(Client’s name is change to protect her privacy.)

(Lita was describing an interaction in which several of her girl friends had views about how she is living her life that bumped up against how Lita sees it, and didn’t feel good to her.  She felt judged by them.  Lita is asking who’s to say who’s truth is better?  Lita is also dealing with trust issues.)

“It’s not a matter of this person thinks this and the other thinks that, and that’s her point-of-view,  that’s her truth — from which then follows the question of:  ‘Who is to say which person’s truth is better?’

Each person comes from their own perspective, which adds richness to the truth of the whole situation.  So different people’s perspectives are a wonderful gift.  But people’s limiting decisions* cause them to be afraid of what is really true in reality, and so they develop emotional defense systems in order to control how reality is perceived in the areas of their limiting decisions*.  But blocking present moment truth also blocks a person’s real contribution.  Therefore people’s defense systems end up covering over the individual richness that people could be adding.  So it only becomes a matter of whose truth is better when there’s an avoidance of truth.  Otherwise each person’s perspective would add to a greater understanding of what is true.

The reason the issue of judgment comes up for you has to do with who is going to define reality.  You seem to think that people can define reality and make it so. So whatever they say, then becomes the reality for you, which you then struggle against.

Because you are letting other people define reality for you, the issue of if they are or aren’t trustable becomes vital, because now you’re depending on how they define reality for you. And so if they fail or are not perfect in some way, that becomes dangerous for you. By letting someone else define reality for you, you are giving them the power over your experience of reality.  So the limiting decision that people can’t be trusted easily follows from that because you’re expecting others to basically take on the responsibility of God, which no one can live up to.”

* For a definition of limiting decisions, click here.

(To Fiona) “… What you’re talking about is a structure of reality in you that is not in alignment with truth. It’s your particular structure that you’ve built based on limiting decisions about what it means to be a soft, loving person. It has to do with you not realizing that being truly loving, which is your nature, is an open channel, which goes both ways. It’s giving and receiving, the channel is open so you can receive what you need. You’re not seeing it that way, but that’s the truth of it. You’ve got structures formed that don’t allow that to happen. But the truth in reality is that’s the way it works. So when little pieces of that loving you show, it elicits a loving response from other people. It creates an open channel. But because of your internal structure, you don’t trust it.

The reason that you get taken advantage of is because you’re not consciously present in the situations in which trust is an issue. If you were present it would be obvious to you what you could trust and what you could not trust. You can be a trusting person without stepping into the middle of the street with a car coming toward you. And if you decided to not step in front of a car, you wouldn’t think, ‘Oh, I’m really bad because I didn’t trust that car to not hit me.’ But apparently you have a judgment against yourself if you don’t unquestioningly put yourself totally in the hands of others. You must feel as though you have to make yourself overly vulnerable, for some reason. You seem to think there is a conflict between seeing things as they are, and being trusting and optimistic and positive. It’s not about negatively judging other people. It’s not about being judgmental at all. People have defense systems. That doesn’t mean that that’s who they are. And so you can choose not to walk into a situation that’s dysfunctional without judging the person as being a bad person. There are a bunch of issues mixed up in there that are confusing you. One thing does not mean the other thing. It’s perfectly possible to be a completely positive and loving person, and not walk in front of a moving car. I think there is something that really is important to you, underneath this that you think you have to give up in order to have boundaries. And it’s not true. I promise you it’s not true. There’s an unhealed issue in there that is causing you to think that. It’s like you’re trying to hold in place a particular principle, by doing this. I promise it’s possible to hold the principle in place without harming yourself, and without being amorphous and lacking boundaries. You are basically inviting people to take advantage of you.”