the problem, and when you clear it you’ll be a part of the solution. By the fact that you made this limiting decision, you’re holding in place that reality just as much as the man who is in the heart of the dynamics of it. Both are holding in place an untruth.
There’s a really big difference between interpreting this as this is just the nature of men, all they care about is their genitals — and realizing that that’s not what feeds this. The source of it, for those who have this unhealed issue, is a deep pain that they’re not powerful, or they’re not good enough as a man. But, instead, you saw them as having the power, which is the illusion they’re trying to present in order to compensate for feeling powerless. As soon as you realize that it’s not that they have power when they do whatever the behavior is, it’s that they feel powerless, then it puts you out of the position of feeling powerless in relation to them.
*Limiting decision: A decision made in early childhood that is some form of that life doesn’t work, and usually that there is something inherently wrong with you — such as “I am powerless,” “bad,” “without value;” or “The world is a dangerous place,” “People can’t be trusted,” and so on.
This is a part of the “Ask Jane” Series,
in which Jane answers questions
you email to her that of concern to you.
(Names are changed to protect your privacy.)
Just go to the “Contact Jane” page
and ask your question in the contact form.
This question was asked by a client of mine named Sue:
Sue told me she was feeling lonely and not happy in her relationship with her husband. She felt he spent too much time working or doing other activities he likes to do. And often when he was with her, he wasn’t really focused on her, although he was sometimes. She wanted him to spend more time with her, really focused on her, but didn’t want to stop him from doing the things he enjoys doing, and wondered what she should do.
My response: I think what you’re really wanting is intimacy. And the lack of intimacy in your life is what is resulting in you feeling lonely. The particular amount of time with your husband focusing his attention on you, is just a symbol of that for you. But you not receiving intimacy, has to do with you not having the channels open for receiving it, in other words, an inability to receive it. Intimacy can’t be gotten by controlling another person’s behavior.
This is actually an interlocking issue between you and your husband, because he also doesn’t have the channels for intimacy open. And so the solution is not to have him stop doing what he likes to do and focus his attention on you. Approaching this by trying to get him to focus more time on you is an attempt to control what can’t be controlled in reality, and it is a backwards approach to the problem. The problem is not about what each of you wants being in conflict, but it’s about your unhealed issues distorting each of your experience of reality in a way that proves your limiting decisions to be true. When people make a limiting decision, the unconscious mind gets invested in proving that it is true. That’s what causes people to keep repeating dysfunctional patterns in their lives, doing things over and over again that they know isn’t good for them, or getting into the same kind of dysfunctional type of relationship. In this case, the limiting decision, and what your unconscious is invested in proving, has to do with believing you are not lovable. And so the solution is to transform the unhealed issue.
When the limiting decisions in both of you that are closing the channels for you being able to have intimacy in relationships are cleared, than the issue of how much and in what way you spend time with each other will natural flow in a way that creates intimacy. The truth is that intimacy is something you both want, as it’s inherent in intimate relationships. When you get to the real issue, you find that what each of you wants is not actually in conflict with the other.
*Limiting decisions are decisions made usually before the age of 6 or 7 years old, that are some form of deciding that there is something inherently wrong with you, and/or some form of that life doesn’t work — Such as “I am bad,” “I am worthless,” “People can’t be trusted.”
This is a part of the “Ask Jane” Series,
in which Jane answers questions
you email to her that of concern to you.
(Names are changed to protect your privacy.)
Just go to the “Contact Jane” page
and ask your question in the contact form.
This question is from Chad in Rancho Santa Fe:
Chad: Let’s say a friend of yours has a limiting decision* that they’re stupid, and you point out something to them that they did that ends up triggering that feeling in them. Then you are suddenly affronted by the fact that the person was triggered, even though you didn’t do anything to them on purpose. So the question is what do you do when someone gets triggered by some innocent remark you made?
Jane: First of all it depends on the particular type of relationship you have with the person, how vulnerable you want to be, how much energy you want to put into it. If this person is someone with whom the relationship really matters, I would say the healthy response would be to reveal to the person how you are responding to him. Relating in general is about revealing whatever is going on inside of you in response to each other. When you get affected, that is the beginning of a dialog, and so then you respond by revealing where you are. You always can participate in a dialog, which is honestly revealing where you are. If you’re triggered and you know it, you can reveal you’re triggered.
Chad: I’d like to have the way to deal with it when it’s happening, like a script.
Jane: Having a script is not the solution. You have to reveal where you are in the moment, which is more of an emotional risk. And since it’s revealing, it’s vulnerable, as opposed to judging or attacking. You might say, for instance, “I feel upset and surprised that you had that response. I didn’t mean what I said to be a criticism. What did it mean to you?” Or you might say, “I feel really triggered by your reaction, as I thought what I said was just a neutral comment. It’s bringing up in me concerns that it’s not safe to say what’s on my mind. Why was this upsetting to you?”
It is leaning on truth to move things forward, versus leaning on mollifying the other person, or manipulating things to calm him down, and not have things get out of hand, and upsetting. And you can do that, and try to calm things down, but it won’t get anywhere. It won’t be a deepening of the relationship. It won’t evolve things forward, because it won’t be bringing anything to truth. And it’s also not respecting the other person. If it’s a relationship that matters to you, then you want to get to truth. And you start with yourself, by revealing the truth of where you are, and trusting the larger medium that you’re both under — which is what I call the larger source, or Intelligence or Truth — to bring a larger perspective beyond the individual experience, and move things forward. If you allow the larger truth to be there, it opens possibilities. It makes things clearer. Whereas you could never figure it out with limited human intelligence to manipulate the situation in order to have this and that work out. But if you put truth in there, then perhaps you or perhaps the other person might see something you never saw before, or maybe something might happen that opens things up. And it might get messy for a while, but if both of you stay in the dialog, then you’ll get to a deeper place of truth.
* Limiting decisions are unconscious decisions made in childhood that are always some form of deciding that life is not meant to work, and usually that there is something inherently wrong with you, such as: “I’m not valuable,” “I’m powerless,” “the world is a dangerous place.”
This is a part of the “Ask Jane” Series,
in which Jane answers questions
you email to her that of concern to you.
(Names are changed to protect your privacy.)
Just go to the “Contact Jane” page
and ask your question in the contact form.
From Ginger in San Marcos. (I never use people’s real names.)
Ginger: In your newsletter, you brought up self-interest and how people immersed in fundamental, repressive religious dogma, with no legitimate outlet for human desires, may act out inappropriately. I have a dear friend, who recently became very active in a church. I sent her an invitation for a new thought series and received the following preachy email. I would love to hear your perspective on how to best handle this.
“Please do not send me this kind of information. There isn’t anyone or anything that has the power to ‘connect with your soul’ other than Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior. The New Age has really gotten a hold of many. And sadly, they are deceived about the truth. I pray you would flee from these sorts of things, and find your true worth and purpose in life is for the ONE who made us. I encourage you (because I care and you are my friend) to read your bible, begin with the book of John. Only there you will hear the truth, the word of God.”
I feel attacked, judged and hurt, although I love her and want the best for her. I am feeling that this friend may have moved into a new vibration that doesn’t support the energy I want around me. It seems a shame to throw this friendship away if some clear communication can resolve it.
Jane: The energy behind your friend’s email seems to be coming from fear and anger — both in relation to what you might be representing to her that has the potential of influencing her, and also coming from limiting decisions in her that are causing her to take such a blind stand on concepts that don’t appear to be something she is really coming into her own experience with. The issue is not the content of what she is saying, but the invulnerable and separating way she is saying it. When a person is taking a ridged stand on concepts around which to orient reality that are based on a fixed source outside of themselves (usually some written document or some central charismatic leader), rather than being grounded in their own experience, there is no way to relate to them about it. Instead there is a separating wall, based on fear.
Fundamentalism is about not trusting your own experience of reality. One of the reasons people gravitate toward fundamentalism is it gives them the sense that if they join it, they can be identified with a powerful authority — in this case the word of God. So a person, for example, that has made the limiting decision that they are powerless, or they can’t trust their perception of reality, or they are inherently bad, could gravitate toward some external symbol of authority and righteousness that can’t be questioned because it is seen as the word of God. And that way they don’t have to deal with their own limiting decisions, and they don’t have to build up their own strength and personal empowerment. But instead they are building up a separation between themselves, reality, and other people. Separation leads to mistrust, and mistrust leads to fear. The unspoken demand is you have to give up your own perception of reality to their control, as an agent of the only source of truth.
There are three choices I see that you have in relation to how to respond to your friend. One is to join her in her separated place, which is inherently against anyone who doesn’t agree with her stance — which clearly is not a choice you wish to make. Another is to be at odds with her. You would only make this choice if you are not secure in your own perception of reality, because you would see her as a threat, which is how she appears to be viewing you. Or, you can relate to her beyond her defenses to where and who she really is, which she may or may not be open to.
It appears to me that your friend is in a major power-struggle to hold her perspective on reality in place. And the question is whether you are going to let that define your reality or not. She is reflecting a fearful, separating, and conflicting perception of reality, in which there is a power-struggle going on. Are you going to step into the fear and separation and power-struggle, where you and your friend are at odds with each other — or are you going to stay in a heart-connected place, and relate from there to who your friend really is?
You may be right that she has stepped out of a vibration you can relate to, but it won’t hurt to practice relating to her from your own defining of reality and see what happens.
I also suggest you upfront acknowledge that you are both coming from perspectives that are different from each other’s, to just make clear where you are. And make an agreement to not try to convince each other of your points-of-view on religion.
This is a part of the “Ask Jane” Series,
in which Jane answers questions
you email to her that of concern to you.
(Names are changed to protect your privacy.)
Just go to the “Contact Jane” page
and ask your question in the contact form.
I addressed the below question in the previous “Ask Jane.” In this “Ask Jane” I’m addressing it from a different perspective in relation to how it actually came up.
Lita: “I’m in a really great relationship with a man now, and things are going really well. But I keep feeling afraid something will go wrong, and he will end up leaving. I’m concerned because of this fear I’ll try to control things with him, that will actually cause him to leave.”
This question originally came up in Lita’s TimeLine session. And the limiting decision at the core of this question turned out to be “I’m not good enough to have the relationship I want.” The originating event was many lifetimes ago, and she was a woman in her late 30′s and she wanted this big, strong, handsome man in her village, but he wouldn’t have her, because she wasn’t pretty enough, or young enough. And she wasn’t interested in any of the other men. It just seemed that there was no one for her.
Jane (in the context of teaching during the learning part of the process): “The issue here is what is it that you really want? What you’re really wanting is the Divine. What you’re really wanting is the essence of the Universe, that may be shining through this particular person. And so it’s never an attachment to the person himself that is what you’re really wanting. It’s the heart of intimacy, the heart of love. And you can get that in a lot of different places. You’re wanting love, and love is everywhere. You find it through many, different sources, when you are a conduit for it. When you are in that vibration, you’ll naturally attract it. It’s not about having to have that man in order to be happy. When you are in that vibration it’s an allowing of what’s true, which then allows the right person to come into your life, without the pressure or weight being on him.
But when you’re coming from the limiting decision that you can’t have what you want, you are needing to grab something that you believe you can’t have, which is controlling. And inherent in it is loss. It’s coming from a place where you don’t have it, so that then is the reality you are creating. From that place you can never get it. And then whatever you can get, you don’t want.”
After the limiting decision was cleared: The way Lita then experienced her situation in that life time was that she could see good qualities in many of the men in her community, and many men were attracted to her, and it no longer seemed like an impossible situation. And so then she was open to what was really there for her.
And in terms of her present reality situation, she no longer felt that fear that her boyfriend might leave.
