To Do The Work, or Not To Do The Work...

I’ve come to believe there are two kinds of people (is this idea a trite cliche yet, or can I make just one last comparison before we retire the tired old term?).
No, but really....

I’m lying in my bed thinking about the kinds of comments people are writing on my posts (thank you) and the kinds of things I’ve been reading from other #215800-ers (are we going to get t-shirts made?), the kind of changes we’ve made possible for ourselves and one-another.

From here I can’t tell whether it’s true of all the participants or just the ones who have popped into my little world, the ever-expanding circles I run in in this extravagant experiment - but from all my experience can tell me, this is a group of people dedicated to self-growth. To getting down and dirty and vulnerable and doing the needful.  To doing the work. 

The other kind of people, are not.  They either are not interested in doing their inner work, would rather be entertained/fed/numbed/stimulated/what-else-have-you-got than to buck up and do a little psychic housecleaning, or don't believe they have any work to do.
And to a certain degree, they are the reason the rest of us have so much work to do.

Is this laying the responsibility for our difficulties at another’s feet?  Saying, “I would not have this struggle if not for you”?.  To some extent I suppose it is. On the other hand, if we could say such a thing and get a cooperative response, we would know that the person is in the “do the work” camp and could be trusted to take their share of responsibility in the healing endeavor that is “the work”.

Way back when I was in massage school I received instruction in the art of Lomilomi massage.  This is a sacred Hawaiian form of bodywork traditionally taught by kahunas.  We delved deeply into the spiritual traditions that inform Hawaiian healing arts, which revolve around the assumption that everyone is doing their own work diligently, and that problems come when we cease to do so. In a world where hurricanes and tsunamis are considered Nature's response to neglect of inner work on someone’s part, there is a lot of personal responsibility going down.

We were taught that forgiveness in the ancient Hawaiian tradition is not unconditional. That's right,
Not. Unconditional.

This notion went against everything I believed at the time: we forgive despite all the ranting and thrashing from our injured selves that we should not let the bastard off the hook, in order to transcend the injustice and take “the higher road”, I thought.  Or, I thought that the act of forgiveness releases the healing energy pent up behind the plug that would go “pop” when forgiveness took place (and was not really for the other person anyway, but merely an exercise to relieve my own blockages). 

But here was this idea (a very old idea, from a culture that grew out of peaceful intentions) that forgiveness could be offered with a contingency clause. 

Once I grasped the concept, it made sense on a level that vibrates in all the knowing centers of the body:  When a person is wronged, they are expected to express it to the wrongdoer, who is then expected to seek forgiveness.  The person wronged must decide what penance will be sufficient to restore balance. The penance must be appropriate in content and magnitude to the injustice. Only when the penance is completed does the forgiveness actually take place.  It’s like a system of absolution mediated by the inner knowing of the people involved. 

Now my old notion of forgiveness as an exercise in transcendence was revealed to be nothing more than an elaborate ruse to keep from having to do the confrontational part of the work: the “you did this to me” part.  And why the avoidance?

Because this is not ancient Hawaii, where holding people accountable was de riguere; here and now it is very nearly the highest form of social inpropriety to call someone on their shit. There is no social expectation that people will take responsibility for their actions or the impact those actions have on others. In fact, such a confrontation would serve only to cause the other party to trot out their display of denial, violence, and mindtwisting head games... whatever’s in the bag of tricks that keeps them from digging down into their own neglected work. 

The “don’t do the work” camp are often in denial that anything needs doing- none of it is their responsibility, nobody has the right to judge their choices (regardless of the impact on others), those who are upset with them are just hysterical or uptight or not to be taken seriously.  My therapist quotes M. Scott Peck in A Road Less Traveled and says these people have “disorders of character”. 

At times it seems these Disordered Characters who make up the "avoid the work" camp are in the majority, leaving the rest of us baffled, embittered and bemused...
...and yet strangely empowered.

When we commit to our own inner work, we are taking some of our power back from those to whom we’ve given it in the past.  Has it ever occurred to us that most of the power they hold over us was taken, borrowed, or stolen from us in a moment when we were blinded by fear - that it is in fact our OWN POWER in whose shadow we’ve cowered all this time?

What I’ve learned is that we can unplug our circuitry from theirs, directing our own power back in the direction that serves us.  In effect, we stop feeding the dragon.

This is not to say we play the denial game or the turn-away-from-it-and-it’s-no-longer-true game (no, no... no one ever wins that one).  It’s to say that while it  may not be necessary (or even possible) to confront the people responsible for the work we’ve got in our respective baskets of woe, we can start by recognizing that we are already ahead of the game because our willingness and determination to do the work surpasses their refusal to participate. 

To borrow from an encapsulated summary of the Road Less Traveled by Newton Fortuin:

    “For the entirety of our lives we must continually assess and reassess where our  responsibilities lie in the ever-changing course of events. Nor is this assessment and reassessment painless... we must posses a willingness and the capacity to suffer continual self-examination.
    This capacity or willingness is not inherent in any of us...”

In other words, the capacity and willingness to do the work does not come pre-packaged.  Each of us in the “do the work” camp has had to develop these virtues on our own, often in the dark and in spite of abject terror and real harm coming down on us.  These have become our greatest assets, opening us to experiences, lessons, and even people that are simply not available to those who can’t/won’t/don’t-think-they-should-have-to go there.

The experiences, lessons, and people we’ve encountered in the last however many days it’s been since #215800 was launched are the gifts bestowed because we have fostered the willingness and the capacity to grow.  As we continue, may we unplug the energy we’ve been channeling to our demons and use it to nurture the delicious, outrageously fabulous beings we are on our way to becoming.

Gotta sign off now- going to see Karate Kid for Independence Day.  Ciao Lovelies...