Part Two (A): Shame, and "making it hard."
Posted by John on November 06, 2001 at 18:09:07:

In Reply to: Another Monster posted by Bruce on November 03, 2001 at 10:18:51:

Ah, there's such an abundance of riches on the table for me to jam off of in coaching today! First, my aware intention of pausing and leaving a space
for it has been richly rewarded in the ongoing catching-on that you go on doing on your own here, Bruce!

In "Another Monster" you have highlighted the same three major themes that I seem to be looking at most often about you. You seem to be on the
verge of catching on to how the whole personality jigsaw puzzle fits together for you, on your own. I'm not sure that it's all quite "clicked-in," all the
way, with absolute clarity for you yet, so I'm going to go on with the exercise. I won't give my take on it away yet. ;-)

But, I'd like to call attention to this title you've picked, "Another Monster." Ahem. There's that thinking mind at work again. Words, nothing but
words! All that we're *really* talkin' about here, Bruce, are some little habits that get your life slowed down to where you get stuck, and some other
habits that get your life speeded up a lot, without bringing satisfaction. That's the two so-called "monsters" you're talking about. When you let your
Self put such a label as that on what we are working on together here, you make it out to be much worse than it is, much bigger and more formidable
than it has to be. You "give it too much power." You "give your power away to it." You make it sound very *hard* to deal with it!

And that's just your thinking mind talking that way again. Do you see what I mean? You may have a long-standing habit in your thinking to make
things out to be much harder than they actually are. If so, that's part of the pattern of lies that the thinking mind weaves in reaction to the common
human experience of shame, or, depression. It's normal that you do that. It's all so human that you have that reaction. Yet, in this kind of a class, we
are exploring mindful tactics for rising above automatic normal reactions.

How might you have titled this sharing? I'm really not comfortable about putting words in your mouth about your work of art in person. That would
seem rude. But I can loosen up enough about it to point out that had you described this sharing as "another lucky insight," "another useful catching-
on," "another beautiful opportunity to learn and grow," "another of the things I've come to this class to find out about," etc., etc. any of those kinds of
expressions might be existentially correct . . . . . without making it seem harder than it really is.

The thing to learn to pay attention to here is the automatic conditioned ways you may have gathered over the years to unconsciously make things out
to be harder than they really are in your thinking.

........................................................................

I've gone back beyond the parameters of that game-tape-review exercise I suggested, to remember your debut here in Classroom Talk, Bruce. I
remember it rather clearly without looking at the tape. You got my attention at that time. You came across as a smart, very well educated guy, and I
tentatvely guessed Teacher/Con Artist off of the music of that. But it was the way you came right out and offered to re-arrange the curriculum of
the class that stood out the most in high-relief for me. Do you remember that?

You called the personality wheel that we have been using here "flat," as I recall. And you urged me to consider using the Enneagram, instead. That
was a judgment on your part (perhaps a very wise one, indeed). And I supposed, in hearing this effort to set things right in our class, that I was
listening to the music of the Judge. Judges correct mistakes, set things straight, and rearrange things accordingly.

There was no hint of Doormat music at that time. I could never have guessed that from the first impressions that you made. In fact, if I was playing
poker, I'd have bet all my stakes that it was a Judge making a very sophisticated Con-Artist-like suggestion. For the Enneagram probably IS regarded
in most spiritual and mindfulness training circles as the most advanced, most sophisticated diagnostic instrument that is available anywhere for this kind
of work.

But I guess I'd have lost my money on that bet. Because you were probably not about showing off your intellectual prowess for the sake of creating
an image of superiority for the rest of us to admire, in making those remarks, as I thought you were doing then . . . so much as coming from *
perfectionism* at that time. In balance now, the latter seems more likely. . . . . . And, of course, later on, we came to find that it isn't "being superior"
that you are stuck on (the plight of the Con Artist on the wheel). Your problem, clearly—or, one of your few basic primary problems—is being stuck
on "being inferior," (the plight of the Doormat).

Coming into this class, with much perfectionism in your make-up, you may have admired me, the students in this class, and what we are doing here
quite a lot. But there was one problem that made it a little less than perfect for you to engage in training with us here. That is, it was a problem if you
came here with an agenda of learning how to be as perfect as you could be. No matter what else we might have to offer you here, it could never
seem perfect to you so long as we were depending on anything less than the most perfect diagnostic instrument that you knew about.

I'm hamming it up a little bit here, but, can you relate to this by any chance, in relation to what you call "perfectionism" in your make-up? If so, it's not
a characteristic of the Con Artist, but a characteristic from straight across the wheel, over in the corresponding reciprocal of the Con Artist . . . the
Believer. The Con Artist shows off "being already perfect." The Believer shows up "not being perfect enough."

In fairness, you've done a great job of setting aside your initial disappointment about this, Bruce. And you've plunged in experientially with the
wheelbook so deeply by now that I doubt you find it quite so "flat" any more. I'm grateful for your doing that. Imagine, if you do find you get
benefits out of participating in this class, some day . . . you might look back and realize that you almost might have passed it by, because it didn't seem
quite perfect enough in every way when you first got here! (There's a hint there, as with all the types, of how the characteristics of personality can
undermine our lives, work against us, and interfere with our best wishes and dreams.)

The Enneagram probably *is* a more sophisticated instrument than the wheelbook! I don't know because I haven't explored it very deeply so far. It
was hard for me to catch on to it, some time long ago, and another system that was easier for me to catch-on to came along . . . and for years I've
been working at developing this other approach to fit in especially well with the awareness game training that is taught here at this school. So it has, at
least, that virtue on its own.

Perhaps you might have noticed, in some of the foundational classes that are linked to the Site Map of the Campus, and in "a philosophy" that this is
not a school of perfect mastery, and I am not a perfect master. In fact, I made a special point of saying that this is "a school of imperfect mastery." In
the raw reality that this training is not designed to make a student perfect, but, rather, to learn how to engage mindfully with an imperfect everyday
life, any perfectionist that might come along might suppose they could get nothing out of it because they couldn't get what they wanted out of it the
most, perfection. I'm glad that hasn't happened to you.

.......................................................................

Next . . . . . ta-dah!!! . . . . . Part Two, Section B., that reviewing the game tapes exercise that I asked you all to try out.

Coach

Uh, I think that's where we will be going next . . . heh-heh. {blush}

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