Hold your Beliefs Lightly
At some level, our worldview is comprised of a set of beliefs derived from our experiences. Recognizing this can be incredibly freeing. In life we have experiences that lead us to believe certain things. If those beliefs become set in stone, and we place those stones into our spiritual backpack to carry around with us, our attachment to those beliefs can keep us from being open to fresh guidance.
Our spiritual backpack becomes so full there is no room for new information. And the longer we carry around a belief often the more unwilling we are to let go of it. But if we hold our beliefs lightly, as ideas and possibilities, we can release them when more pertinent or meaningful information is presented.
As we research Body of 9 we hear stories of what it means to live in the body of each of the Natural Numbers. We take what we hear, and construct a picture for others. We continually check in with ourselves about what we begin to hold as belief in this process. We believe that there are nine types of human beings, that the 9 Natural Numbers and our process for identifying them are true and accurate. And everyday we seek to challenge ourselves, the words we use and the way that we hold this belief and the ramifications it has for our actions. As soon as it becomes a set of beliefs about which we are not willing to change, then we will cease to learn more.
The Impact
If I notice that I am trying to convince someone though my words about what I believe about Body of 9, and I am honest with myself in feeling the impact, I know when I am holding a belief so tightly that I am no longer open to new information about it. So I recognize my beliefs, and try to hold them as ideas instead. If it’s an idea, then I can take in new information and I don’t have to be right or wrong, just open.
Holding beliefs as ideas has been incredibly freeing for us it helps us see how we mold our sense of the world around us through experience, and how the interpretation and decisions that we make about what we believe about our experiences shapes our world. To stay open for change we pay attention to our attachment response to experiences. For example, if I find myself having an intense attachment in a situation, I again look deeper. What belief am I holding that I can examine as an idea, what shift do I need to make?
For Example
An example of this is, I identified a person as Natural Number 5. Afterwards I got comments back from the NE5 via a mutual friend. The NE5 was skeptical about the physical process we use to identify the Natural Number. They wondered if I had introduced a personal bias into the way I would push on people differently depending on their energy identification. My first response was defensive, and I went to a place of defending my process, and to a place of negating their comments saying that they didn’t get to see others experiencing the process. I noticed my defensiveness, and my attempt to further convince (myself :))and began the conversation again with more curiosity and less attachment.
I opened myself to the possibility that it could look that way, in fact it could be that way. I realized that I need to continually hold neutrality and honoring as I worked with people. The moment I begin to try to convince someone, I have to look if my ego is attached to a belief I am holding about being right. This is always the trickiest and slipperiest slope. When my belief attachment involves my own self-worth, it is really hard to stay open. Paying attention to how I hold my beliefs makes it much easier to self-evaluate and re-examine. Then I can take in new information.
This is “practice” is in our book Practices For Presence: Body-based Insight for Living a Life of Purpose.