Hey, it’s Anne with your Coaching on the Go.

Today we’re talking about rules, regulations, and beliefs. 

We can often say what we believe in, but often if somebody asks you what your rules are, it’s hard to cough those up, it’s hard to bring those to the surface. 

I would have to say they are embedded in our operating system and embedded in us.

We operate on them, and can’t even say what they are most of the time. 

It’s wonderful to give them an audit, and it’s a great time to do that when you feel “hurt” or “disappointed.”

When you have given away your power to something, that’s a great time to say, “What rule was broken,” because you don’t feel good. 

When you feel hurt, why are you feeling hurt? 

It may be some general rule, like “Family doesn’t hurt family.” 

What does that even mean? 

Okay, that’s one of my rules. 

That was one of my rules, and it still rears its head because it seems like a truth, that family wouldn’t hurt family, but often it’s the people closest to us, they get in the deepest in our lives and there are opportunities for us to not be on the same page. 

When you’re a child, you can make a rule that your family always gets along, because that’s what you want, but in the world of contrast and growth, what I’ve discovered is often our family is our biggest source of learning and growth.

We have all these beautiful beliefs, expectations, visions of how beautiful our family and our life is and is going to be, and when someone’s not following the directions, our directions, living their own life, experiencing their own pain, their own struggle, we’re so close to it that we get to experience it along with them, and to interpret it in our own way. 

Our pain is basically, literally, through our own interpreting that we come up with the pain. 

In the physical sense, someone can give us pain, but in the emotional sense, in our emotional world, we are the ones interpreting, and that interpretation either creates neutrality or joy or pain, or some sort of judgment that brings us into the emotional feeling that we feel. 

Ultimately, we are responsible for our pain. 

No one can make us experience that pain. 

Knowing that, what is giving you pain in that moment?

What interpretation is giving you pain? 

What rule is being stepped on, breached, or broken?

Once you can discover this, then you can decide, “Is the rule very well written?”

Does the rule make sense? 

Do you need a rule there?

You get to make all these decisions. 

My rule about family doesn’t hurt family, well, if I’m the interpreter of that event, I could make a new rule.

I could decide, in my responsibility, I treat my family with respect.

That could be my rule.

Or I love my family members, and so if something happens where there’s a misalignment and I feel pain, no matter what I felt, I could decide that I love my family members and I’m going to treat them in a way that’s loving.

You can see how complicated the rules can get.

If your rules are sloppy and really broad, in that way where they don’t really give you definition, you can easily be constantly hurt, feel constantly hurt, disappointed, or let down. 

There was a girl in a seminar who raised her hand that she was nine out of ten depressed, and when she got up on stage, the facilitator coaxed out her rules, like ten of her rules. 

One of her rules was that every time she did something great, and that’s relative, every time she succeeded at something, her parents would celebrate with her.

They would know and celebrate. 

Then the facilitator asked a couple of questions. 

“Are your parents there whenever you do something that you consider good or successful?” 

She said no. 

He said, “Okay, let me ask another question.  Do you tell your parents, if they weren’t there, so they know?” 

And she said no. 

He said, “How will they know?”

She realized how her rule was written in her mind; she realized it. 

They changed the rule, to “When I do something good, I tell my parents, and they celebrate with me. “

Even that opens the door for possible pain, but it was much better written, much more effectively written because she was a high achiever, she was constantly doing things, and nobody knew what she did because she wasn’t sharing it. 

She had ten rules like that. 

She had ten impossible rules. 

He said to her, “You’re setting yourself up for failure. You’re set up for failure and depression.” 

You get to look at your rules and see if you like them.

Also, a lot of people’s rules are, “I don’t do this, I don’t do that.” 

I challenge you to shift the writing of your rule so it’s towards an agreement forward. 

So not, “I don’t.”

What do you do? 

“I do”… “I consider”… 

“I am open to possibility…” 

Okay, that’s a rule for me.

“I am open to possibilities.” 

“I am open to shifting the interpretation of scenarios.” 

I’m always open to that. 

That’s a rule for me, because if I feel hurt, that rule allows me, even if I felt hurt, to look at something, to stop and look at it and see if there’s an additional interpretation or possibility, so I can navigate.

I have very few rules. 

Tony Robbins talked about this years ago. 

People who have the fewest rules are the happiest because you’re free. 

Think about your hard rules, like, “People don’t hurt me.”

What does that mean? 

“Someone who loves me won’t hurt me.” 

Someone who’s closest to you is going to be the most likely to not be in alignment with you all the time, and there’s going to be some misalignment, and what does that mean? 

If you give that a disempowering meaning, you’re going to have a lot of struggles with the people close to you.

You are going to have quite a tightrope for them to walk for you to be happy. 

If you are struggling with this, and it’s definitely a complex thing, send me a  note and open some discussion around this.

If you discover a rule that was really not workable, not a rule for success, share it with me or someone. 

I just shared one with you, so go ahead and create some interaction through this.

I’m sending you big love today.