WELCOMING ALL PARTS
Recently, I was having a challenging conversation with a friend. We were seeing a hot topic differently and my response was to search inside and see if I could find approval for where they were at. Upon hearing this, your first thought might be “sounds like wise action”. That was certainly mine! That feeling of ‘getting right with what is’ is deep relief for me, an unbinding from the ties of needing others to be different in order for me to be ok. When I see my students and clients practice it, I witness them gain the same freedom.
The thing is… approval can’t be fabricated, it can’t be practiced as a spiritual ideal, and certainly it can’t be laid over upset, fear and resentment without feeling damn shitty. When we try and leap to being open to things as they are (what in Buddhism we call upekkha or equanimity), without first tending to all that doesn’t feel right, as in this case I was doing, it’s not true approval, but an action born out of fear of our more complex human feelings. Gratefully, I noticed this dynamic inside and was able to drop down into all that was arising.
This is important, because I’ve been teaching a lot about approval recently. With all of my students and clients, I know it as a key ingredient to deep intimacy, embodied sex and true power. And I want to make sure people really understand what it is and how it’s cultivated. And honestly, I want the real thing, not a substitutionary proxy.
The kind of approval I’m talking about doesn’t come from aspiration, intellectual understanding, or even values. It arises from Self energy, also known as loving awareness or consciousness. And without that primary source, we have proxy at best. Self can meet all things with loving kindness, including the unexalted, messy, human emotions I described above. That’s how you know you’ve tapped into real approval, you feel open hearted curiosity towards it ALL. It’s not conditional, it doesn’t change based on your mood or the facts of a situation. This doesn’t mean you don’t have boundaries - with yourself or others. In fact, the wisest boundaries arise from seeing things as they are. But it does mean you don’t have to ignore, ostracize, or demean something (or someone) in order to practice that boundary. And that includes your own conflicted feelings.
When the Self is present, we can be with hurt, fear and longings in a way that they’ll reveal their secrets to us - where they came from, what motivates them, and what they truly desire (not always what’s there at first glance). Isn’t that just the truth of it- in the light of approval, we’re so much more likely to open and reveal ourselves? From there, space naturally opens up for this same approval towards others and life as a whole.
So friends, my invitation is to not skip any step. If you’ve been a perfectionist or deep spiritual aspirant like me, you’ve likely been compelled to. Even the temporary hit of conceptual approval feels good. But if that’s true, imagine how good the real thing feels.
PS - this is a deep and nuanced practice and at so many points can be used to spiritually bypass and even justify our own unskillful behavior. Spiritual maturity asks for more than that.