What if i don't fit into the system?

Systems are put in place to help people or things to grow, it’s a structure for development, a way for assessing progress. They are good for society. We needs structures. A home without structure is dysfunctional, a business without a structure will not thrive. 

Systems can also suffocate, and they do when we think the structure is an end to itself. Instead of the structure or system serving the people the people serve the system. 

If someone built a fence with a hammer you would not give the credit to the hammer when they were done. You would appreciate having the ability to use a hammer as it is extremely helpful and necessary in the process but the hammer itself does not take the credit for the fence being built. So to a system is a hammer, it is a tool. 

And at some point in all of our lives our emotional, psychological or practical  systems break down.

By ‘systems’ I mean any internal or external mechanism we self-construct to make our life’s feel more comfortable. The beliefs we hold about people or ourselves, the ability to predict, make sense of and control any area of our lives.  

At some point they stop working for us, (sometimes one at a time and sometimes all in one go, i.e. midlife crisis) and we find that we are stuck, we are outcast, the place that used to make us feel comfortable no longer does.

So what am I left with?

If I am In touch with who I truly am before I created the system, then this is just another opportunity for growth, a new adventure, a journey. It can be an exciting challenge. Like a snakes skin shedding, I let go of the old and embrace the new. 

But 

If the system was how I identified myself, this is very scary, because when the system has fallen from beneath me I no longer have identification, I am a hollow emptiness.

When fitting in becomes the goal, wearing the right clothes is the most important thing. Doing what people expect me to do so I will be respected is most important and especially when it comes to our self image… oh, we have created the biggest, most daunting and beautiful structures in our own heads that outline exactly what we expect of ourselves and if we let ourselves down in any way? The pain is tremendous. Because we have forgotten that we are not the system, we are not the hammer and we are not the business, we are so much more! As a result of the pain that I feel because I have forgot who I truly am, I close off my heart, it turns into stone, we treat the pain by amputating the limb. 

I remember as a small child having a pain in my toe and imagining that if only I could cut off my toe then the pain would go away. We do that with our hearts, the source of the pain is my heart, if I cut off contact I will feel no pain. 

But if your heart is the tool for feeling it means that yes now you feel no pain but you also feel no joy, no love, no connection, no passion, no hope, no grief, no sadness, no longing, no desire. 

The result of not feeling, of having a wall of stone around our hearts is isolation, loneliness and disconnection from myself and others. I could be in a room full of people and feel alone, in a life full of joy and feel nothing....

When the pain of this is too great I am compelled towards addiction (and there are many varieties that are not drugs or alcohol, I.e anxiety, co-dependency, food, any form of drama in life, overwhelm, panic, work etc) the external passions that temporarily leads me to feeling alive again, but it never really quenches the pain and that’s why I always need to up my game, adding more and more for the high of yesterday is no longer good enough, today needs more, and I need to feed it constantly because if I stop I am left with the pain of my lonely heart. 

The next stage is I lose self-awareness, I am not even aware that I am doing this, and after that I become aware but my head and my heart are so deeply disconnected that my awareness has no effect on me, I know I am an addict and that changes nothing, it only adds to the torcher because I can see that I am self-destructing and I know what I should and could be doing yet I am not and so the self-hate sinks in deeper and deeper...

Systems are important, they are there for when they work, but if someone has fallen of the wagon, I.e. they started identifying with the system as who they are and the resulting emotional breakdown has occurred, they need a way back, and the way back is NOT through the system 

You can’t expect a child who is anxious to do well at school, or to get to bed on time. 

You can’t expect someone who is drunk to build a strong straight fence even if he has the best tools in the world.

And you can’t expect a mother to be able to nurture her children if she is only concerned with what people will think. I.e the child needs a little extra help... but then people will think there is something wrong with her and she will be looked down upon.  

As a mother I need to make sure that my child has their physical needs met, I dress them, I feed them, I take them to school, I pick them up, we do homework and eat supper, brush teeth and go to bed and yes every single one of these things is important. But if I haven’t stopped to think why I am doing these things or looked passed the physical activities to the people within, if I haven’t looked into my child’s eyes and smiled, if It’s just about getting the job done and being on time I have missed the point. If my child becomes another job to me, from the child’s perspective they would rather I didn’t bother, this is intensely painful and lonely for the child. All of us need and crave emotional connection. The stony face experiment shows to what length Baby’s will go to get attention and connection from there mothers, not physically, emotionally.  As humans we need real true deep connection from the heart with those around us and on a deeper level this is in truth connection with Hashem. 

When your child decides they don’t want to get dressed or eat breakfast, or at any point they stop cooperating with the system it’s because they feel the connection is missing, and they are trying to get it back, they just don’t know how. They need they eye contact, the smiles, the loving touch, the laughter, the chatting, the time to be with you, they need your presence and your compassion. 

When systems don’t work we need to take another route.

That route is compassion and honesty

Compassion/ true empathy is the attribute of truth because it’s always accessible. Honesty and compassion go hand in hand, compassion is awakened when the truth is acknowledged and accepted.

Love has limitations, you can’t love everyone, so does discipline, there are times when it doesn’t work, but compassion? You can always have compassion if you are willing to be truly honest. 

Honesty means you see reality as it is, with no distortions. the truth always has two sides, equal and opposite. 

Compassion and honesty are the route that take you over the quantum gap. They take you to the place before the system, the place where the system comes from.

Deepak chopra writes in his book, quantum healing, about his research on spontaneous remissions. He explains that there is a quantum gap between the conscious thoughts, feelings and physiology of a person and the source of the thoughts, feelings and physical conditions. when we reset the source (the cellular memory) then the conscious thoughts, feelings and physiological responses from the body automatically change. 

If every year 98% of your body’s cells are brand new why do you still have the same health conditions year after year? You cannot see a difference physically between active and dormant DNA. 

Yes we have many thoughts but from where are the thoughts generated? There is no part of our brain that can be labelled as the source of our thoughts. 

The controller of the body’s wellness or sickness lies beyond the quantum gap, a place that is not in the physical reality of the body but instantly effects it. 

To reach there and press the recent button is the quantum journey a person must travel to experience a spontaneous remission.

How do we move over the quantum gap to reset the cellular memory?

Through honesty and compassion. 

Honest and compassionate communication with what is already present, breathing into the pain and yet knowing that it it does not define you, you define it.

 In a mimor by the Alta Rebba, in Torah or called “shuva Yisroel” He explains that the concept of the Baal teshuva is the one who overrides the system, he over rides the system of the tzadik because he is broken, he goes to the place of Hashems essence before He expresses himself in the world and in the spiritual systems he put in place. How does the person make that quantum leap to wipe the slate clean, to be lifted from the depth of disappear to the loving embrace of the one who truly knows the depth of his goodness.

When I have lost touch with who I truly am I can at least acknowledge the truth, that I have lost touch. I can acknowledge that in truth my potential is beyond my ability to comprehend, I am a chaylek  eloki memal mamesh, and I don’t even know what that really means. I can have compassion on the fact that I don’t even know who I truly am, and if I can’t have compassion on that because I don’t feel compassion, I can have compassion on the fact that I can’t even have compassion on who I truly am and if I can’t even do that I can have compassion on the spark within me that is so far from its source and is so lonely and pained by its separation... and I know it’s pain intimately because it’s pain is my pain... and if I cant feel it’s pain I need to stop feeding my addiction and it will return instantly. 

 I return to myself through honesty and compassion compassion overrides all, it’s through the recognition of the truth of who I am, the recognition that I don’t even know the truth of who I am, the recognition that the truth of who I really am is so much more then I could ever images... this brings me to a place above the system. 

Never let a system override the truth, if the system becomes untrue or non compassionate its time to override the system and create a new one.