Ep. 56 Jim Phillips: Living In Full Expression

Perhaps it’s part of the human condition, but most of us seem to have difficulty accepting the way things are. Instead, we find ourselves angered by what we see on the news, enraged by some enemy we are told is out to get us, disappointed by the quality of our lives, or the numbers on our bank balances, or the measurements on our waistbands. Constantly striving for more, and better. There always seems to be something to complain about, to be dissatisfied with, to feel aggrieved about, and always someone or something to blame. It’s almost as if we’ve become addicted to chaos and negativity, and that we have created a system that feeds off this addiction, requiring us to exist in a constant state of low level emotional trauma in order to sell us clicks, clothes and vacations. Requiring us to act and think and behave and identify in certain ways which, when examined closely, are not actually in alignment with who we really are. And it is when we are out of alignment with our authentic selves that we don’t realise our potential. As Maslow might say, we remain un-actualized and, indeed, this whole system that we have created for ourselves seems designed to keep us that way. Simply put, we aren’t who we came here to be, and we aren’t living the lives we came here to live. Even though we are experiencing this existence, are we actually the ones pulling the strings? So how do we break free from this state inauthentic living, and step into our most real, most authentic, most true selves? It’s not a new question, but one that has been played with for thousands of years. Lao Tzu said it sometime around the 6th Century BCE, when he stated “when I let go of what I am, I become what I might be.” Rumi, the Sufi poet, hinted at it in the 1200s, when he wrote “You think you belong to this world of dust and matter. Out of this dust you have created a personal image, and have forgotten about the essence of your true origin.” Mooji, the modern day spiritual teacher, said it when he wrote “step into the fire of self-discovery, it will not burn you, it will burn everything you are not.” This quest to discover who we really are, despite the trappings of culture, society, and expectation, and to create a life that is in alignment with this true version of ourselves can itself take a lifetime. And perhaps we may never get there, living a life shaped by the dictates of expectation, convention, tradition and culture. But while we settle for anger, discontent, for resentment, and the exhausting bitterness of carrying around a thousand injustices, while also straining to be something we are not, in a world that is not built for us, we cannot begin that journey. At some point there will come a day when many of us decide that it’s time to put down the baggage, and start taking the action of change to unravel and unload everything we’ve accumulated over the course of our lives, and in the process dig down closer to the truth of who we are. This notion of our unique truth, of finding out who we are once we remove all that we are not, is explored by Jim Phillips, the author of the book “The Key to LIFE: Living in Full Expression”. Jim is an entrepreneur, speaker, and coach, and he joined me on the podcast to talk about how our truth, our reality, and who we really are, are shaped by a lifetime of experiences. But once we learn to let it go, we can live a more fulfilling, real, and rewarding existence. http://www.livinginfullexpression.com