Stop Resisting Your Resistance
Last weekend I was serendipitously in New York City the same weekend as the New York City Marathon. Since I’m a wanna-be runner who was sidelined with knee injuries, I look with awe and amazement at these athletes who are so dedicated, disciplined, and committed to training and running this race. I love to engage them in conversation and hear their stories. One first-time marathoner I met explained to me that running this marathon had been on her “bucket list” for years, but year after year something had always come up that prevented her from doing it. She said that after Hurricane Sandy, the resulting cancellation of the 2012 New York City Marathon and the tragedy of the Boston Marathon bombing, she knew she could no longer put off pursuing this dream.
We’ve heard this same sense of urgency in our own circles. After Debbie Ford passed, we heard from many people who always meant to attend one of her live events or enroll in her trainings. We heard from people who always wanted to come to The Shadow Process but, for some reason or another, had not gotten around it to it. Grateful that Debbie’s work was continuing and not wanting to take another moment for granted, they signed up immediately, knowing that they could no longer procrastinate when it came to fulfilling their internal commitments and following their inner voice.
Recently, one of my students in the Breakthrough Shadow Coaching Training Program asked me a very powerful question. The student knew that there was a goal on my “bucket list” that I had yet to achieve. So he asked me, “What is stopping you?” Of course all of my very justifiable excuses came up first. I was busy working. I was moving. I had to take care of my family. I didn’t have the time. But as I pondered his question more deeply, I realized how truly lame my initial responses and excuses were. When I looked at what was underneath those excuses, I discovered that I had tremendous fear — fear of trying and failing, fear of not being good enough, and fear of what my life would look like if I did succeed. My procrastination, excuses, and justifications were all forms of resistance and underneath my resistance was fear.
As human beings, we are “resistance-generating machines.” It’s one of the things we do best. We resist because we don’t want to face a situation where we feel fear, shame, or some other uncomfortable emotion. We also resist because we don’t want others to find out what we fear most — that we are not good enough, not smart enough, or not talented enough. Yet as Debbie explains in Spiritual Divorce, it is not the situation that we are resisting that causes us the pain but the resistance itself. Resistance is the glue that keeps the pain permanently in place since “what you can’t be with won’t let you be.”
Most people try to get rid of their resistance. They do this by denying, avoiding, or promising themselves that tomorrow they will wake up and take care of whatever the situation is. But ultimately what you resist persists, tomorrow comes and goes, and the situation still remains unresolved.
At The Ford Institute, we teach people that no matter how hard you try to get rid of an unwanted emotion, situation, or circumstance, whether you eat over it, drink over it, shop over it, exercise over it, or work over it, it will always keep coming back. But if you look at your resistance as your friend, your perception will shift. You will realize that all the unwanted circumstances and emotions are here to teach you, motivate you, and help you unconceal and bust through your old belief system.
For me, I always get excited when I realize that I am in resistance and that there is some fear running my life. Then I can really look at the fear and see what I have to do to take responsibility for that area of my life so that I can pursue my dreams and achieve all of the items on my “bucket list.”
If you want to have a breakthrough in any area of your life, I invite you to stop resisting your resistance! Once you surrender and go into the feelings or discomfort, the glue will soften and you will more easily be able to receive whatever message or wisdom is there to be extracted from the situation.
Transformational Action Steps
1) Find a comfortable, quiet place and bring your journal and a pen.
2) Identify a situation, circumstance or event that you are resisting, avoiding, or have a list of excuses why you have not yet accomplished it.
3) Allow yourself to go deeper and journal about what that fear is under your resistance.
4) Ask yourself what you would need to know or what belief you would need to let go of to transform that fear.
5) Journal about what would be possible if you accomplished the situation you are avoiding.
6) Take an action or put a practice in place that will support you in taking a step in transforming your fear and achieving this goal.
With love,
Kelley
