Joshua,

I’ve been chewing on your answer all day, and it finally just clicked. I was feeling stuck on the last paragraph, specifically on figuring out how my perception of the words “honorable” and “favorable” (and the perceived implication that I was acting in a “dishonorable” and “unfavorable” way) was right.

It seems so simple now that I’m giggling at myself for making it out to be way more complicated than it is. My perception was right because all perceptions are right, because there is no wrong anywhere in the universe. Therefore, it doesn’t matter whether I am honorable or dishonorable or favorable or unfavorable because those are all simply constructs of my persona and have nothing at all to do with who I really am, which is a being of pure positive love.

I am worthy because I exist. I can stop worrying whether or not anyone perceives me as “good”, because it’s all good, even the “bad”. It doesn’t matter how anyone else perceives me, because it’s really only how I believe they perceive me, and that perception is simply a mirror showing me how I’m seeing myself.

Does that sound about right? I can feel the relief, so I guess that’s a rhetorical question 🙂

Is there anything else for me to get out of this? Or is it time to serve up a couple fluff questions so my brain can have some time to recover?

With love and gratitude,
Kyla

Dear Kyla,

That is exactly right. Since it is impossible to know how anyone perceives you, what you are really doing when you believe that someone is judging you is creating your own perception of their perception. Your perception of their perception is not true. It is formed from a point of reference that does not truly exist. You think that someone is thinking something about you. You can’t know. Even if you could know, it wouldn’t be accurate because the other person can’t know you and so their perception is based on their perception of themselves.

For instance, you see someone look at you as you walk down the street. You automatically assume that they are thinking about you and you try to imagine what they are thinking. The thoughts you attract are brought to you as a result of the Law of Attraction. If you are in a good mood and you feel good about yourself, the thoughts you attract from that emotional state of being would be in line with how you are feeling. You might believe that they think you are attractive, young, confident, stylish, etc. You can’t know what they are thinking or event if they are thinking about you. Everything is fabricated by you and it will always depend on how you feel about yourself.

If you are walking down the street and you are feeling attractive, you will notice attractive men looking at you and you will attract thoughts that perfectly align with how you are feeling about yourself. If you are not feeling good about yourself, you will attract unattractive people looking at you and you will receive thoughts that align with your lower emotional state of being. In reality, no one is ever thinking about you, they just see this woman and they make up their own stories. The woman they see is a figment of their imagination.

Now, if we can move a little deeper, you do the same thing with your friends, family, and other relationships. You see them looking at your situation and they may say things to you. You will interpret their words based on your emotional state at the time and your belief about what they think of you. If your mother says something negative to you and you feel negative emotion, you are seeing it from a perspective that is not aligned with who you are, what you want, or how your inner self hears that same comment. So then, your belief about the comment is false because you judged the comment as wrong. You felt fear when the comment was spoken and that is your indication that you are viewing it as wrong. It cannot be wrong if it was said in your presence.

Now, listen to the comment again from a perspective that the comment is right. How is it right? It is right because you have a belief that needs to be adjusted and the comment is there to help you adjust your beliefs. If the comment was not attributable to you, if it had no resemblance to you, if it did not resonate with you, if you did not believe that it might be true in some way, you could not feel fear.

If you mother said that you were a bad mother and that your children would be better off with their father, you would feel fear and you would call that statement wrong and your mother wrong as well for saying it. If she said that you were a bad ballerina, you would not care because you aren’t a ballerina and the statement brings up no fear. You do not consider the statement to be wrong and so you have no limiting belief in that area.

If the statement hurts, then it is right for you to hear it and for the other person to say it. It is necessary. Now, you can look at the statement and realize that it causes fear only because your ego is trying to protect your persona. The persona is false and in this area, you must reexamine your beliefs tied to this false aspect of your persona. These beliefs are limiting.

If you believed that it was wrong to take the Craigslist job, you would have missed a vital step on the path toward what it is you really want. Your judgment that your inspiration was wrong caused you to reframe the experience in a way that made you feel comfortable about it. You wanted the money to pay for these sessions so that allowed you to overcome your own self-judgment. However, there was some lingering judgment of your own morality and so you felt some trepidation about allowing the question to be used on the radio show.

When Janine made a statement criticizing your action, you felt a little negative emotion. The emotion was considerably milder than it would have been in past times. This is due to your ability to see things from a higher perspective and because you have made peace with your decision by looking at it from a higher perspective as well. However, you still felt some negative emotion and felt a little fear. This fear came from your concern about how others perceive you (your persona) and it is highly limiting.

Janine said something that no one else was prepared to say and for that you must thank her. Now if you can listen again to her exact words, you can identify the limiting belief that gave rise to your negative emotion. Your ability to choose to look at this from a higher perspective alleviated the intensity of the negative emotion you experienced. However, there is still a strong limiting belief in this area (the belief that other people’s opinions matter, how you are perceived by others, and your desire to be seen as a good person) and by taking a look at the exact words she used, you might uncover something very useful.

Do not shy away from criticism. All criticism is self-criticism. You are always your own worst critic. Listen to their words, realize that they are right, find out why you believe their words are wrong, identify the limiting belief and the fear, change your perspective and alter your beliefs, and then move on. If you can get good at doing this, you can create anything you want because you will become a master allower.

Joshua