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The Valve of Abundance
Robert Rabbin
A few years ago, during a particularly
intense period of introspection, I experienced a profound encounter with
severely limiting, entrenched beliefs and an impoverished self-image. One night,
I felt a power surging from deep within, commanding me to go to my desk. As soon
as my fingers hit the keyboard, the following words came out. In my final
column, I present them here, in the same unedited way in which they originally
appeared on my screen. While the text was addressed to me, it seems to have
universal appeal and application.
Dear Robert,
Over the years, you have worked long and hard, with diligence and purpose. You
have developed a rare capacity for sustained introspection to go along with your
sincere desire to experience and express freedom and joy in your life. You have
known from the beginning you came here to uplift the consciousness of the world.
You have known from the beginning you were here to be participate in the
unfolding evolution of a higher order of consciousness on this planet. You have
known from the beginning, and you have been told by others, that you were here
to do work that is yours alone, work that is necessary now, work that has not
been done before—and therefore you would have no guide or model, no one to tell
you where to go and what to do. You have had to find your own way. You have
lived for a long time in the wilderness of doubt and uncertainty, of deprivation
and solitude, of poverty and disappointment. That period of your life is over. A
new chapter begins today. You are now ready to go farther, give more, and have
more than you’ve ever allowed yourself to dream. You have seen with your own
eyes the source and reason of your solitary wandering and poverty.
You have used well this rare moment, this intersection of time and opportunity.
You have been given a few minutes in the magical garden of golden fruits and you
did not waste your time. You filled your basket with golden pears and plums and
you are now going on your way with incredible wealth. This basket of gold is an
outer reflection of the worth you have discovered within yourself. You were
given a few moments in which to change your life for the better, in which to
dissolve limiting beliefs about your self, in which to claim as yours what
belongs to you — and you have done so.
You have seen how long ago you shut off the valve of self-worth, thereby
stopping the flow of abundance that is yours to receive and to give. You have
been living in Self-exile from your kingdom. In your wanderings you met so many
people who confirmed your lack of self-worth through their behavior towards you.
They were but mirrors for you to see the how you lacked belief in your own
nature and birthright to participate fully in life’s abundant treasures. These
people were never real; they were your own consciousness masquerading as people
and events to show you the error of your thinking and believing. Now you have
seen this, and these ghosts of your own making have already left your life and
they will never return. You are returning to your kingdom. You have reclaimed
your throne of power, authority, deservedness, and positive outcomes. You will
now receive the respect and acknowledgment you are entitled to by virtue of your
innate worthiness and your good, original, and inspirational works. It is not
overstating matters to say your true life begins today.
Self-worth is the valve that regulates the inflow and outflow of an individual’s
life-force. The inflow of the life-force brings the infinite abundance of life
itself; and this abundance is experienced as wealth in all aspects of one’s
life: relationships, career, health, education, social standing, etc., and
within these spheres of life one experiences effortless and endless opportunity,
acknowledgement, recognition, approval, validation, support. This is the default
position of each person who comes into the world, because the life-force within
each person is truly unlimited, boundless, free, expressive, creative, and
overflowing with enthusiasm, joy, and love. This is the natural state of
affairs. That few people come to know and experience this is proof that so many
people have found ways to subvert, through their thinking and believing, that
they are not worthy and entitled to this abundance—even though they may mouth
the words, the inner feeling is not there. They are burdened by some faulty or
flawed self-image, as you were. They took other people’s anger, criticism, and
accusations of insufficiency into themselves as truth, into themselves as fact.
And then, as you did, they lived in Self-exile from the inflow of life.
The outflow of the life-force is authentic self-expression: the gifts, the love,
the creativity, the energy, the enthusiasm, the joy, the contribution to self
and others that one wants and needs to make. When the outflowing life-force is
not restrained by an impoverished self-image and negative thoughts of
self-worth, one experiences ongoing opportunity to let the full magnitude of
their own spirit manifest in real and telling ways. They see and feel their life
manifesting in irresistible ways, in gorgeous ways, in magical ways, because the
unlimited creative spirit of the universe itself is thundering through that
person.
When and how did your own Self-exile begin? Like this:
Unfortunately, your mother was suffering from Self-exile, too. Except she did
not know this. She, like everyone else in Self-exile, passes along the “disease”
without really intending to. She was fearful, angry, resentful, insecure —
because she had come to believe things about herself that were not true, but
that had been told to her with such force at a time she had no defense against
these forceful charges to which she succumbed and submitted, and then she began
to belief them. So, please, do not blame her. She did what all others do — act
out their pain of Self-exile. This is simply a telling of the story of your own
Self-exile from life’s abundance, a story which is over, a book which is closed.
But the story may have value for others, and it may have value for you as you
work to show others a possible path of return from their Self-exile.
Your mother was easily upset. She harbored so many resentments about her life
that she couldn’t help but be critical, negative, angry. She had no confidence
in herself, and she was afraid of life and of her life. She did not
believe she had any capacity to stand up, to speak up, to act from her core. She
was disappointed, frustrated, and angry — all the time.
Not knowing how to work with her own self-created Self-exile, she blamed others.
She would blame you. She made you feel as though something you said or did
caused her upsets. Her upsets were frightening to you as a young child. They
were full of implicit threats that you would be punished in some way: perhaps
she would withhold love, approval, encouragement), or perhaps the acting out of
her upsets (anger, pouting, shouting, criticism) were just too overwhelming for
you to cope with on an emotional level. Is it any wonder that you had chronic
and debilitating asthma your entire life, which disappeared totally the very
day you left home for college? How many years did you live without being
able to breathe, without being able to take in the spirit of life itself? You
were so afraid, you could scarcely breathe. You were so unworthy, you could
scarcely breathe. You inherited this fear and lack of self-worth from your
mother. It is not her fault. It is not your fault. This is just how it happens.
Your mother loved you but she did not have anything else to give you. Her fear
and resentment was all she had; it was all she knew.
You were afraid of your mother’s upsets, for which she blamed you. You did not
know how to protect yourself, how to stand your ground, how to separate your
reality from her projection. So, you would apologize. You’d submit, acquiesce,
lower your head. You would admit to being wrong, when you weren’t, in order to
appease her and neutralize her threats of reprisal for causing her upset. You
surrendered your desires to her desires, your voice for hers, your life for
hers. You gave away your life to her, unable to stand up to her threats and
challenges. And you have never really taken back your life, till now.
You were coping in the only way you knew how to cope at that time. However, the
consequence of your constant capitulation was a slow erosion of self-worth, of
doubting the validity of your thoughts and words and actions—of your life.
You decided:, “I’m not really worthy. I don’t expect approval, recognition,
support, encouragement. I’m always wrong and bad. I cannot trust myself. I
cannot express myself. I have to preempt her anger and criticism by being as
unobtrusive and compliant as I can.” Criticism is deadly to children. You
learned that anytime you stood for yourself, you would be criticized. So you
stopped standing. You cowered, when you should have towered.
And there sat your father, the very embodiment of cowed submission and
self-worthlessness, who died at 53 — another fatality from the harsh environment
of Self-exile.
As you were constantly criticized, rebuked, or shouted down, you began to feel
that your very life was flawed, your thoughts, words and actions unworthy, your
hope of support and positive outcome nonexistent. You were afraid of getting her
angry. You began to second-guess yourself, afraid to fully express yourself lest
she criticize, rebuke, or get angry with you. Something in you shut down and
closed off. You put your spirit into an iron box, and your growth was stunted as
the feet of Chinese girls encased in tiny, rigid shoes. You did not grow
straight and tall, confident in your innate worthiness and goodness; instead,
your confidence became a twisted and broken foot upon which you could not truly
stand.
This impoverished self-image remained a core belief about yourself and your
worthiness and readiness to receive abundance from life. You sealed yourself off
from life in a vault of self-doubt and fear. You fully expected life (your
mother) to punish you for any strength and self-determination you might exhibit.
You lost confidence in yourself and you dared not stand up for yourself. You
forfeited your innate right to participate fully in life’s abundance. This is
how you entered Self-exile. Self-doubt mixed with fear erodes the natural sense
of self-worth.
This all occurred in the emotional world, where things do not necessarily make
linear or logical sense. In the often murky and subterranean caverns of emotions
and emotional memory, of subconscious decisions and beliefs, this story was
written by you. In the emotional world, one seeks to give and get love, receive
validation, experience safety and security, have trust and faith in oneself,
connect with others, feel worthy of life and life’s gifts. All of these are
freely and fully given to each person upon birth. It is tragic that so few
people retain their own birthright.
Your subconscious was thus programmed, and from an early age to recent times,
your life was to a large extent regulated and governed by the self-fulfilling
prophecy and unspoken expectation that you would never receive life’s abundance,
as you were not worthy of this.
Your impoverished self-image kept you separate from your work; it was as if
someone else did the things you did. No real joy, no real recognition, no wealth
came to you. You would not let it. When there was acknowledgement of your work,
that acknowledgment would float like a dying echo into a void and disappear. It
had no effect in your life. That is why you have experienced endless
disappointments. Book after book, article after article, radio interview after
radio interview, workshop after workshop, lecture after lecture, client after
client: all the value you created was for others. You did not receive even a
fraction of the worth and wealth and respect you were entitled to, because you
would not receive it.
You know from Spirituality 101 that one’s consciousness flows from the “inner”
to the “outer.” Yes, there are always other factors involved in any outcome, but
one must always consider the effect of one’s unconscious beliefs to shape and
determine experiences and events in one’s life. You know this as a principle;
now you have experienced the truth of this.
You had a contract with yourself and with the people in your life — who
represented your self image and self-worth — not to upset them, anger them,
disappoint them, or leave them, even though you were often not paid what you
were worth, nor respected and appreciated as you and your works deserved. Many
of the people and events you drew to you were confirmations of your impoverished
self-image. You simply accepted what was given, whether it was fair or not. Like
your father, you lived in quiet servitude to the will of others, afraid of them,
afraid of yourself, afraid of life.
You have seen many examples of this during the past few nights. You have been
taken on a ride through your past, where you have seen and heard how it was, and
how it came to be. You have seen with your own eyes the way your life was shaped
in the image of your inner beliefs as surely as a potter’s hands shape and mold
the clay.
I am not trying to be mean; I want you to see and understand how the constant
disappointment and poverty in your life was created by your beliefs. The story
of your lifelong disappointment and poverty is due in large part to your beliefs
about yourself. Though you did great, sometimes miraculous, works, you never
ascribed them to your own power. You never allowed bounty to flow into you, into
your life. You had clamped closed the umbilical cord of nourishment from the
world to you. Each of your many potent seeds fell on hard rocks. Where there
should have been wildly growing crops and abundant harvests, there was nothing.
Your subconscious programming was broadcasting an impenetrable frequency: I
am not worthy to receive any of life’s abundance. And so you did not. You
have seen much in the last few nights of your sleep. You have encountered so
many ghosts of your past. You know enough about all of that. You have made
amends with yourself as you need to.
It is your destiny to be powerful, wealthy, and respected. It is your destiny to
be an exemplar of life’s abundance, to be a wise and worldly person who
re-defines many notions about spirituality. You have many talents, many
wonderful gifts to offer the world. And the world has many gifts for you. Some
have already entered your life, others soon will, and even the works of your
past will find new life in your new life.
Now, you will give and receive the full measure of your destiny. You will from
this day forth, receive the full respect, support, encouragement, appreciation,
and recognition from the world. You will from this day forth stand straight and
tall, as you were meant to. You will give full voice and expression to your soul
and spirit, you will give what you came to give and do what you came to do. The
valve of self-worth is wide open and locked in that position. All this will
happen effortlessly and assuredly, for it is your right and destiny.
All this time, you have been broadcasting the frequency of poverty and
worthlessness. Forgetting you are the very embodiment of unlimited creative and
expressive power, you took your begging bowl into the streets and hoped someone
would toss in something, anything. Your prior beliefs made you satisfied with,
even to expect, just bare and meager sustenance.
Now, you have remembered who you are. You have within you the full,
unconquerable power of universal manifestation. Live as that which you are.
With love and respect,
Your own Self
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