A Mason's Work

[00:00] it's not your fault.
[00:03] You very likely grew up in an environment where they rewarded you for being able to solve problems.
[00:13] And in the process of being able to solve problems,
[00:17] you attached some of your value as a person to that capacity.
[00:23] So when your friend comes to you with a problem,
[00:27] you go into the pattern of trying to be the person who solves problems,
[00:34] because that's how you got your treat when you were a kid.
[00:39] It may be how you get your treat now,
[00:42] where you are this crucial figure in someone's life,
[00:48] and your ability to help solve their problems is how you feel good as a person.
[00:57] This is not uncommon.
[01:00] It's something that I think a lot of us struggle with.
[01:05] And in the process of being able to separate yourself from that need in you,
[01:13] you begin to gain the ability to meaningfully help others.
[01:19] See, here's the thing with a lot of this stuff when it comes to helping other people.
[01:25] If we give them the solution, they learn nothing.
[01:30] If we give them the solution because that's what makes you feel good as a person,
[01:35] not only do they not learn anything,
[01:39] you're feeding the wrong behavior in yourself.
[01:43] This is why it becomes vitally important to understand that every opportunity that presents itself,
[01:49] every struggle in your own life,
[01:51] every struggle brought to you and presented to you on a platter by a friend or a loved one
[01:58] is an opportunity to work your own stone.
[02:03] How do I respond to this?
[02:05] Do I satisfy my own ego and give them the answer?
[02:11] Do I satisfy my own discomfort with their struggle and make it go away?
[02:19] Do I cement my relationship as the person who solves problems at their expense,
[02:28] at their loss of autonomy and agency and capacity?
[02:31] Do I have a question?
[02:35] This understanding, this knowledge that the things that happen and arise in our everyday life
[02:40] are the work and how we interact with others and how we consider their work in our own space
[02:50] is its own opportunity for additional work is very, very challenging
[02:56] because you don't really understand.
[02:59] Oftentimes, your behavior is on autopilot.
[03:04] You are working with a pattern of stuff that you're bringing to the table from years and years and years ago.
[03:11] And here's the thing, like, helping feels good.
[03:16] We're told it's good.
[03:18] You were literally taught to share and help other people with their problems
[03:24] and do all of these things in your upbringing.
[03:27] Okay.
[03:29] So how do you deprogram that without losing the essence of compassion,
[03:34] without losing the essence of what it means to work with others and yet not fix it for them?
[03:43] We'll get to more of this as we talk.
[03:49] But the first thing that we want to be mindful of is when we hear a problem,
[03:57] feel deeply into the problem itself, not the solve.
[04:05] Feel deeply into the person who's expressing this to you, the safety that they feel in sharing their issue with you.
[04:17] Feel deeply into the relatedness itself rather than biting on the problem.
[04:27] Because if you take that bait, you will walk down a path of solving the problem,
[04:33] and it will lead you to another meaningful challenge.
[04:40] We talk about this too, because if you give somebody a solution to a problem,
[04:47] and they don't act on it, what happens to the relationship then?
[04:55] Think about your own behavior here.
[04:58] Think about the times where you had somebody give you well-meaning advice,
[05:02] but you couldn't follow it.
[05:04] And then they got mad at you.
[05:05] The emotional content increased, not decreased.
[05:09] The relatedness decreased.
[05:11] The separation increased.
[05:14] What we're trying to do here as fellow people working in the quarry,
[05:19] working on ourselves, working on our own stuff,
[05:21] is to be close to each other with our work, not separate.
[05:25] And we'll talk more about that in tomorrow's episode.