The Power of Being Real

I have been aware lately, through listening to my clients and even just watching our culture, how we have been taught to protect and hide what is going on inside of us. There is this egoic aspect of ourselves that wants to project out a certain image, or face, to the world. We have been taught and think that doing this is going to give us the most control or power over life, but this is not entirely true. We end up relating to each other’s external shells, and because they do not match the inner situation, it ends up creating a lot of problems and miscommunications and misunderstandings.I have watched a few TV shows lately, and I have just noticed how all of the problems, whether in a sitcom or a drama, do not come from people being bad or evil at heart; they come from miscommunication. Almost every show is about how things are miscommunicated and then go wrong. I have noticed this even in myself- I am very careful and precise about how I say things, but others may not be able to accurately hear and understand what I am trying to say due to their own personal filter’s and interpretations. And that’s why in Inquiry Method™ the focus is on paying particular attention to what somebody is saying—and even the energy behind it—and truly just listening to them. It is also even about getting curious about what is underneath the shell that we present to the outside world. This idea is about showing the inside on the outside.I was just speaking with a client about her relationship with her daughter and with her mother, and every time we came back to my client’s desire to take care of one of her family members in some way, we realized her issue around this would be solved so much easier by her expressing her own inner struggle around it. So, this would be like instead of trying to fix her daughter’s problem, she could say “You know, as a mother, I am having a challenge right now because I would really like to support you right now and I do not know how, but do you have any ideas?” That is showing inner vulnerability, and it seems so simple and obvious, but it is not the thing that we say. Instead we give advice, and try to fix, and try to push our agenda on someone else, which usually just makes things more complicated.It is just amazing how just the most obvious vulnerable thing that is going on inside of us can allows the situation to move forward. It is the same thing when I am working with couples; if we can just say the thing that is going on inside of ourselves—not so much the emotion, just whatever is happening—not only does that help someone else understand us better, but then we can also put our finger on our own problem too.In a big-picture view, Inquiry Method™ seems so simple, yet at the same time ‘simple’ is so not what we do. Sometimes I feel bad about the fact that my work in and of itself seems so simple, yet the results are always extremely profound, which is how I know I am doing things right.Essentially, to improve all of our relationships and interactions in life, the best thing we can do is to get our insides on the outside.