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Authentic Relating

How you relate to others is not about them, but about you. If you accept this statement to be true, then you might say the following to yourself: “The authority to love arises within me and is not dictated by how others are or how they react to me. When someone rejects my love, or can’t receive it, I must not let that determine how I act or express myself. I have an obligation to be who I am at the deepest level I am capable of. When I identify with my soul, my essence, I naturally express love unconditionally and I empower or support the one I am in relationship with.

“If someone rejects me or criticizes me or acts in ways I do not like, I can allow that reality to dictate my reaction, in which case I am handing over the authority for my response to their actions or attitudes. In that process I deny my own inner authority; I deny my own power, love and intelligence. I lose my real identity. I then come from a place of incompleteness, defectiveness, past created pockets of self-rejection that I have internalized whenever I have allowed others, who did not love themselves, to be my authority. I then typically blame others for the way I feel and act, thereby justifying my attitude.

“On the other hand, I have the choice to understand that others react in ways that are unloving when they lose the connection with whom they really are. I can then seek to help them restore that connection by being who I really am – unconditionally loving, understanding, and empowering. When I choose to come from the soul within me that enables the one I am in relationship with, through resonance, to reconnect with their own lovableness. There is no other way to restore love when love is lost.”

The reason we take other people’s feelings and attitudes as the authority we ought to follow is because we have been conditioned to do so from childhood. The unconscious motivation for doing so is that this is the way we got love. If we did what others wanted and adapted ourselves to their expectations then we were praised, accepted and rewarded, all of which to us were expressions of love. And since love is the most fundamental need everyone has, this has been of utmost importance to us.

Some of us have not developed our own inner authority to a great extent. Or when we follow our own inner authority we often feel we are being rebellious against what is right, which is not the case at all; but that is often how it feels because of our conditioning. We therefore do not fully trust it or ourselves.

Whenever we react in a negative way to something or someone we are not coming from soul but from an unconscious place within ourselves. Because this is not really who we are in essence, we will justify our negative reaction. Since there is no justification found within ourselves we justify through placing the cause of our reaction outside of ourselves. This results in blame – blaming others, circumstances or realities that we believe we have no control over. This kind of justification fortifies the veil that hides our essence. After some years of this we become quite unconscious of the truth that we are denying our own power and inner authority.

The practice of watching yourself respond to others will assist you in becoming more aware of whose authority is prevailing in each situation. Is it yours or that of others? Relying on your own inner authority is being the author of your life. It is being authentic, living and expressing from the heart and soul of your being. This is not only your greatest contribution to others; it is also the secret of your own happiness because it is the fulfillment of your life purpose.

Exercise: At the end of each day review the way you related to others and assess how authentically true to yourself you were. This will be reflected in your compassion, understanding and empowerment of others. Listen to your heart as you do this review for it will tell you very accurately what your mind might otherwise distort.

This is one of 150 Soul Perspective articles. For more articles visit Soul Perspectives Index.

Andrew and Bonnie Schneider are now offering personal interactive email coaching for the 4 Level Soul Journey program. Connect weekly with Andrew and Bonnie on how to develop soul consciousness. Read more about this personal coaching from Andrew and Bonnie Schneider by clicking here.