Last night, I was listening to a friend of mine call me out about
something, and I didn't appreciate it. He was telling me that I'd been
carrying around this air of bitterness.
When he finished telling me this, I turned it around. I recalled something he'd lied to me about, and used that to avoid having to face the truth of what he was saying.
The truth was, I had been bitter.
But, how dare he tell me that!
He was in no position to tell me what I was doing wrong, or so I thought.
What was really going on was, I was afraid of being a doormat. I was afraid of being walked on and being made to feel as if I was invisible and insignificant and a failure.
So, I turned his correction around and pointed it back to his flaws and his mess-ups.
I wasn't supposed to be the one with the problems.
As I was sitting in my morning meditation this morning, and rehashed the conversation that went down, I realized that I had misplaced being a doormat with being humble.
While in the moment I was afraid of being walked all over, looking back I realize that I was actually afraid of being humble.
Over the last couple years, there's been this massive, sweeping, almost faddish media outpouring from (out of all places) Christian outlets about creating boundaries to prevent oneself from being hurt in any given situation.
There's this waking consciousness that screams self preservation and drawing hard-line, black and white generalizations about what it looks like to help others and to help ourselves.
One of the undertones of this rising philosophy is that our problems are created by outside influences, like people and places and situations.
Out of this rising consciousness is where phrases like being a doormat came from.
But I disagree with most of what this consciousness proposes.
And here's why, using the example of my conversation last night.
What my friend told me immediately raised red flags, triggers for things like anger and resentment and defensiveness.
The undertone of this recently unwrapped philosophy is that I need to create walls to prevent myself from being hurt - or boundaries. That way, it is believed, I can be free to help others without getting hurt myself or hurting them.
The problem is, as human beings we have this uncanny knack for having selfish twinges every time we want to help someone out.
We inevitably end up having cracks in our boundaries.
And so, what our efforts in creating boundaries actually do is shield us from doing anything that leads us to taking actions that result in humility.
And humility is not being a doormat.
Being a doormat is the thought process that occurs before being humble.
He wants money again? I never signed up to be his banker!
And so, we say no because we don't want to because we don't want to be walked all over.
But the reality is, and I know this first-hand because I've had a hardened heart for way too long, that the feeling of being walked all over has nothing to do with anyone else but us.
At the root of this concept is the fear of not being in control of whatever's at stake - money, relationships, power, stuff, emotions.
Being humble is about advancing past the "doormat" train of thought. It's about realizing that my stuff is not my own and that there are areas in my life (usually the ones that are being threatened at the time) that I need to release control of.
In the moment of conversation with my friend last night, it was actually an opportunity to release my need to be right.
Yet, the "boundaries" part of me told me told me to hang tight onto what I thought was right to prevent myself from being hurt.
So, when people talk about being a doormat or building boundaries, they're actually talking about shielding themselves off from avenues of humility.
Humility goes against the essence of our human instinct. It goes against our will to survive, to make it, to feel accomplished.
Yet, there's so much insight and growth that is untapped because we tell ourselves, "Well, I'm not gonna be a doormat!"
When we run into opposition (mainly, people we don't get along with), we are running into mirrors of ourselves. We don't like them because they display something that's inside of us. And so, we create boundaries to keep us from having to see that mirror and having to endure what that mirror has to teach us.
Looking back onto the conversation with my friend last night, I realize that I had a boundary set up and I didn't even know about it. Instead of defending myself and turning it around on him, I could have listened quietly, through the fear of being walked on, and waited for the truth.
Today's Action: There will be at least one situation today where we have two alternatives: let the fear of being a doormat take over and control our actions or release control and be humble about it, even when it hurts.
When he finished telling me this, I turned it around. I recalled something he'd lied to me about, and used that to avoid having to face the truth of what he was saying.
The truth was, I had been bitter.
But, how dare he tell me that!
He was in no position to tell me what I was doing wrong, or so I thought.
What was really going on was, I was afraid of being a doormat. I was afraid of being walked on and being made to feel as if I was invisible and insignificant and a failure.
So, I turned his correction around and pointed it back to his flaws and his mess-ups.
I wasn't supposed to be the one with the problems.
As I was sitting in my morning meditation this morning, and rehashed the conversation that went down, I realized that I had misplaced being a doormat with being humble.
While in the moment I was afraid of being walked all over, looking back I realize that I was actually afraid of being humble.
Over the last couple years, there's been this massive, sweeping, almost faddish media outpouring from (out of all places) Christian outlets about creating boundaries to prevent oneself from being hurt in any given situation.
There's this waking consciousness that screams self preservation and drawing hard-line, black and white generalizations about what it looks like to help others and to help ourselves.
One of the undertones of this rising philosophy is that our problems are created by outside influences, like people and places and situations.
Out of this rising consciousness is where phrases like being a doormat came from.
But I disagree with most of what this consciousness proposes.
And here's why, using the example of my conversation last night.
What my friend told me immediately raised red flags, triggers for things like anger and resentment and defensiveness.
The undertone of this recently unwrapped philosophy is that I need to create walls to prevent myself from being hurt - or boundaries. That way, it is believed, I can be free to help others without getting hurt myself or hurting them.
The problem is, as human beings we have this uncanny knack for having selfish twinges every time we want to help someone out.
We inevitably end up having cracks in our boundaries.
And so, what our efforts in creating boundaries actually do is shield us from doing anything that leads us to taking actions that result in humility.
And humility is not being a doormat.
Being a doormat is the thought process that occurs before being humble.
He wants money again? I never signed up to be his banker!
And so, we say no because we don't want to because we don't want to be walked all over.
But the reality is, and I know this first-hand because I've had a hardened heart for way too long, that the feeling of being walked all over has nothing to do with anyone else but us.
At the root of this concept is the fear of not being in control of whatever's at stake - money, relationships, power, stuff, emotions.
Being humble is about advancing past the "doormat" train of thought. It's about realizing that my stuff is not my own and that there are areas in my life (usually the ones that are being threatened at the time) that I need to release control of.
In the moment of conversation with my friend last night, it was actually an opportunity to release my need to be right.
Yet, the "boundaries" part of me told me told me to hang tight onto what I thought was right to prevent myself from being hurt.
So, when people talk about being a doormat or building boundaries, they're actually talking about shielding themselves off from avenues of humility.
Humility goes against the essence of our human instinct. It goes against our will to survive, to make it, to feel accomplished.
Yet, there's so much insight and growth that is untapped because we tell ourselves, "Well, I'm not gonna be a doormat!"
When we run into opposition (mainly, people we don't get along with), we are running into mirrors of ourselves. We don't like them because they display something that's inside of us. And so, we create boundaries to keep us from having to see that mirror and having to endure what that mirror has to teach us.
Looking back onto the conversation with my friend last night, I realize that I had a boundary set up and I didn't even know about it. Instead of defending myself and turning it around on him, I could have listened quietly, through the fear of being walked on, and waited for the truth.
Today's Action: There will be at least one situation today where we have two alternatives: let the fear of being a doormat take over and control our actions or release control and be humble about it, even when it hurts.
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