Ever since I was young, family was everything.
From the moment I was born, the first others I felt and saw were my family. I was the first-born child on both my mother’s and father’s side – and there was much celebration and many photo shoots, family gatherings and doting, just about me. From the very beginning, I was deeply loved and cared for. From my Mum and Dad, aunties and uncles to the grandparents, I took centre stage. Every move was watched, every word spoken and heard. I was the golden child with everything laid at my feet. With all of this attention, there was nothing I could do that was wrong.
With all the fussing came something underlying. I felt exalted, not just from being me, but for what it was I could do. I was the one others could tell their friends about and boast to their neighbours about. I was the ultimate distraction for many from their own lives. In all this, the expectations were enormous. The first-born baby and a son, too. What would become of me? Would I become a builder like my grandfathers? Maybe an engineer? Maybe I was so intelligent that I could become a doctor or lawyer? This would make everyone proud, to see the first-born son become something great.
I soon learned that if I acted in a certain way, more attention came my way. If I smiled on cue, did things that made people laugh and did all the things that pleased them, there was much in it for me. I could get my needs met at the drop of a hat and all the attention I wanted.
This was all rosy, with it all going my way; I had it made, or so I thought. But next came something that really rocked my little bubble – along came some brothers and then sisters and I was no longer ‘the one.’ Now there were others that were smaller and cuter and who got all the attention. How could I compete with this?
There was no amount of looking brighter or being better that could compete with what I was up against, so by trial and error I found what worked for me was going into my shell. In the withdrawal, the attention came again; not in the form previously, but nevertheless it was there and at this stage of the game I would take whatever I could get. My family would say “What’s wrong with you? Why are you so sad? Would you like this or that to cheer you up?” Again, the game was on.
With this way, I learned that I could manage life quite well. I could get all the attention I needed by not engaging with life, by disconnecting from the world and waiting for others to connect with me. My move was strategically planned and fail-safe, or so I thought.
As I got older, into my teenage years, I discovered that not everyone wanted to be around someone so withdrawn. I often felt isolated and alone. For a long time I lived like this, knowing all along that there must be more. Things didn’t add up. Surely there must be more to life than the constant merry-go-round of seeking recognition from others in this way.
It took going through a family breakup and the support of Universal Medicine practitioners for me to realise that the way I had set things up was causing the problem.
From there, what I started to feel was my own connection within. The more I allowed myself to feel this connection, the less I felt I needed approval and recognition from others. For the first time in a long time, I was feeling what I knew deep down to be me. It had been there all along – I just chose to not connect within to my own essence.
Bit by bit I realised that with this connection with myself, I could also connect with others in a different way than I was used to. I felt I could let go of trying to be a certain way and be me, without the concern of what others might think. I’m finding now the more connected I am with me, the less something can come in and rock me, as the foundation of my connection strengthens.
When I start to feel rejected, I don’t need to withdraw any more as there is the connection with myself that has a steadiness and where I feel truly held and cared for. This connection is always there to connect to when I choose.
This beautiful relationship I am developing with myself is one that doesn’t stand still; it asks nothing of me but to be just who I am.
By Chris Vale, Mechanical Fitter/Welder, Bunbury, Western Australia
Further Reading:
Acceptance
Packaging and Opening Us Up
Returning to our essence
511 Comments
Super simple and super confirming of the fact that we are never alone when we develop a loving, connected, respectful and interactive relationship with ourselves. Thank you, Chris.
This is a great point to make Matilda – “…the fact that we are never alone when we develop a loving, connected, respectful and interactive relationship with ourselves.” A great reminder for all of us and something to really connect to as it will make everyone’s life so much more rich and gorgeous.
The inner connection you talk about Chris, brings the steadiness that holds us regardless of the intensity of what’s happening around us. And it is delicate, ever so exquisite and unwavering in its beholding quality of ourselves and everybody else. It is the hallmark of true strength and power – nothing pushy, forceful or muscle-driven – simply the ever constant steady holding of the love we are.
The connection to oneself never fails, it goes with us through thick and thin and it gets deeper and vaster, more encompassing. It is fail proof and the most delicious and fulfilling good one could ever wish for.
Agree Joshua – a very honest and wise blog that reveals that before anything – our connection to ourselves is first and foremost. Thank you Chris! – A wonderful blog!
Your beautiful words remind me that we already have everything we seek.
Absolutely Leonne, hence why it is exhausting to seek anything that is outside of ourselves, i.e, love, connection, religion, God and the list goes on and on.
Hear hear – all we need to do is allow it to come to the forefront and feel it in every cell 🙂
Thank you for such honesty of what it was like growing up for you. For a first born especially if it is a boy there are such huge expectations for the future. I know from my experience with my brother that there was a massive expectation from the family for him to succeed even if he wasn’t the first born and the girls in the family were left in no doubt that they were not at all important. And in many cultures this divide still plays out.
What a gorgeous piece of writing from a man and something to be deeply appreciated and celebrated. Connection is especially rare with men because of their guarded protections so very beautiful to read and feel indeed
I agree Joshua. It is truly beautiful when men express what they feel. I’m sure this blog will inspire many men to do the same.
Yes, it is very inspiring. It is establishing a foundation that it is safe to be transparent and vulnerable.
Yes, it is touching when men (and women too) express as they are without the protections. This is how we bridge the divide that can creep into our relationships. Being ourselves… yes to that.
I agree, we are all sensitive and it is beautiful when a man expresses what he feels.
Really beautiful indeed and opens up so much more then for all …
You said it – a game. Exactly that is what it is – all the tactics and strategies we cultivate as we attempt to go through life relatively unscathed, and to secure our identity. It is so liberating when we come out of it and are able to see through it all, and start to choose simplicity of just connecting with who we truly are.
Building our confidence on the approval of others seems great while the illusion lasts. But it seems all it takes is one rejection to expose the cracks in such a false facade and for the doubts and insecurities to seep in.
Learning to deeply appreciate ourselves and take care of ourselves so we know we are running on all cylinders, and gauging a job well done by the quality with which we can feel for ourselves, on the other hand, offers a confidence that is not dependent on the whims, beliefs and judgments of others.
Beautifully described Chris, we all developed a variety of ways to get the recognition, approval and acceptance that we craved and yet all the time we missed the point that we withdrew and rejected ourselves.
Chris thank you for sharing, how beautiful it feels to be able to connect to our essence. Our Essence is always there from the moment we are born, like you many of us lost our connection to our essence and was looking for it outside or us. Thanks Universal Medicine we where shown how to reconnect back to our own essence.
There are so many lessons we learn as children, from all our relationships, and the hurts we feel that we carry with us into adulthood, unless we have parents or mentors who can help us deal with them.
It’s quite amazing how duped people are in to believing that they must fulfill the pictures of life and how having a first son in the family is such a relief and not a joy for everyone . Thanks for sharing Chris.
Coming back to the connection with myself when I am feeling out of sorts, when things seem too out of control or if I have reacted to what someone has said or done, is one of the most valuable tools that I have in my ‘self-love tool kit’. Taking the time to stop in these moments and to feel where I’m at quickly shows me that I have simply disconnected from me and from there I have disconnected from everything else around me; no wonder then that life starts to unravel.
When something comes up in a relationship our immediate response is to blame the other person, be it directly or indirectly, it’s to do with ‘their’ behaviour that’s messing up the flow. But what if we were the ones who configured a set up where, for example, no one takes the lead or initiates moving forward, there is one sided support, sometimes we’re ‘too busy’ to have a decent conversation and so forth? Until we’ve deeply considered this ourselves, can we really point fingers?
So true Susie, a relationship is about how we relate to each other and how we relate to ourselves. When we just step back and make it all about the other person we don’t evolve, for we don’t look at what we are bringing to the relationship and how are we being. I see this play out at work and in families all of the time. It’s amazing how all the game playing just stops when we look at our reflection.
What games we play to get love and recognition yet none achieve true, lasting success. It is only when we stop playing the games do we achieve this.
Games are so tedious – how much more fulfilling when we just be who we truly are through connecting to our selves and reflecting this connection and others may choose to connect too.
This is so crucial to develop and honour the connection within, we will often be rejected for all sorts of reasons and to know how to return within when the outside is seemingly rejecting you which feels very personal, but in my experience is never personal, is a true support not just a way of getting through.
The expectations of others can be a heavy burden on us and many cope by manipulating this circumstance to their own apparent advantage. However in learning how to amend our behaviour to make us more acceptable to others we lose our connection to our essence and inevitably have to face the devastation of this at some stage (unless we find other behaviours to avoid this). It’s lovely to feel the solidness of your connection with you Chris and it would be great to get an update of your evolving relationship with you in the future.
How beautiful to have a relationship with life which doesn’t have any withdrawal. Or very little. The things we pick up in childhood we can actually be living as adults, out behaviours, reactions are not simply ‘us’ but have a traceable pathway back to what we have experienced and chosen as a consequence. How beautifully you have shown the self empowerment in all of this Chris.
Thank you Chris for exposing the way so many of us behave as a consequence of attempting to make sense of the world and our relationships. Universal Medicine restores the sense, our connection with our innate love and through the healing modalities and workshops, empowers us to relinquish the hurts that we used to block our vitality and wisdom. It is truly miraculous to witness this re-emergence into who we truly are, a joy to see the sparkle returning to people’s eyes and bodies as they re-embrace their unique expression and truth.
Recently I found myself in a small group of people where one of the group left me out when introducing someone he knew. I clocked immediately what had happened and found myself at a point where I could either indulge in the rejection or do something about it. I did something about. I read the situation and introduced myself. I chose to not play victim, accept what had happened and not allow another to try to bring me down because I was feeling and looking amazing.
Caroline, a similar situation occurred with me recently and I immediately nipped the situation in the bud by introducing myself. I am no longer the wall flower standing in the shadows happy not to be seen.
Thank you for sharing this Caroline and your clear simple steps of not indulging in reaction, reading the situation, and taking action. Essentially you chose to stay with your essence.
Well claimed Caroline. It is so important to not allow ourselves to feel less simply because another has either shut us out, rejected or simply forgotten to mention us. There is no reason others should miss out on an introduction to another, because of how one other person feels.
We love to be loved and the center point in other peoples lives and I can remember the same thing when my younger brothers were born that there was some readjusting in my ways to get attention. Yet I wonder if we would be truly loved from the moment we were born if this would still be the case. Attention is not the same as true love and I think that what we feel when there is another more cute and more small brother or sister born that then gets all the attentions, is the fact it was not true love, as that is always equal there for all and we would not feel like missing out. We then would also learn from young that we are love and how to confirm and love ourselves, this would change our world.
Attention is not the same as meeting, knowing and loving each other and ourselves in essence. Thank you Lieke.
Great to put the emphasis on this here Melinda as it is a great marker and something we can watch out for.
I enjoyed the candid nature of this blog and how open and honestly you’ve shared here Chris. Thank you.
Thank you Chris. Beautiful that you have arrived at a place within where you feel held and steady, without need of approval or recognition from outside yourself.
Re-connection to who we are within is an incredible restorer of all those old hurts. In the action of this its beautiful to feel those needs from others drop away.
Our connection becomes everything, because we feel that there is no such thing as being isolated, even though we may be alone. If we are feeling isolated or withdrawing we soon learn that we are off track and disconnected from the wonder and everything that we are.
Yes all we have to do is check in and look at our livingness and we can quickly make a change if we have not been with our selves, reconnecting, checking in and starting anew – this is possible any time for anyone.
Chris thank you for sharing your story, it is very confirming to read both to reflect on my life and also to consider what my daughter will be experiencing now as she grows up. I love your line “The more I allowed myself to feel this connection, the less I felt I needed approval and recognition from others.” as this was the same for me when I came to Universal Medicine, its that feeling of connection with myself that is the foundation of everything and when I loose that connection nothing else matters until I feel the connection again.
Reading Chris’s story brought home for me too of what my sons feel around them from family and friends and how they are with that. It’s great to talk about these things and check in with ourselves of do we change or not.
Perfect Chris.. the games we play, how well we play them, and what damage they can do (especially as they feed not only the emptiness in ourselves, but equally are the other side required for everyone else in the family to continue playing out their own version). But building a relationship with yourself, as simple an antidote as it sounds, has immense power to break it down and show the world something real.
Sure Simon, if we can let go the individual need and see that there is something grander to adhere to we can connect to the truth of our being and with that to the grandness we are. That is then what we show to the world and bring into our families and which is as you say very real because we all do know it from deep inside.
“The more I allowed myself to feel this connection, the less I felt I needed approval and recognition from others” This is gold Chris. Seeking recognition from others is never enough as there will always be the desire for more, if not now then tomorrow or the next day, It can be like a drug. Connecting deeply with ourselves enables us to feel we are enough, without that neediness.
Yes Sue, seeking recognition is like an insatiable hunger never filled, connecting deeply with ourselves, to the love that we are, the hunger disappears as the emptiness is not there.
Beautiful analogy with the hunger – and our true connection is so yummy we don’t need recognition or acknowledgement from others then as we deeply know and embrace who we are.
Beautiful sharing Chris, it made me look at how I was the youngest in the family for four years and then a baby brother came along. This may explain a lot of how I also chose to withdraw. Finding that connection with self is such an important part of the puzzle of life and opens us up to be enjoyed by everyone.
It is such a delicate shift to make, between withdrawing into our selves verses re-connecting to our inner essence. One choice brings down the shutters, the other opens the door to our hearts and allows all our playfulness and love to flood out.
“This beautiful relationship I am developing with myself is one that doesn’t stand still; it asks nothing of me but to be just who I am.” A beautiful relationship that is the foundation for all relationships and connection with others.
Chris, thank you for sharing this, I can feel that in the past I have done this too and actually I have also done this as an adult; ‘by trial and error I found what worked for me was going into my shell. In the withdrawal, the attention came again’, in recent years I have found that this is not a joyful way to live and that it is very up and down and so what I do now if I feel sad or upset is to talk about and express what it is I am feeling so that I do not have to experience the pain of withdrawing; expressing what I am feeling means that I do not shrink away and so I feel more empowered and consistent because of this.
When we re-establish our connection with ourselves, the world becomes a simple place, which requires nothing from outside of us to make us complete.
Yes, so true Steve and as we build trust with our inner world we are able to stop looking outside of us and trust what is within and know that what is within has been there all along, patiently waiting for us to re-connect.
Trust is a huge and fundamental part of our relationship with ourselves and the rest of the world. When we’re always tuning in, listening and responding to what we can feel, we naturally have our own backs, without needing anything from anyone or anything else.
I agree Bryony. I had very little trust in myself or the world and from building the connection with myself, with my body, what I feel guides me. I have my own knowing and with this I go out into the world.
We all developed strategies that got us the attention, that subsistuted the love we were missing in ourselves. Once we discover that this love is still there inside of us, these strategies will fall away.
Reading your blog Chris was like reading my own life story and once more I confirm that there is no other way than re-developing a true connection with ourselves. The stories whether same or different they are nothing but stories.
Thank you for being such a clear mirror .
The lovely thing about connecting with ourselves is that through that we connect with everyone else and as you describe we often find we all once had the same stories – maybe different flavours of separation but basically a story the exposes the hurt of the disconnection and the consequences of living in that way.
Many of us (and everyone eventually) are also blessed to share the story of the joy and glory of the reconnection 🙂
The stories are so familiar to us all as we are all ONE when we are choosing to make life about the whole than one self.
Why would we ever feel rejected when we are in that connection with our inner most in which we do know we are part off and in continuous connected to the all?
Nico thats a great point, whenever I feel that connection with myself the thought of rejection does not come in. The case in point is there can be two very similar situations occurring and based on how I am with myself I approach and am different with both of these. In One I get to feel horrible and worthless, i.e. when I feel that rejection and the hurt. And in the other I have more understanding and continue on with my day. The difference is me and how I choose to be.
Well said Nico – the simplicity of truth exposing the complication and lies of rejection and other emotional states that we believe to be the truth of who we are.
When we are in it for ‘self’ we are master manipulators, ever ready to bend and mould ourselves to our desired external experience. By handing the reigns over to this part of ourselves (the human spirit) we lose connection to our true self (our Soul), the part of us that does not wait for the outer world to confirm the truth we know ourselves in essence to be but more so allows us to bring forth into the world all the love that we are.
In an often turbulent and emotion-based world it is easy to get rocked frequently and want to withdraw, especially if there is no steadiness or knowing within to cope with what arises. To develop a connection to ourselves and with that an inner knowing and strength is of paramount importance for it to consistently support us to remain unshaken as we move through life.
so true to me Samantha, life is rocky and is constantly trying to take us out of that connection we all innately are born with.
Yes Samantha, I used to get rocked all the time and withdrew as a result feeling not able to cope, this was not the answer though. Developing connection to myself I no longer react in the way I used to.. withdrawing from life. As I build my connection my steadiness continues to build and my own knowing of how to deal with life is naturally there.
Beautiful Samantha. Yes, agreed. When I a have a steady rhythm and routine, nurture myself, express how I feel – commit to life, I develop an ever-increasing self-appreciation which supports when things get a little tough. When I feel a bit bombarded or thrown it is my rhythm and self-nurture that I return to.
When I feel more spacious it allows me to be more of me, there is less need to be confined to look or act in a certain or particular way. This confinement could be what I have picked up from those around when young or it could be what I have allowed myself to see. What does it mean to be me? This is what I have questioned…and I feel it is actually with space that I am discovering this deeper, as when there is more space I can feel much more than when I have been stuffed full of ideals and beliefs.
Beautifully written Chris, so deeply honest and accountable with much for me to ponder on with some similar patterns arising as a first-born too. I have either used striving for achievement or withdrawal as means for recognition, and agree that the simplicity of returning to our essence and establishing a steadiness with this provides a foundation to truly love ourselves and others. From our essence there is no need to seek the other seeming rewards we can desire when we live in disconnection from ourselves.
I was third born and also ended up in a mess – whatever happens same result for most which is to lose connection to who we truly are. What a blessing thanks to Serge Benhayon and Universal Medicine to reconnect to the true love I am and that we all are.