We live in a world that centers itself on a survival mind where we are conditioned to feel separate. The idea that your gain is my loss and my gain is your loss divides us, as if we are living in this imaginary world made of points and the one with the most points wins. What really are the points? And do they all mean the same thing to each of us? In school, we were conditioned to operate from gold stars or brownie points. Let’s just note for a moment that the point system is totally made up AND trains us to look for okay-ness and validation outside of ourselves. If we break down the pattern of the points then what does that really look like? Who really is keeping score?
It’s all a game of the mind, made up just like the majority of our thoughts. Did you know that science has shown that we have close to 60,000 thoughts a day? As we are stuck in the play of points, stuck in thought and the best way to “win” in the system, we can lose the sense of connection to the truth that we are part of something much bigger than ourselves. We can get lost in the illusion of the vastness of me-ness, mine, me and dare I say it, individuality. The point system feeds these fear-based neural patterns as well as the sense of needing to protect ourselves and our belongings.
Science shows that energy flows where attention goes and as we build this pattern over and over again, we may begin to survey our environment as if it is full of threats, experiencing fear becoming the primary emotion, feeling, default state and reactionary pattern. When we do this everything else is perceived as outside of ourselves and is treated as the other. This creates an environment where we live in a jungle of competition operating from survival of the fittest. When we do this—we alienate, isolate and separate ourselves—which keeps us feeling separate from a sense of greater wholeness and flow. We suffer in our separateness because we fear the other and miss the other and, at the same time, miss ourselves and our vital connection—our true home that is part of everything. Living in a cycle of fear, we experience more anxiety, depression, and loneliness and can long for more connection.
How do we drop the points system to awaken from fear and move into love?
One place to start is to let go of any idea of points and begin to shift your thoughts. By practicing new thinking and behavior patterns we then begin to wire our minds with intention to shift into love over fear. As we shift out of fear, we are working on our emotional intelligence. Emotional intelligence or emotional quotient (EQ) is the ability to manage our emotions and understand others emotions around us. As we understand our emotional states, patterns and regulate our emotions we can grow patterns for more love, peace and joy.
What is the path for growing our emotional awareness and heart wisdom?
The first step is self-awareness, our ability to know our emotions, strengths, weaknesses, motivators, and values. This aids us in understanding how our actions and behaviors affect others.
Next is self-regulation, or our ability to fluidly adjust our behaviors and emotions in changing circumstances. How well can you regulate your emotions when things change? Can you bounce back quickly or do you need time to decompress? Just taking three deep breaths is a good tool for you to reset and help you with your emotional regulation.
Third is developing our social skills. This plays into how we manage relationships and get along with others. Can we begin to see other’s wins as our own wins and wipe the state of the point system clean?
Fourth is opening our hearts to empathy, or our ability to feel others emotions and experiences as our own. Do we make decisions with others in mind?
Finally, we must work with our motivations. Being aware of our motivators is key to understanding how our emotions drive behaviors. What is the intention here? Is this coming from a love-based place or one based in fear? If it comes from fear, how quickly can it shift into love?
The more we practice emotional awareness the greater our ability to disassemble the point system, remove the fear in our heart and see the connection with others becomes. We can begin to experience how the joys of others are our own joys and cultivate more love based states where everyone wins. We no longer need to be a species just surviving and, instead, we can thrive from love.