Seeing, Realizing and Understanding for, as, and by Self - Day 56

For much of my life I have participated within and as a personality of "therapist" or "helper" or "person who can help others see (what they should do, how they should be, what choices they should make)." Sometimes this assertion and insertion of myself and my opinions has been requested and sought out by friends and family. Sometimes, however, it has been unsolicited. In many of the times I would see that the other person might seem to benefit from the conversation wherein I shared with them my perspective of "what they should do" (of course this perceived benefit may have merely been a projection of my ego state of being a "good helper" and "having the answers"), but nonetheless there have been many times when actual change within the person did not manifest, which is to say that they did not choose to apply my "teachings" and went about living their life as they saw fit. Also sometimes my insistence on sharing my perspective has actually become a point of conflict in relationships to where I was basically telling a person what I thought they should do without any regard for what they thought they should do and the fact that they are walking their own process and must make their own choices. So in all of this I have almost always been invested in the outcome where I have attached myself to a desired outcome in what the other person decides to do with the "assistance" I have given them.

I have become increasingly aware over the years how my approach in these instances sometimes is experienced by others as abrasive. Even in an approach of simply asking another questions which might assist them in coming to their own self-supportive conclusions, I have been told or have otherwise realized that I am often asking these questions with my own answer in mind, and thus the questions are "leading" with the expectation of the other person reaching that same conclusion, and within this I have been informed that sometimes others experience awareness of this expectation to where they sense that I have this expectation of them and feel pressured to come to that conclusion or feel like they are wrong if they do not come to that conclusion. It has also been pointed out to me that I will make this expectation all the more obvious by continuing to ask questions beyond their answer if their answer is "wrong"/not the answer I "wanted to hear." So here again it is obvious that even in the act of attempting to assist/support/help another, I have my own self-interest in mind as my starting-point as a way to feed my ego within feeling "good" about helping another and feeling "smart" for having the best answers for their problems.

I can also recall a great many times in my life when I have received advice from others, both solicited and non, and I have in fact become defensive within this advice or otherwise have not implemented it within myself.

My point here is that this exchange of advice is not always supportive, productive, or beneficial.

At one point in college I was living with two other young women, one of whom was my age ("T") and the other about 4-5 years older ("C"). At one point, I was in the process of making life decisions for T under the premise of helping her and creating friction within myself regarding my investment in T's choices or T's adherence to my set of life guidelines to where our friendship suffered not only because I was inserting and asserting my opinion but also because I was attaching myself to the specific outcome I had destined to be the one true "right" outcome rather than aligning myself with T as one and equal to where I would see and respect her as able to make her own decisions and walk her own process for herself and not for me. It was all very self-centered, among other things, such as interactions with my ego and pride and multiple personalities I have created for myself.

At one point, C pointed out to me that T needed to see, realize, and understand for herself (not these exact words of course), that I cannot direct T according to my will. This serves here as an example of advice that I received and rejected because I was so insistent on not only having and providing but in fact BEing T's answer/solution. And now I see why I received and rejected: I, too, needed to see, realize, and understand for myself that every individual needs to see, realize, and understand for themselves. C had the "wisdom" of having already seen, realized, and understood this for herself. Here she was trying to bestow this lesson upon me by sharing her perspective (and only sharing it once), but when she saw that I rejected it and continued to insert/assert myself to the detriment of my relationship with T, she continued to embrace me and T as equal as life forms who have not yet seen, realized, and understood for ourselves various aspects of our processes. She let us make mistakes so that we could see, realize, and understand for ourselves, and she loved us unconditionally.

The strategy which C utilized here to assist and support me in my relationship with T is one that I have attempted to use to varying degrees of success and about which I have decided upon a useful metaphor, which is to lay information on a table and let the other person pick it up rather than forcing it upon them, forcing it into their hands, at which point it is much more likely they will reject it / react to it. "Laying it on the table" allows the other person to see it and consider it and either leave it or take it, and also to come back to it later to pick it up for, as, and by themselves, while decreasing the likelihood that they will go into a reaction about it or engage within and as their pride/ego to the reception of guidance. It also safeguards against the fact that not every solution is best for every person or situation, and that the person giving suggestions does not know the entirety of the situation and thus cannot always offer the best advice. And within this metaphor and within my pattern of investing myself in the outcome of my assistance of others, it is then imperative that I remain unattached to whether or not the other person "picks up" what I have "laid down" such that I am merely sharing my perspective, "take it or leave it." So it leaves it up to the individual to take responsibility for themselves while still assisting them with perspective. Generally speaking this seems like a very effective way to communicate any kind of differing perspectives which could turn into conflict/debate/argument, since the only person who can change one's mind is oneself.

It is through my own process and also now reflecting upon the example that C set (laid on the table) that I am able to see, realize, and understand now for myself that every individual must see, realize, and understand for themselves and direct themselves to change themselves for, as, and by themselves.



I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to take on a role/personality of "ultimate helper" and "knower" and "seer" when others experience "problems" that I believe I can answer.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to help others from the starting point of my ego and self-interest.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to participate within and as an egotistical energy when and as I am helping/assisting/supporting others.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to, when I see myself helping another through advice-giving, hear what I am saying, "like" it, and then actually just like the sound of my own voice continuing to help this person, within and as the thought "yeah! I'm so smart! I'm so great for helping this person!"

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to invest myself in and attach myself to the outcome of my assistance/support of another to where I project expectations of what that outcome should look like within what the other person decides to do in response/reaction to my help.

I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to see, realize, and understand that other people must see, realize, and understand for themselves and make decisions about their lives for themselves and face consequences for themselves.

I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to see, realize, and understand that I must see, realize, and understand for myself and make decisions for myself and face consequences for myself.

I forgive myself for accepting and allowing myself to participate in the destruction/demise of friendships because I am so attached to my ego and the outcome of the advice that I give to others, where I want to possess/control others through and as my self-interested egotistical desire to be right and to have the answer.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to assist/support others from and as the starting-point of my self-interest and ego and that within this I have not accepted or allowed myself to align myself with another as one as equal as life and so within this I have not accepted or allowed myself to align myself with what is best for all and align my advice/support/assistance/help with what is best for all.

I forgive myself that I have not accepted and allowed myself to give "advice," support/assistance/help as a suggestion but instead have given it as a command.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to, within and as my self-interest and ego, create a presentation of myself which is "abrasive" even as I am attempting to "assist," "support" and "help" another.

I forgive myself that I have accepted and allowed myself to believe that I know the answer to another's problems and that from this even when I ask questions in an attempt to allow another to draw their own conclusions, I am asking "leading questions" with the expectation of the other person arriving at the same answer I have.

I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to assist/support/help/advise another from the starting point of self-honesty within and as what is best for all.

Perhaps all of this is relevant to and as why I have a tendency to become so defensive/self-protective when I receive support in the form of a differing perspective of what I should do?

I forgive myself that I have not accepted or allowed myself to hear and receive another's support/assistance/help/advice/perspective from the starting point of self-honesty as what is best for all and instead have reacted within and as my ego/self-interest/self-preservation.


When and as I see myself in the position of providing support/assistance/help/advice/perspective to another person, I stop and I breathe. I have a look at myself and who I am within this moment. Am I being self-honest? Am I aligning myself as one as equal as life with this other being? Am I respecting this other being as one as equal as life? Is my approach here what is best for all? I realize that if I am participating within and as my ego and self-interest while attempting to support another, then I am supporting no one. I commit myself to being considerate of all of this and of the other person as one as equal as life and to align myself within and as what I am able to share with another to assist and support another from the starting point of self-honesty and what is best for all.