Well who am I and who are you?
It's the endless question begging to be answered on these web sites and blogs and networking platforms., like a job interview or a personal ad or a resume, where we must look for and find the list, the endless lineup of credentials, all the letters and titles after our names. Credential has it root in the word creed and creed at its root means belief in or acceptance that something is true. So who are the credentials for, really? The reader, the seeker? Or do I/we need the credentials to believe in ourselves? Just what is it that makes me or anyone else belief-worthy? Is it the school or university that someone graduated from that lends credibility? Is someone belief-worthy because they're certified or approved and if so, by whom? And then how does someone determine the credibility of the institution or the certification upon which the credentials are based? Is it by personal experience or is it anecdotal? Is trust in someone based upon popular belief in the credibility of their credentials? There are unscrupulous lawyers and dangerous doctors with credentials from prestigious universities. And certified financial planners whose finances are a disaster. If we always look for the credentials does it somehow discourage us from trusting our intuition or override our inner sense of knowing? Are we discouraged from trusting our own sense of knowing? Have we been convinced that we're not capable of knowing what is true and who to trust? When we put our trust only in the credentials do we step away from personal accountability and responsibility for the choices we make about the credibility of the individual? Who am I? Do I have any credentials? Can you believe in me? Can I believe in myself? Who are you? What makes you believable? What are you hungry for? Ingrid, the Rune Woman Wise and Irreverent Schedule Your Complimentary Session Today
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In the process of merging and consolidating my business and personal profiles and my web presence (see previous post), I began to realize that there were some things that I needed to eliminate. You know, like we're constantly being told to eliminate salt and fat from our diets, or eliminate cravings or desires.
Then how is this word any different from expressions such as throw away, let go or get rid of? Eliminate From Latin: ex/e meaning out From Latin: limen/limin meaning threshold From Latin: eliminate meaning turned out of doors So interestingly, eliminate literally means to be drive out across the threshold. In teaching I often talk about liminal space, the threshold, where we can cross from one place, realm, experience, or state-of-being into another. There are liminal occurrences such as sunrise and sunset and the solstices and equinoxes and liminal places on the earth like vortexes and sacred sites where it's possible to slip back and forth into other realms and times easily and quickly. Birth and death, sex, menstruation and religious ecstasy are also liminal. When Odin offered himself in sacrifice, he 'tore a hole in Ginnungagap', the great Void; he reached across the threshold and 'runes rushed in, and out'.* When we eliminate something, when we drive something out across the threshold, where does it go? Can we cause something to exist in another dimension by virtue of our own choice? Whether something is in or out is completely dependent upon perspective. When we cross a threshold are we coming or going? What happens to those things we say we eliminate? What do you hunger for? Ingrid, the Rune Woman Wise and Irreverent Schedule Your Complimentary Consultation Today *this is taken from the book (un) familiar "Gar gift of Ing you are the one who brought them forth tore a hole in Ginnungagap runes rushed in and out with piercing wail the high one sacrificed himself ending the beginning" I love words. I love the meaning of words. I love to explore why one word is more appropriate to use than another, or why a word feels a certain way or doesn't seem to belong where it's been placed.
Words are names and naming and because of that, they have power. I have a presence on the world wide web in many different places, with various write ups and bios and domain names and tag lines and descriptions and it's become just too much. Too much to remember and too much to attend to. In my decision to streamline and simplify I felt around to find a word that best describes what I want to do. One webinar spoke about merging, using the analogy of a freeway, where many roads feed into one. A business colleague used the word consolidate to describe what she had done with her various business identities. Consolidate From Latin: Con meaning together From Latin: Solidus/solidare meaning to make solid or firm From Latin: Consolidare meaning to combine into a single whole or make solid by combining into one Merge From Latin: Mergere meaning to dip, immerse, plunge into water, to cause to become combined, absorbed, swallowed up, united into a single enterprise One word is solid, the other watery, by definition. So which one is it? How would you decide? Or would you use a different word? And in the meantime, I just need to get on with making things more simple. What are you hungry for? Ingrid Wise and Irreverent Yesterday I spent several hours working on a project that was technical, troublesome and tedious and when I finally completed it, I found myself with the inner and outer dialogue of how hard it was and how much time I'd spent or wasted and how it kept me from doing all the other important things I needed to be doing, should have been doing.
So this morning as I was writing my Morning Pages, (thank you Julia Cameron), I asked myself: What if I would stop the thoughts that what I had spent so much time doing was wasted or stressful or wrong somehow and look at it instead as having done the thing that was being called to be done at that moment? And if something else was needed, I would have done that. This line of thinking presented a very different perspective, a shift. I could change my story from 'there was something more important or better that I should have been doing' and state the fact that it was just what I did. No matter what we do in life, it is our experience and experience adds to what we know and knowledge and experience affect the decisions and choices we make in the future. I'm not fond of expressions like 'I learned a lesson' or 'I was working out my karma'. The thread I have just spun and woven into the great loom of the Wyrd will affect the pattern of my life as an individual as well as the pattern of the whole. Some people will be more affected than others by my threads, depending on where and how often their own threads cross mine. At the same time, what I spin and weave can only come from what has been before and can only be woven into the web that was already laid in place by the Norns. So nothing is a waste of time. There was nothing else I should have been doing. Life just is. A client of mine told me she didn't want to do a writing exercise I'd recommend because she didn't think it would work. She didn't like to write.
It's a simple yet powerful exercise called: If I Really Tell The Truth.* It involves setting aside some quiet, uninterrupted time and taking pen to paper and writing out the prompt 'If I really tell the truth....' and then just allowing yourself to write whatever comes out the end of the pen. You do this over and over again, at least 25 times and it allows you to get to the root of things you are dealing with pretty quickly. I asked her why she believed that she didn't like to write and she rattled off a list. "I always procrastinate when I need to write something. I hate answering emails. I don't have anything interesting to say and who would want to read it anyway?" So, I said, give me an example. "Well, I recently found out that a relative of mine has cancer and had an operation. I bought a card but just couldn't get around to writing it and sending it and then finally I did because I felt guilty." When she had finished I said, I don't believe that you don't like to write; my sense is there's something else going on here. Let's use the exercise. Finish the sentence, If I really tell the truth.... "I don't even like this relative", she blurted out rather quickly. " I haven't had any connection with her in years and besides I 'm angry by the way the news was handled. No one ever called me or sent an email. I found out about it on Facebook." How quickly the writing exercise worked, even though we weren't writing. It's not unusual to say we don't like something, when there's actually something else lurking at a deeper level, something perhaps that's more truthful. What are you hungry for? Ingrid The Irreverent Wise Woman *If you'd like to learn more about the process "If I Really Tell The Truth" and how to use it, send me an email. |
title Photo by Amaury Gutierrez on Unsplash
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