Purifying You, Not The Toxins Around You
We get into a frenzied high when we swan dive into the toxic swamp of where our lives are stuck.
We think that if we can work harder, try more, explain with more clarity, help more efficiently, show love with more grace, be more patient, negotiate with more leniency, compensate with more generocity … if we give more and more and more, then maybe we can change the swamp into a clean glistening lake.
It doesn’t work that way.
The world is far too filthy for any one of us to Messiah our way through and save everyone so that we can live in a better place.
We are literally forfeiting our lives in order to try and purify the toxins,
but our purpose is to purify ourselves from the toxins.
Look at how we are striving to do this :
politicizing every thought, taking away decisions from those that aren’t deciding our way, manipulating those that we want something from, pretending to be graceful but returning with resentment, over giving and over needing, working for things that will make our life worthy, using morality to justify demanding the behaviour of others ….
These are ways that we are trying to stay where we are, who we are, while attempting to change the toxicity in our life so we don’t have to. This is a way that we altruistically manipulate the world around us so that it can fall into our order.
Great intentions, but we are accidently abusing.
Instead of trying to purify others into our own order,
we need to purify ourselves into our own order.
It isn’t that what you have in mind that is bad - far from it!
It’s that you are trying to use other people to do what you want to be done so that your environment is more safe and you enlist others to synchronize with your trajectory.
What you have in your mind, for your own world’s order is brilliant. But it is just for you, so it has to start with you.
When you purify the old toxins that you are unhappy with, the old traditions, the old beliefs, the old patterns … then you are putting the work into establishing your very own world
You are establishing self sovereignty.
This is scary though because you have been taught that you aren’t allowed to have that. You’ve been taught, and sometimes violently, that you are selfish, arrogant, rude, bossy, aggressive, abusive, unloved, unworthy, and certainly unrighteous if you are pursuing the purity of who you are.
If you are owning your desires, pursuing your dreams, accomplishing your ambitions, upholding your laws, choosing your health, taking care of your value, meeting your needs … then you are holding yourself apart.
But here’s the catch,
you are only holding yourself apart from those that want you to stay in the swamp with them, so that they can keep you unwell with them in the name of unity and togetherness, in the name of love.
Here’s the secret
You are trying to purify others so that you have the permission to be pure …
But that’s not how purification works … you need to purify yourself and others will fall away, join, or newly arrive.
Instead …
When we purify our own self,
clean out the old ways and embrace new self sovereignty ….
Those who show up are those who have
also learned how to sovereign themselves.
Then you get the wealth of health. You get to have the communication styles that are diverse, the education that is exploratory, the emotions that are deeply honored, the social order holds respect, the ambitions are inclusive, the days are simply enjoyable…
Use this as a purification process:
Look at what you want from others, how you wish they would behave, what they need to give you in order for you to feel happier and better about yourself.
Then, mirror that to yourself. Look at how you wish you could behave, receive, give, feel happy and better about who you are.
Take that list and apply it to the way you show up, the way you think, your own beliefs, the ambitions you have, the work you need to do in order to get there. Be the change, be the right way, be the one that does things the way you want things to be done.
Let the rest go, let others choose where they want to be, even if that is not where you want to be. Let yourself move forward and trust that the healthier, purified, version of you will be fully embraced in the new world. Give yourself permission to not be in the swamp anymore, and give others the permission to stay.
So as hungry and urgent as you are to purify the external world around you, start with your own inner world … give yourself the permission you need to be who you want to be.
You will pull yourself out of the swamp of intoxication, and enter a new world of a sovereign self.
It is here that you will find what you are looking for.
Some journal prompts to help you integrate these concepts into being more self centered
What is something that you are paying a very high price in order to try to purify in others?
How can you let go of changing them, and instead let your self be what you want to have from them?
Look at these places in particular - how you are trying to get others to care, to show up, to believe, to uphold, to respect, to love … see how you can better care, show up, believe, uphold, respect and love for yourself …