The December 1, 2023 Insight Timer live event description:
Inspired by a few months of monastery life in the UK, for 15 minutes or so let’s hash out these three qualities — of kindness, confidence and authenticity — pertinent for England and quite a few other walks of life
Audio: Kind. Confident. Authentic.
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The raw unedited YouTube transcription of this podcast:
holess welcome inspired by a few months
of Monastery life in the UK for 15
minutes or so let’s hash out these three
qualities of kindness confidence and
authenticity pertinent for England and
quite a few other walks of life so I
won’t go too much into staying and
living at monasteries in the in the UK
on this event but what it came to see or
what came to me it’s seem very important
are these three qualities kindness
confidence and authenticity they kind of
are like a trinity structure they
support each other especially the
confidence and authenticity
support uh where kindness could possibly
go astray so we all are familiar I hope
by now of why kindness is so important I
mean that’s basically the only rule in
life I think Kurt bonan said is kindness
and of course the Pinnacle of this for
me is loving kindness so I I don’t
really need to talk too much about this
I feel although I invite questions and
comments about it as well this is kind
of a basic thing especially towards
ourselves what I noticed with a lot of
people in this crowd and I don’t know
how universally applicable this is but
everybody was really kind you know for
the most part
the challenge of where it could
potentially go
astray some personality types when
they’re
kind they tend to diminish themselves
right if I can be overly
humble and just kind of passive not get
in the way not say too much of anything
um then I’m less likely to ruffle
feathers less likely to step on people’s
toes I can just not really be seen or
heard and you know that’s secondary to
being kind and I would say yeah yeah
kindness is the top but this is what I
noticed more about this more inferior
ego or
diminishment now granted there’s a time
where you know we’re in more
contemplative mode and we don’t need to
be speaking them as much or uh doing
anything to draw attention to ourselves
but I noticed about the the British
people I have a lot to learn from their
humbleness which is very
admirable um it’s kind of like a
national pride it seems like almost over
there uh until it turns into like a
competition but as far as competitions
go it’s a great one so this notion of
confidence uh can we be kind and
confident now probably talk about this
before but early on before I started
waking up I would see plenty of
confident people and I was confusing it
for E egotism like someone for
themselves completely different things I
mean there’s a lot of people that are
really egotistic iCal that have plenty
of self-confidence but there’s also a
lot of very humble kind well-meaning
people that are
selfless not attached
to really big views of themselves or
clinging to a lot of things and yet
there’s
a notion of confidence that’s there and
self-confidence too right um now we’re
talking before the show about with my
fiance about this what also come in is
this notion of self trust where it comes
around confidence
um this comes in trusting ourselves that
things are going to be okay this innate
okayness that maybe I don’t know what
I’m doing but I will trust that it will
be okay and even if it’s not okay it’s
okay to not be
okay especially all the time you
know so does anybody have have any uh
questions or challenges around
self-confidence and self-trust I mean
what nurtures it what Fosters it how do
we train in
self-confidence I know for me it seems
to be
like more and more letting it s sink
deep into the bones that will things
will be okay things are okay and they
will be okay we’ve experienced worse
we’ve survived everything up to this
point so this notion of
self-confidence like I was saying
balances out this um or self yeah
self-confidence balances out where
kindness can kind of be diminishing
sometimes
um okay so pav says I definitely
learning to trust my own judgments and
feelings very important I know speaking
from experience
I starting off my judgment just wasn’t
there you know and um my feelings were
something I was trying to avoid and deny
but as we go on and do this work and
love and care for ourselves too then we
notice or I notice that there is no
wrong feeling right there is it’s got a
little bug on my nose I don’t know if
anybody can see
this um that feelings are always valid
there’s no wrong feeling can’t argue
with feelings
they can’t be
wrong and feeling feelings that’s why
they’re called that right is very
helpful um in judgment too as well
judgment and discernment discernment is
needed to determine all these things and
choices um judgment is needed you know
in the right kinds of judgment but if
you just want to substitute discernment
for that not talking about getting
satisfaction from putting people down or
um saying they’re doing something
something and then I feel better about
myself that’s a
judgment um an un an unhelpful judgment
okay so this other
quality pav says a kindergarten on a
path to self-kindness and self-loving
yes yeah we all start where we’re at
just as long as we’re not diminishing
ourselves right to now the kindergarten
I can uh interpret that as being humble
right I’m not putting myself as the most
kind person on Earth and I’m the but on
the other hand am I giving myself enough
credit you know of where I’m at on my
kindness Journey so pav I don’t know you
but I I encourage you to to to see where
you’re at there and and I don’t see the
need where we need to draw conclusions
either I think it’s totally okay to to
to say we’re in the kindergarten of
kindness so um comparing ourselves to
ourselves though
right Katherine says difficulty
retaining my confidence with certain
people well tell me more
Katherine
um that’s uh yeah I mean we’ve all
experienced that right and I don’t know
how comfortable you are sharing
specifics with that
um but yeah it just seems like around
certain
people there’s just certain kind of
habit patterns that because we’ve
trained and have so much habitual energy
around certain people being certain ways
around certain people you know it it
sometimes it’s a long training being
kind with ourselves as we work to train
to be
confident yeah
authoritarian so this next notion of
authenticity another thing I noticed
would people would come to to me and
they would say I just don’t feel
authentic you know I
don’t I I don’t think I uh you know I
don’t feel authentic I’m I I don’t I
wish I was more authentic and to me this
is a really fascinating one because in a
way I don’t feel 100% authentic because
I’m right now even because I’m talking
on a screen I’m looking at myself and I
see a little bitty icons down here of
people you know that are joining and and
it’s not all the people that are joining
here and there’s there’s a few comments
but I almost have to like sense into
what’s going on you put a camera on
someone they they get a little bit
different a lot of times unless one is
just absolutely trained to be in front
of a camera but you know this is the
notion that this is where I’m at this is
the what authentic authenticity I can
bring towards this camera but I might be
a little bit slightly different when I’m
off camera around people and certain
people uh so I like to to look at the
notion of where are the similarities and
where the differences in different
situations in due to different causes
and conditions too but with authenticity
for me it starts
with I haven’t really had an issue with
this because I’ve always been kind of
confident of um not really having to
pretend anything that I’m not um and I
think it really starts though with we’re
under so so many programs and conditions
that so many people I could be wrong
don’t know who they are because they’re
living under the ideas of someone else
have given them either their parents and
this is not necessarily wrong either but
their parents give them we all need that
coming up right friends family members
then schools but then the media right we
see certain things people adopt certain
Lifestyles certain ways of being because
of all kinds of different reasons
because it’s cool because wouldn’t want
to be too seen as too far out there or I
I need to belong in this group this is
what kind of person that people want me
to be or who I should be and so to me
where this all starts is clearing out as
much as that as we can and I think that
the the lockdowns we had helped some
people do this were clearing out all the
Clutter and so given a chance to see
what’s underneath all the different
programs and training that we’ve gone
under and see what’s under there and I
know for me it was a lot of um kind of
sadness uh there was regret there was a
lot of things I had forgotten about and
came back to so I think a lot of healing
work goes on to see who we are and
another thing is confidence that it’s a
it’s a process in finding authenticity
too um knowing that we’re going to
belong somewhere with some
people eventually right like a lot of my
old friends fell away got new friends
and yeah and we can also ask well why do
we want to be authentic or why why do we
think we’re not
authentic how can we get there why is
this
important um what can I do about
it
um another thing is being honest with
ourselves as well even if that means
that I don’t know how to be honest with
myself I don’t want to be honest with
myself it’s
scary you know maybe I’ve been faking it
for so many years and I don’t know where
to start how to go about that how will I
be if I stop doing the things I’ve been
doing you know and again the the answer
to all this is is kindness and care you
know um even if it’s just the honesty of
I I hate myself you know I I don’t like
the way I am and um I don’t want to be
like this sucks to me that’s that’s
that’s honesty you know and that is a
form of self-love and self-care being
honest with
ourselves okay pth says Katherine yes I
am learning to hold my ground with
father and a lot of one-ups me
qualities uh P doesn’t authenticity go
along with bringing forth our
vulnerabilities Katherine says yes being
honest authenticity is very
empowering so yeah holding a ground with
the father and so and this oneup
mentality these qualities so this is a
common thing among males I haven’t gone
beyond this either yet there’s this
notion and tendency to want to impress
and compete
right so how can we be self-confident
without this notion of one-upmanship and
how can we turn it into maybe
cooperation you know and support and
encouragement and
upliftment um so that helps a lot with
self-confidence I feel is when we can
encourage encourage ourselves and others
Empower ourselves and others instead of
compete so much right um easier said
than done still a long way from there
myself authenticity absolutely can bring
forth a lot of vulnerabilities and but
that’s how our heart opens right um if
we’re constantly armoring our heart
shutting it down protecting ourselves
against everything there there can’t be
any vulnerability that’s good for a time
and when we’re in danger and don’t feel
safe and comfortable but our heart is
really hard to open and share on deeper
more profound levels even with ourselves
right so yes there’s um we take it step
by step whatever we feel comfortable
being vulnerable and who we open up to
and and show vulnerability and be
vulnerability and then after a certain
time you know we we get more and more
trust and confidence in being safe and
opening our hearts and and being
vulnerable and feeling very deeply both
the very pleasant things and the the
very unpleasant things right and we
don’t have to like the unpleasant things
but that’s how we um can really make
deeper and deeper connections with
ourselves with others uh with the World
At Large higher Realms even as well I
feel but of course we know when to draw
back and do self-care nurture and know
when to establish and maintain
boundaries when when need be as well um
yeah we don’t stay in abusive situations
just because I’m working on my V I’m
working on opening my heart through
vulnerability
right that’s the distorted version of
that um again yeah authenticity is
really empowering absolutely absolutely
people can sense it um if we’re being
authentic or not if we’re just blowing
smoke up somebody’s butt or you know um
whatever and there’s different degrees
too like I was talking
about well I guess I’ll wrap this back
up with kindness It’s been 16 minutes
already glad you all joined here
um how can we uh spend the rest of the
day being kind to ourselves and others
in an
authentic um and
empowering way you know
um
yeah well one last thing here I a few
this notion of accountability right um
being held accountable and this goes
along to me with um even more so
self-responsibility so empowerment does
come with self-responsibility taking
responsibility for my thoughts words and
actions and even though it might not be
mine I don’t have to um identify with it
but I’m responsible for how I view a
situation how I perceive a situation
what I pay attention to how I respond to
something
and then what I do or don’t do about
it and Maggie says hello from Arizona
much loving kindness sending much love
and kindness to everyone on this call
well thank you Maggie and the same and
uh wish you all the kindness of days
empowering
authentic and confident kindness loving
kindness may all beings everywhere be
safe inside and out May all beings
everywhere be happy and joyful may all
beings
everywhere live knowing ease in their
hearts may all beings everywhere be
healthy and strong and may all beings
everywhere realize Awakening and be
free
confidently
authentically to the degree we’re able
now bye y’all
Integrating Presence 