Transcript for Ep. 15

Part Three of the Self-Esteem Series

Pillars of Self Esteem - Part Three - Self Responsibility & Self Assertiveness

[00:00:00] Hello, and welcome to order within navigating a world of endless chaos and crisis. Many of us are experiencing inner turmoil, insecurity, anxiety, fears, and isolation. These feelings are only being amplified by news cycles. Social media and never ending political madness. How do we find our way out of the chaos?

[00:00:24] How do we find strength within ourselves? How do we find meaning in a world driven by materialism these questions? And many more I aim to answer on the show. My goal is to be a trusted guide on your journey to selfhood. May you find what you seek.

[00:00:45] Time to get back into another episode of order within. Part three today. So this is a five part series on the pillars of self esteem. That's been developed by Nathaniel Branden. A very influential. Psychotherapist around self-esteem. How to go about establishing self esteem within ourselves. So the first episode.

[00:01:14] Focused on defining what self-esteem is looking at the components that make up self-esteem, which is self efficacy and self respect. The confidence and ability and belief in our abilities. Thoughts, our creative capacities that is efficacy our belief in our abilities. Respect is our respect for ourselves. Our.

[00:01:41] Belief that we have a right to exist. To be, as we are. Those are the two components that make up self-esteem from his perspective. I agree with them as well. Cause it's very it, when you start doing this work, you start to realize it. The second part was based on. The first two pillars. So there's six pillars of self-esteem and the pillars are practices. They're basically practices. That show us. Ways that we can go about building our self-esteem. And so the first two pillars were living the practice of living consciously and then practice of self-acceptance. Conscious, they build on one another living consciously and accepting ourselves.

[00:02:25] Is part of the process. So now in part three, we're going to be focusing on pillars three and four. Self responsibility. And self assertiveness. So we're going to start with the practice of self responsibility. And. There's a lot to unpack here as we've done before. The essence of the cell. The practice of self responsibility is really about a sense of control over our experience.

[00:02:55] When we take responsibility. For our actions. Our words, we have a sense of control, a sense of command over our life. And by accepting responsibility for our lives. We have the ability to influence things instead of being passive participants. We're active participants in life. And so the practice of self responsibility allows us to take the reins.

[00:03:22] Of our lives and do what we can, where we can. And so we're going to talk a lot about the components of this things to consider actions, to take. There's always sentence stems that Nathaniel Branden discusses, which is a very simple tool. For developing relationships with ourselves and establishing.

[00:03:42] Apractice of building up and loving ourselves from within it, really? And so the thing is too, is. The relationship with ourself is carried everywhere. There's no escaping our relationship with ourselves. So we carry it into everything that we do, our work, our friendships, our romance, our creative work, everything.

[00:04:05] And until we establish that fact until we learn and begin to practice the respect and love for ourselves that we need. We tend to fall into bad habits. We tend to self-sabotage. We tend to live by fear out of fear.

[00:04:22] And so we're looking to change that here. The next focus of this is going to be the action implications of self responsibility. And so we go through there's some components, just like the other pillars. That make up. What self-responsibility means.

[00:04:40] And so the first one is I'm responsible for the achievement of my desires. Not others. No one owes me anything. So that's a little bit of a, so I'm responsible for the achievement of my desires. Not others. A very key piece to realize there is that what we want. And what we dream about what we believe, what we desire in the world.

[00:05:01] Is our responsibility to bring about and make happen. We are not entitled. To accomplishment, achievements our desires. It's our efforts, our commitment. That will bring those things to us that give us the highest probability of creating them. But no one owes. Us. And that's a key thing to remember is.

[00:05:24] We have a right to exist. But we don't have a right to take from the world and have everything given to us without our responsibility, without our effort with our commitment. To the work required.

[00:05:38] If we don't take responsibility for our desires, for the things that we want. Ultimately, we're just dry daydreaming. Because with responsibility becomes action, becomes reality. We anchor things in to reality and we're taking direct action towards what we want. If we're not. Then we're just dreaming and imagining what we would like. And that's okay. It's.

[00:06:07] Daydreaming, imagining envisioning those things are great, but. Knowing them for what they are. If we do have a serious desire to achieve things and create something specific in our lives, then it takes more than just envisioning. We must take responsibility for those desires. And we must take action around it.

[00:06:28] And that follows into.

[00:06:32] The next piece here. I'm responsible. For myself and my actions, my thoughts and my actions. So my mind, my actions. Ultimately again. Tying that back to our actions and what's required of us. Is key here. Things don't happen without our connection to them without our direct actions, our commitment to what needs to be done.

[00:07:01] And so by committing to those actions, by committing to my risk, to my actions, I'm giving myself a chance to move forward and progress towards what I desire. Things won't happen if I'm not willing to take responsibility for those actions.

[00:07:17] And that's the key. There is the power of this is that we hold the power to take action, to do these things, but that's also the scary piece of this is that it falls to us. It falls in our hands to take the actions that will drive us towards what we. Desire.

[00:07:39] The next piece. I am responsible for the level of consciousness I bring to work. The statements are clear. But. It's important to realize that this applies to all areas of our life.

[00:07:51] The level of consciousness that I bring to work to my relationships, to the tasks that I'm doing. That means we have to take responsibility for my components of work. That means that I have to bring a level of fierceness, intention, commitment to things that I desire at work. If there are certain things that I want from my work, I must commit to them. I must press for them.

[00:08:14] I must be the one that drives progress towards bringing about what I want sitting around and waiting for others to do. This is a mistake that we often make now. I have found. Myself. Guilty of this. Not bringing a high level of consciousness to work. And it causes things. To falter it weakens the ability.

[00:08:42] Of ourselves to do the things that we desire. It also allows us to make excuses for what's happening when we don't bring that level of consciousness to our work. And consciousness means that I will be aware I will be truthful to what is happening. I will be honest about what is happening. That may mean a change that may mean we have to move or pivot based on the fact that I'm not being respected or loved or regarded.

[00:09:08] Where I am today. But that level of consciousness is our own responsibility to bring. The next piece is I'm responsible for the level of consciousness I bring to my relationships again. Consciousness is key. It's why it's the first pillar, because ultimately without it, we can't be aware of what's happening and without awareness, it's not possible to make change. So it starts with consciousness.

[00:09:31] And it's consciousness is simply awareness. Awareness of the truth awareness to our feelings, awareness to what is. And so this applies to our relationships as well. Many of us will ignore what we see and know to be truthful. Or if a relationship is going bad, we will see signs to that, but we ignore them because we are turning down our consciousness because we don't want to face the fact of pain.

[00:09:58] We don't want to face the hurt that causes us to realize that maybe my relationship isn't in a great place. And that I have worked that I need to do both on myself and by communicating my desires and needs. That consciousness is what gives us the ability to do these things. And so it moves into now. I, the next one is I'm responsible for my behavior with other people, coworkers, associates, customer spouses, children's friends, et cetera.

[00:10:28] So our behavior. We have consciousness, which brings in our awareness to these pieces of our lives so that we can see what's happening. And then now it's moving in our behavior. So it's looking at the situation as a whole and also our own behavior. How am I behaving with people in my life? In my life. That's my responsibility to manage, to look at, to be honest, about to deal with.

[00:10:54] The way I treat other people is my responsibility. We can't blame other people for how we treat them our own behaviors. That's often what happens. Is you made me do this, or you made me feel bad or you did this. Which could be true. Now we can feel bad based on things that people do. I'm not saying that, but it's our responsibility for how we behave for how we respond for how we react.

[00:11:21] Ultimately, this is where that power lies is. We reclaim the responsibility for everything that we do in our lives that we have control over.

[00:11:30] The next one. Is I'm responsible for how I prioritize my time. Now this is a good one, too. Like how we manage our time, how we prioritize that time is our responsibility. What we see as important. Is going to be based upon the actions that we take. Do they align with what we're doing? Do our goals and our objectives align with our actions on a daily basis.

[00:11:54] If I claim to be a family person. That loves my family and wants to spend time with my family, but in my free time, I'm doing all kinds of things that are not involved with my family. I'm playing video games. I'm going out with buddies. I'm going to bars. I'm going golfing, whatever it may be.

[00:12:11] We have to be honest with ourself selves about how we manage our time, how we prioritize our time, and then the actions that follow. So it's our responsibility to mandatory manage and prioritize our time. No one else. It's interesting how simple these things are, but how much we forget this.

[00:12:30] The next piece is I'm responsible for the quality of my communication.

[00:12:36] That basically that mean. That effectively means. How clearly am I communicating with others? So I'm responsible for the clarity of my communication. I'm responsible. For ensuring that people understand what I'm saying, that they're clear on what I'm asking or what I'm needing. I am responsible for the quality of my communication.

[00:12:57] That again, takes effort and intention to work through, to make sure that we're communicating in ways that people can understand that they can resonate with. And that they grasp. That's the key. We have to confirm and clarify for people when they don't grasp it. So that's, our responsibility is to be.

[00:13:16] Be clear. On our communications. The quality of those communications and how well we're doing it. So ultimately that's up to us.

[00:13:25] Next here is I'm responsible for my personal happiness. That's a big one. Our personal happiness is ours to make, to create, to build, to work on. Not others. Other people are not responsible for our happiness to make us happy. You'll often hear that in relationships or in our language. I just want to make you happy. I just want to make you happy. I just want to make you X.

[00:13:54] Now we can influence someone's happiness, but ultimately it's our own responsibility to be happy. To stay happy. The world and people are not puppets in and clowns here to entertain us. So understanding that allows us to reclaim our power and know that our happiness is our own to create. Not that responsibility of others.

[00:14:21] So whenever we find ourselves falling into that trap, we have to realize that it's our own making that allows us to experience that happiness.

[00:14:29] Alright, next up I'm responsible for accepting or choosing the values by which I live.

[00:14:36] This is key. A lot of us have values and beliefs. Based on what society family culture has told us, not really what we've chosen ourselves. We have to go about a process. Of doing that of showing. What that is.

[00:14:56] Because it's on us. To remember. And learn and uncover what our true values and beliefs are.

[00:15:06] Because when we do that, we make them our own and we can reflect on what is, or isn't our own. So many of us accept values based on what has been given to us. And we go about examining them. By exploring what exists within us. And so this is where claiming responsibility for our values is so important because it becomes our power to hold.

[00:15:33] It becomes our power to claim. When we say I am responsible for my values and reflecting on them is the best way to go about understanding where we are today and then making honest, conscious decisions about. What is our values?

[00:15:51] The next one here is I'm responsible for raising my self esteem. The final one. Self-esteem varies in all of us. It's based upon the actions we take or don't, we can raise it and lower it, it will be higher and lower at different points in our lives. My self esteem, when I was a young kid, teenager.

[00:16:11] Adolescent was insanely low, same thing rolling into my twenties. I was deeply depressed. I've talked about it here on this show, but. It's not the same now. Because I've worked through these things, we can do work. To find strength to find.

[00:16:29] The power to raise that self-esteem through these actions and that's why I'm doing this show. That's why I'm doing this work is because there is. Meaningful things that we can do. Actions we can take. To raise our self-esteem. But it's our responsibility to do that. Not the responsibility of someone else.

[00:16:48] And that's the key that we have to remember. Again, like a lot of this is happiness. Self-esteem work, fulfillment, our communications. Those are our responsibilities and the same thing with raising our self-esteem it's on us to do that. So we, by accepting that responsibility by embracing that responsibility.

[00:17:07] We have the ability to make changes. And it's very powerful work simple. But we have to be consistent in it. You can apply sentence stems to each of these statements. And then do the six to 10 sentence stems that we talked about in last episode. Around those specific topics. As an example.

[00:17:30] If I here's an example. So one is I'm responsible for my personal happiness. If I were to do sentence stems on that, I would say. If I were to take responsibility for my personal happiness. Blink. And then it would be, you could say whatever. And so in this example, if I take responsibility for my personal happiness, I'll be happier.

[00:17:49] I'll feel better about my life. I'll live a more fulfilled life. I'll be more authentic to who I am. I'll have a better chance of living an honest life. I'll have a better chance of being fulfilled in my life. I'll have the best chance of living the life that I desire. So I was just obviously speaking that, but you can go about writing it.

[00:18:07] Journaling it recording it, whatever you want to do. And I will link to. The sentence stems from this. Episode that nothing of Brandon recommends.

[00:18:17] All right. So real quick, a clarification.

[00:18:19] This is not mean that people don't suffer. Through accidents or the, through the fault of others, we're not responsible for literally everything in our lives. There's a lot of things that happen outside of our control and our responsibility. I don't mean everything. We don't mean that, that we're responsible for everything in our existence. There are plenty of things that happen to us that are not in our control.

[00:18:42] People do things. That are not within our control. People do dumb things. People do mean things. People do brutal things. We live in a society that's consistently doing. Dumb brutal, goofy things all the time. That create consequences in our lives. So there are a lot of things that we're not responsible for, but what we are responsible for is how we handle those things, our responses, to those things, the actions that we take around them and how we choose to live our life.

[00:19:13] But. There are absolutely still victims in the world. I think the thing that frustrates me most about victim culture is it takes away that the reality that there are true victims and that horrible things happen in this world. That there they just happen. And they're terrible. And so knowing that doesn't mean we have to blame ourselves for everything. That's the key here is not about blaming ourselves for all the stuff that's happening in the world.

[00:19:39] A lot of people do that too. It's like a form of self abuse. So that's a quick note on clarification there, around what's happening and knowing that we're not responsible for literally everything in the world, but. Let's get in. Let's keep rolling here.

[00:19:56] The difference is. Is that we're taking a proactive approach. Instead of a passive approach to challenges and problems in life. That's what self-responsibility really means is that we are hitting the challenges. And the. Efforts the problems, the difficulties of life head on. We're not retreating from them.

[00:20:18] We're not denying them. We're not passively rolling over to them. We are proactively hitting things head on.

[00:20:26] That's the power of living self responsibly is that you're taking a proactive approach to life instead of a passive. Many of us take passive. Reactions and pads to life. And it creates struggle because we're just sitting around waiting. And there's nothing that we can do if we're serious about making our lives better. If we're taking that passive approach.

[00:20:50] It's interesting because it's easier. To be passive and to claim the victim mindset, to be a victim about the world. But it's also harder because the life that you live when you're in that state of mind is miserable. I've been there. It's miserable. And so while yes, it's easier. Quote, unquote, it's actually harder. It's worse than it is. If we take responsibility for our lives.

[00:21:16] Taking responsibility is hard, but it's so fulfilling. It's so much worth the work. Having a life that your own. That you feel it, it, you own it that you live it every day is an unbelievable accomplishment that not many people achieve. When we work towards this, accomplishing that in the feelings that we have with us, the experience that we bring to life every day.

[00:21:41] Is an incredible feat. That's why we do the work.

[00:21:44] Another aspect of this is productiveness. Work supports our existence and without effort and goals, we remain children. So work is the means to which we live as adults. We are no longer children when we become adults and we have to support ourselves. And that's ultimately what this means is that being productive, working.

[00:22:05] As what allows us to support ourselves and in live every day. And we do that through our efforts. Through our commitment to work. And so if we don't, if we're not willing to make that commitment, Then we will struggle because we're waiting for someone else to do it.

[00:22:26] That's the challenge we have to put in the effort. To support ourselves to exist, to live. And we do that via work. Lot of ways to work today in the world, which is an incredible blessing for us. Because it's so different than it was even 20 years ago, even 10 years ago. The fact that you can work for companies really all around the world. You can start your own businesses with just with ease now it's wild. So there's a lot of opportunity for us to be, as we are in the world today.

[00:23:01] Our ability to produce for ourselves supports our self-esteem. That's the another aspect of that is it's a very powerful piece to who we are and allows us to build our self-esteem when we support ourselves through our actions. So it does support and empower self-esteem. Whereas when we go. The opposite direction. If we don't take that responsibility, we can easily lower our self esteem and continue to chip away.

[00:23:30] At our self-esteem.

[00:23:31] So self-responsibility is an active approach on life. Another aspect of this as thinking for oneself. Now, this is a big one, especially in today's world, because there's so much media and so much nonsense in the world that we often get led. We get we're bombarded with information. But not very many people are truly independent thinkers in the sense that.

[00:23:53] They're deciding for themselves based on all the information that's available, what they believe about the world, even those things that conflict with their beliefs initially.

[00:24:02] Independent thinking as directly related to living consciously and living responsibly. That's why living consciously is that first pillar.

[00:24:13] But there's a direct correlation between living consciously and living responsibly because when you're living conscious, You're not ignoring information, no matter what the implications may be for our personal beliefs and how we live.

[00:24:27] When we're thinking for ourselves, we lean into consciousness and we live responsibly and we embrace what is. We observe and look at what is.

[00:24:39] Without that. We are only regurgitating what others have told us. We're just claiming thinking of on our own, but really we're just repeating. The opinions. Of others. Not. Blindly accepting without question, which again, We can exercise our most mind and our responsibility, or we can,we can pass that responsibility off to others.

[00:25:07] To government people to media, people, to journalists, to celebrities, to our family. Whatever it may be. A lot of us pass responsibility for thinking off to others. And what it does is it causes us to blindly accept things without question. The whole concept of I'm just doing my job is a prime example of that thinking horrible, brutal acts have been committed throughout time. Based on that concept of I'm just doing my job.

[00:25:36] In other words, I'm blindness, I'm blindly following orders with no question. That's a dangerous place to be. In general. If we're serious about thinking and being free, we have to take responsibility for our thinking and not just accept things. Without question, we should challenge and question everything. That's okay. That's healthy regardless.

[00:25:59] We want to challenge the ideas of the world.

[00:26:03] As thinking today is often just recycled ideas from others that I had mentioned. That's not where we are. That's not what we have to do.

[00:26:12] All right. So the interesting thing too, is that moral the moral principle. Taking self responsibility. We imply that others are free and not here to serve us and exist to meet our needs. So that's a key piece. Here is there's a sovereignty element to that. When we take self responsibility for who we are, we lean out into the world.

[00:26:35] And we know that exists for them as well. That's true for them as well. We. People do not exist for our, to here to serve us. They have their own sovereignty, their own responsibility to manage their own life, to manage. So when we embrace this, we naturally embrace it and recognize it in others.

[00:26:54] Never ask a person to act against their own self-interest as they understand it. And that's something that I think, particularly in the business world and relationships, it happens a lot. And so being aware of what that means.

[00:27:08] And trying to do our best to never ask someone to go against their own self-interest. It's a cruel thing to do really, unless it's truly those things of self sacrifice where you're saving someone, that's an act that someone has chosen. But don't ask them to do that. It's a subtle cruelty that exists throughout our world.

[00:27:28] And then the last piece of self responsibility, and then we're going to move into self assertiveness. Is. No one is coming to save us. No one. The quicker we allow that to sink in. The quicker we can begin to make change and take responsibility for our lives. No one is coming to save us. And that's okay.

[00:27:50] We have all that we need now. Now that doesn't mean we're alone in the universe. It doesn't mean we've been. Spun out into the universe and it will cold dark world on our own. But no one is going to save us. We have all the tools and abilities that we need now. Or the potential for them to be developed, but it's our responsibility to to save ourselves, to claim our live.

[00:28:15] Lives and save ourselves. So relinquish that idea, the quicker we can come to that truth. The quicker we can progress and move forward. As a species. All right. So now we got the practice. Of self assertiveness coming up. So self responsibility was the third pillar of self-esteem. Now we're looking at self assertiveness, self assertive. This means honoring my wants, needs, and values and a seeking and seeking appropriate forms of their expression and reality. Self assertiveness basically means that I have needs. I have, once I D I have desires. And I will pursue them. I will go about doing that in an appropriate means. So not abusing. Being evil, crazy corrupt to achieve those things. But I will. It's my responsibility. To honor those things and I will go about doing it.

[00:29:08] By asserting my wants, needs and desires.

[00:29:12] Self-assertive is not belligerence and trampling over others to meet our needs. Just as we had mentioned a second ago. We're all doing this. All of us are doing the same thing. So we can't trample over others to get what we want. That would be going against what we know to be true about the responsibility that we carry and the actions that we take as individuals and recognizing that no one is here to serve us and that each of us are doing the same thing.

[00:29:38] Belligerence and trampling and aggression is not what self assertiveness is about. We have to honor ourselves and we honor others. But we have a right to communicate and go after what we desire. We're not entitled to those things, but we absolutely are entitled to the pursuit of those things.

[00:29:57] Even looking at it life here in America, the pursuit of happiness that was once meant to be the practice of happiness. That's the Liberty that we carry. That's the right, the pursuit, the practice of happiness. Not at the expense of others. But what we can create for ourselves.

[00:30:12] Self assertiveness is the willingness to stand firm. Stand up for myself and treat myself with respect and all human encounters. So again, it's honoring who we are. And speaking out, standing up for myself. The things that I want, the things that I need, drawing boundaries, people have a hard time to do this. Self assertiveness is very difficult for some people.

[00:30:36] But this is what it's about. We have to speak out, we have to stand up for ourselves. We have to draw boundaries. We have to communicate and it's a practice. Remember. All of these are practices. They take time. We do it day by day, bit by bit. We learn, we fall off, we make mistakes, we get back on it and we do it again.

[00:30:54] Authenticity and self assertiveness are connected. We assert ourselves, our true identity, our authenticity by being assertive, by communicating who we are. So authenticity is tied up in this. By being our authentic selves, we assert who we are. We communicate who you are, what we need. What makes us unique? What we love, what we don't love.

[00:31:17] Our likes our dislikes. That's what makes us unique. And we do that. We express that by our assertiveness.

[00:31:24] All right. So self assertives. Is not. A few things here, right?

[00:31:29] So what it is and what it is not, what is the most basic act of self assertiveness is consciousness being conscious, being mindful. Asking questions, challenging authority expressing our being is all self assertiveness.

[00:31:48] By bringing consciousness to life, to existence. We are asserting ourselves. We are asserting who we are. And that's the power of self assertiveness combined with consciousness. So consciousness again, is that foundation to this.

[00:32:03] It's the most basic act of self assertiveness is bringing consciousness to life.

[00:32:08] And so consciousness is key here. It's not just simply rebelling without consciousness, if we're rebelling without consciousness. And there's a good chance that we are. Going to be it's a mindless rebellion. And it's a reflective resistance, even when it's a good thing. This is often seen in teenagers, right? Like you'll tell them that you want them to do something and they just say no, for the very fact of saying no,

[00:32:32] And. When we're young, that makes sense. It's the process of separating. We're growing up, we're going through our adolescents were rebelling against the world. We're finding who we are, but if we don't break that habit and we carried on into life, which is what many people do, we literally do things that go against our own interest in wellbeing, simply for the fact that we are rebelling.

[00:32:50] Not because we're choosing to rebel, but because we're reflexively, rebelling, it's habitual. That's dangerous because it often goes against. Our own. Goodness in what we want and what we actually desire. So being mindful of that, where we're being reflexively rebellious in moments.

[00:33:09] Self assertiveness entails bringing ourselves into the world, not just. Not just sitting around, not just aspirations. We actually get out and we get into the arena. That's a key thing here. It ties into idealism to. Is I, this is something that Nathaniel Brandon says about idealist, and he says that this is one of the most self diluting beliefs that we can have. Is that.

[00:33:36] In the eye, the idealist has this vision of the world. But they don't bring action with it. So they declare my ideals are better than what the world has. And therefore I am better, but I know this, so I don't need to take action, but it's my ideals that are enough. As long as I have this idealistic version of the world.

[00:33:55] Then I have overcome what is. And his point is that's delusional because really it's just in your head and you did something. We tell ourselves a lot. I've been idealistic a lot, bout a lot of things in my life. Relationships work. My relationship with my parents, a lot of things that I had to work on and overcome because I was wrong. I was simply wrong about what I believe in what I thought regarding these pieces.

[00:34:23] So remember that actions, ideas without action is really just daydreaming and thinking in our mind and really not doing much to do it. And it will over time create misery. If we don't change or we don't create action to support it.

[00:34:36] Again, my life is my own and not others. It's a key piece that's repeated throughout this, but it's important to understand that my life is my own. And not others. My life does not belong to others. My life is my own and I, others do not belong to me. That's the key here.

[00:34:55] Ideas at work must be fought for, to bring them to life. Ideas are not enough. That's what I was mentioning earlier about work and just. Entrepreneurship business, whatever. We have to fight for the things that we want. Our ideas we have to push them. Coming up with ideas is not enough of being accountable. Taking action.

[00:35:14] Pulling in people that we need pulling in stakeholders. If there's multiple people involved with what we need, then it's our responsibility to go about doing that. This is how we participate in life instead of spectating, instead of wishing, instead of waiting. We assert ourselves and our desires, our ideas, and we push to bring them to life. Now we don't, we're not pushy. We're not inconsiderate when we do these things, we're mindful of the fact that others also do this.

[00:35:43] But we relinquish the idea that someone else will do it for us. It is our own responsibility in that. I need to collect and move together. And if I have to pull resources and teammates and all of these things, then it's on me to do that. That's an empowering position. It's also. Terrifying.

[00:36:04] Self assertiveness confronts life challenges, and doesn't avoid them. There's so much avoidance right now in our world. Pain avoidance. We're all seeking to avoid pain. We don't grow when we do that. And we just live in our comfort zone and particularly the world that we live in now, it's an endless amount of.

[00:36:22] Placating and soothing ourselves with. All the things that we have, social media, video games, porn, I've talked about a lot of this stuff, sports. Ido you need balance all this? I'm not saying we don't live a fun life. But if we're spending hours and hours a day, every day, Distracting ourselves from what matters, then we're not serving who we are and what we really care about.

[00:36:44] And we're only going to be more unhappy as we go on in life because it just gets further and further away from what we truly desire.

[00:36:51] A real serious thing too, is the fear of self assertiveness. Is in fitting in versus standing out. And that's a key thing. Here is a lot of people. Choose to stay within the herd because they don't want to stand out. Self assertiveness naturally stands out. Because you're asserting yourself and your desires and your needs and your wants regardless.

[00:37:15] Of what society may say. And that's a scary place to be. So it takes a lot of courage to do that.

[00:37:21] This is an individuation process. Throughout history. So many brilliant minds have talked about becoming a whole individual, knowing thyself. Connecting to who we are. The interesting thing is though when we know ourselves, when we develop an individual relationship with ourselves. It empowers us to have relationships with others because we now understand the inner dynamics of human relationship and what it takes to be successful and fulfilled and be happy.

[00:37:48] That knowledge, we carry into relationships with others, understanding they to have those needs and desires and the way we can go about communicating that. Is through this work. So the it's a bit of a conundrum that individuation actually gives us this empowered position to be in relationships with other people.

[00:38:09] It's about this individuation process is about bringing our whole self into the world. All of who we are, all that we desire, the loves the. The beliefs, the values, the cares, the likes dislikes. It's about bringing our whole self into the world. When we don't do that, when we don't express ourselves, we are hurting our self-esteem by suppressing who we are. And this happens a lot. We go about life, not pursuing what we truly desire out of fear, whatever it may be. Fear of money, fear of our parents, fear of society, fear of failure, fear of whatever people think. All kinds of fears. But over time that erodes our self-esteem and our relationship with ourselves. And we end up being miserable.

[00:38:52] Until we learn to honor who we are. And being honest with who we are and expressing ourselves fully, we can't really. Develop a healthy level of self-esteem without that honesty and authenticity. And that's why this last piece here. Is courage. To do all of this to be assertive, to be responsible, to be conscious, to accept ourselves. And it is it's scary. It takes a lot of courage to do this work, to stand out from the crowd to move away from the comfort of the tribe.

[00:39:26] There's risks for ridicule and ostracization, all of those things, but that's what makes it so rewarding. Is it's a courageous act to do that. To do this work is a courageous act. It's a powerful act.

[00:39:42] That can truly change your life and your world if you're willing to do what's necessary.

[00:39:49] So at courageous today, folks, you got it within you. I know you do. So that's it for today's episode, we'll have the remaining two pillars on next week's episode. And then I'll wrap the five-part series the week after that kind of bringing it all together. I really hope you're enjoying this. Series, I've been loving this Nathaniel Brandon's work is brilliant.

[00:40:09] So I really hope you're getting some value out of it. So until next time y'all would that being said. She is

[00:40:16] Thank you for listening to order within. If you found the episode helpful, please consider sharing rating and subscribing new episodes will be released every Thursday at 11:00 AM. Eastern standard time until next time y'all.