You are in the Wrong Meeting Room

Most people are in a “reaction state”.

Now, most people, as they travel through life, are in a reactionary mode. They are influenced by the current. When the current picks up, if they haven’t decided to do anything else, they will go with the current wherever it may take them. The bottom line is that the world, the universe, and all of its systems of energy and matter, influence them and they react to this.

The way in which they react, if they’ve not decided to react in a different way, is based upon their subconscious habits. The program that’s been written into them through repetition, strong emotional anchoring, etc. More often than not, you react because of the way some authority figure programmed you to react.

Example: 

A young boy growing up has a deeply emotional experience. He creates a picture for his father that says, “I luv u.” The father, who might ordinarily be incredibly touched by this gesture, is having a bad day. His day at work has been tough, his boss has ridden him hard, belittled him, and actually called him a ‘moron’ in front of his colleagues. He’s now in his home office, trying to catch up on the work that he was reprimanded for doing incorrectly earlier that day. He keeps thinking about the instance, and reacting to it by becoming angrier, embarrassed and ashamed. 

When his son presents the picture to him, he’s not in the right state to receive it. Subsequently, the father does to his son what was done to him that day: “What are you, an idiot? Can’t you spell? You’re too old to make mistakes like that!”

That child grows up and gets a similar job to the one his father had. Matter of fact, he went into that line of work because he wanted to please his dad and make him proud. But, one day, he makes a mistake. 

He spends hours on a project with incorrect information and botches the whole thing. The company loses several thousand dollars, and now it’s his turn for a talk with the boss in front of colleagues. “What are you an idiot? Can’t you do anything right?”

Even if the words hadn’t been nearly identical to the words spoken to his father, the result would have been the same. This child would have grown up with that program in his head thanks to the emotions attached to his experience with the love letter. He was trying to do something nice. He had worked a while on it. He brought it to his dad, and was completely rejected. This is deeply injuring, and will stay with someone for life if it’s not properly resolved. In this case, it wasn’t. 

So, why did that happen? What’s the answer? Why so frequently do mothers who believe themselves to be unlovable grow up with daughters who feel they are unlovable? Why do fathers who believe themselves to be inadequate give their sons the message that they, too, are inadequate? It’s the biggest injury of their lives! Why would they create that same scenario in their children?

The reason is that the parent is reacting to the data being given them in a way that was programmed earlier in their life. They haven’t decided to react in any way different to the way they’d been programmed, and even if they had, they’d done nothing to ensure that they would react differently. Therefore, the way the world interacts with these people is to give them more reasons to believe whatever they believe in the first place. Guilty. Stupid. Anxious. Depressed. Angry. Poor. Whatever.

How does this happen? Your energy has a scheduled meeting with the energy of the universe. Your state, i.e. whatever you currently believe you should be getting in your life, dictates what sign is hung on the door. This determines what the meeting is going to be about. So, if you’re in an anxious and depressed state, that state hangs a sign on the door indicating that this is a meeting about Anxiety & Depression. Please only bring me evidence for why I should be anxious and depressed, thus confirming what I believe in the first place.

Kind of like when you stub your toe. Bang! 

“Ouch! It hurts! My toe hurts. My toe hurts. I banged my toe. Banged it good!” 

Bang! Again. 

“Ouch! It hurts! I banged it again! I can’t believe it!” 

(But, really you roll your eyes at yourself because you, me and everyone else reading this knows that the toe you stub is the toe you just stubbed.)

It seems like a vicious cycle, and it is. How do you get out of it? You decide that you’re going to attend a different meeting. The world you create is the world you choose to create. If you do not make a choice, the choice is made on your behalf by your default programming. 

Everyone makes such a big deal about the subconscious and how powerful it is. Yes, that’s true! However, we’re the only being on Earth that allows for conscious thought to the extent that we have it. We have the ability to override our instincts. The greatest of these instincts is the drive to procreate. We can go in and have tubes tied and things snipped and decide we’re not going to have children. That’s a choice you make which completely counters instinct.

So, how do you stop attending your current undesirable meeting? Make a choice. Decide what it is that you truly want in your life. (Keep asking yourself, “Why do I want this?” Until you finally get down to what it is you actually want.) Once you know what you want, you can decide the meeting you want to attend. For me? I want to be Happy, Healthy & Wealthy. I have therefore decided that it doesn’t matter what the data I receive is (because the data is neutral) it means that I am Happy, Healthy & Wealthy.

When the current changes, even though I want to go upstream, the data I receive doesn’t mean I’ll never get there. It means I must have some strengthening to do with my swimming skills. I have chosen to believe that about the data I receive. That is my state. So, my state therefore hangs a sign on the door that says, “Happy, Healthy & Wealthy Meeting.” Please do not bring anything to this meeting that doesn’t link up with that.

Now, here’s the deal. If you’ve been on autopilot all your life attending crappy meetings, it doesn’t matter if you decide to attend a different one. Your autopilot (i.e. “body mind” or “subconscious” or “unconscious”) will take over and walk you to the meeting you’ve been going to all along. That’s why if, on your way to work, you need to pick up someone out of the way and out of the ordinary, if you’re not paying attention and choosing where you want to go, you’ll end up taking the same ol’ way to work because you’re running on autopilot.

What is absolutely necessary is to continue to choose where you want to go, how you want to react, and the meeting you want to attend, over and over until it overrides your old habit and becomes the new default. 

But, hear this! Just because you might bugger up a couple times in the first few weeks and go to the wrong, crappy Anxious & Depressed or Angry & Rage or Poor & Lonely meeting, that doesn’t mean that as soon as you realize it you can’t say, “Oh, dang! I’m in the wrong meeting!” 

You can! Pick up your energy, and go! Go to the new meeting of what you want. Decide that the exact same data you received (which is neutral in nature) actually means you get what you decide you want. Your new interpretation of the data will therefore cause you to react differently to it, giving you a much different result, more in line with your choice.

Want an example? Here’s one.

I’m an email marketer by trade. (So, if you’re not on my list, really what’s wrong with you? Better question… What’s wrong with ME? 😬) I was working with a client on their email campaigns, really getting involved and getting my hands dirty. This is how I prefer to work in the first stages of our relationship. Hands = filthy.

That means I was writing their emails, personally. I took what they had, I added my own flair and produced what I certainly thought, and what others on the team thought, to be emails that were worlds better than what was before.

Until one day, I got negative feedback. This organization is a religious one and some Huffy Puff complained to customer service that the email was blasphemous! I was appalled, shamed, horrified. I was aghast that this guy interpreted my email that way. Because, it’s not like I’m a novice to religion. I don’t just take on a client that I don’t share values with. I believe what my client preaches! So for me to be accused of blasphemy to their customer support team was really… horrible.

I felt totally embarrassed, and like the people who hired me were all of a sudden going to get second thoughts. I figured they were talking about me at that very moment. Discussing how they were going to rid themselves of this blasphemous email marketer who had so besmirched their sparkling reputation. 😞

I only found out about the complaint because the support rep wanted to know how they should answer him. So, I did what any other big boy or big girl does when faced with criticism… I took it. I looked at it. I considered it. Then I answered the email in, what I feel is, perfect fashion.

I explained the true intention of the email. But, I also apologized for his misinterpretation of it and took ownership for allowing that to happen. In the end, I validated his feelings, explained my own position, and smoothed things over.

But… I was still beat up over it. When I sat down next to eat with my family, it was still on my mind. I was really irritated that this guy had made me look bad to my clients. People that I counted as friends and respected a great deal.

My clever wife said, “Who would you be without that thought?”

“Without what thought?” I asked.

“Without the thought that he’d made you look bad. Turn it completely around. How can you make the opposite true?”

🤔 “Hmmm… Okay, this guy didn’t make me look bad…?”

She smiled, “Maybe he made you look great? Didn’t you write an epic response? Didn’t you CC everyone important at the company? Wouldn’t they have seen how you totally defused the situation?”

Lightbulb moment. She just asked me to take the same neutral data, and my energy, and leave the Looks Bad to Clients meeting room, and go to the Looks Great to Clients room.

“Yeah! But! You don’t actually know if that’s true!” I can hear you screaming internally.

No, I don’t know if it’s a fact. I never actually found out one way or another how the client felt about it. They never mentioned it. Therefore, both scenarios are equally true and untrue, along with any others I wish to come up with and choose to believe.

Get that: CHOOSE TO BELIEVE. 

This is so insanely important. If you can get this, you will change your own life. The more you practice, the easier it gets. The easier it gets, the more you get what you want. The more you get what you want, the better your life is.

All of this serves to then confirm your choice which is the new default.

Congratulations.

Quick Caveat

What if I eventually find out that my clients were really disappointed by that experience, and they in the future were to use it as an example of why I need to be let go?

What if? Until then, I’ll choose to believe what I currently believe – that the experience made me look fantastic to them because… I may as well, right? I have to believe something about the situation. It may as well be something that boosts me up and improves my life and work.

But, if I eventually do find out that they were disappointed, I’m faced with a decision once again of what to believe about the raw, unbiased data.

If I’m fired, I can say, “Wow. I really was out of line. That’s why I lost that client. I now need to limit myself, and really censor myself. Shaaaaaame!”

I can say that and I can choose to believe it.

Or, I can choose to believe something like this:

“Yes, I wrote an email that bent someone out of shape and for the clients, that was simply too far. We parted company. But, what that means is that they weren’t right for me. Because, I want to work with people who love me, not just tolerate me. I want to work with people who don’t even want to proof my emails because they trust me. Anyone who doesn’t fit that description is actually better off being shuffled out of my life.”

Both options are equally valid, and they both acknowledge the fact. But they employ very different meanings, and it’s the meaning that affects my life.

I’ll choose the latter.

“What’s this got to do with my marriage?”

There is so much miscommunication and misunderstanding that takes place in marriages.

Why? To both issues (miscommunication and misunderstanding) the answer is the same one I’ve already described: 

The way in which you react, if you’ve not decided to react in a different way, is based upon your subconscious habits. The program that’s been written into you through repetition, strong emotional anchoring, etc. More often than not, you react because of the way some authority figure programmed you to react.

This is true for both sides of the miscommunication/misunderstanding equation. Maybe a husband has a strong emotional anchor from long ago. He was raised by a single mother. His father left because she was “too fat” and “wasn’t attractive anymore”.

To him as the child experiencing his mother’s rejection ultimately meant his rejection. He was rejected by his father because [according to his father] his mother was “too fat and wasn’t attractive anymore”.

This imprinted several things:

• You can be rejected for the way you look.
• Thinner is better.
• Attractiveness expires.

So, now this guy is in his mid-50s, still married to his first wife who’s also around that age. He’s obsessive about his weight. He even went vegan to stay in tip-top condition and does power yoga five times a week. His bakasana (crow pose) is amazing, but his marriage sure isn’t.

His wife got out of shape long ago – at least according to him. All he sees is her “messy belly” and “overgrown” crotch, and this Bozo 🤡 has the brains to mention it to her.

He miscommunicates.

Oh, don’t get it wrong. He’s very direct. He tells her that she “could still be attractive” if she could only “lose a few pounds” or “clean herself up a bit.” But he still miscommunicates.

Because what he’s trying to say is, “I’m scared because the primary woman in my life isn’t up to my father’s standards. Because my mother looked about like you when he left. And even though I didn’t think she looked bad at all, he did. And I’m still hurting from that. And even though it doesn’t make sense – because I haven’t seen my dad since I was a kid – and even though he can’t reject me again, and it’s not fair, I’m bringing this to you. Mostly, because I’m hurt from that, and I don’t want to hurt or worry about it anymore.”

He miscommunicates – and she misunderstands.

This doesn’t make his stupid words to her any smarter, but it explains a bit. He’s got a lot of work to do. He needs to go back in time and change what things mean. (It’s possible.) He’s got to take off his father’s glasses and see his wife as she is – completely independent from the situation that hurt him and in no way responsible for it.

Until he does, he’ll react to his trauma and miscommunicate, and she’ll react to that miscommunication with misunderstanding and lash out, whether to him or to herself. Heaven help him if she turns her aggression inward and doesn’t actually call him on his crap. Because when your wife gives up on you (or makes your trauma her problem) you may as well call it quits. (I go into this much more in detail in other blogs and in upcoming courses.)

That’s what it has to do with your marriage.

What are you miscommunicating about? What are you misunderstanding? Until you ask, you won’t be able to fix it and move past your trauma and into the marriage you actually want.