Topics: Money, Over-focus on Technology/Computers/Phones/Social Media, Health behaviors
Money: how you value money, how you want others to value money, control, self-worth, discipline and impulse control, unconscious spending to meet needs
Doug: Behavioral Science of Money. Money doesn’t make us happy.
People dream about making lots of money but it doesn’t guarantee happiness. It is great to have money to pay the bills, but beyond that money doesn’t equal happiness.
Expectations around money create tensions.
Doug: use emotional intelligence to determine what emotions I am experiencing: anxious, angry, betrayed, fear, sadness and grief, abandonment, resentment.
Journal about your feeling. I am feeling _________ because ________.
Identify your own emotions before you can do anything else.
Money is a symbol.
CRIP: content, relationship, identity, process
Content: presence in the physical stuff.
Relationship: who are we? Equals? Superior/inferior, trusting/not, open or opaque, kind or rough?
Identity: who am I in this relationship? Self-esteem? Faith in myself? Self-respect?
Process: how do we manage conflicts?
Husband watching football game. Wife says “you never talk to me”. He walks out of the room. She uses confrontation to get connection. He is conflict-avoidant.
When you have relationship, identity and process is harder to see and understand. Most people push everything into content. So money becomes a goal to replace what they can’t articulate. Project into content.
“Asking the Easier Question”
How much will you pay to save endangered species?
How intense are my feelings about drowning dolphins? Substitute the easy question for the hard questions.
With money I help people identify what they project onto the money.
In the ideal reality what would this fantasy look like: what you want or what do you want for the other?
What is the core piece you have linked with money? If I had this core piece then what would shift?
Identify the core piece: freedom, support, safety? Other?
Invite your higher self, body deva’s higher self to work with the energy fields to activate that vibration in your divine line and body’s divine line. Get those vibrations going and then lift reference points off money.
When you do this you de-escalate the situation.
Doug: this about position versus interest. Positions are not negotiated very well without compromise. Compromise doesn’t tend to satisfy. Fight is on.
What if your position changed. How would you be satisfied. A position is a solution to a problem. What do you need ot have satisfied for the problem to go away. We can find underlying interests that people have. People tend to have the same interests. We can find ways to satisfy the interests. Use positions as a gateway to dive into interests.
Once you become positional you have to back off and identify interests.
I want people to write down 3 ideas to satisfy both sides when I work with conflicts. High premium on creativity. Brainstorm proposals. Leads away from win/lose to collaboration to satisfy all interests.
Working on issues with an employee who took a pay cut with a boss.
Aleya: move up your divine line to your higher self and allow your higher self to talk to the higher self of the boss in higher realms. You can call in angels to help. You hold continuous conversations between the higher selves of you and boss. You may feel a shift. Then a solution is likely to come in.
Work on your own pieces to take your energy off your boss, take responsibility for meeting your own needs.
Doug: you and other co-worker took pay cut. I am answering in the abstract. Is the pay more equitable now that you pay has been cut? If you are a lower end employee because you don’t have as much value to the company that is different.
How are your services valued? In sales your commission may get cut, then look for a new job.
What skills do I need to develop to add more value? There may be a disconnection on value. Look for another job. Build your skills.
If he is undervaluing who you are: make a case for the value you add with numbers. Demonstrate your value. Prepare to accept a “no” or be willing to quit.
CONTROL Doug
We feel controlled by those with money or we control because we have money.
Are you the controller or the controlled?
Money can become a symbolic issue: the relationship is the real issue.
Recognize it is not about the money.
Doug: go back to basic skills. Identify your emotions.
Aleya: identify issue, flip it, meet your needs in your core
Doug: use journaling and self-reflection. Approach a conversation about relationship and identity. Is the relationship equal? If not, why?
I feel we are not equal, and I am wondering how you feel?
If someone gets triggered, reflect the emotion back. You know you hit a hot spot. De-escalate by core messaging and affect labeling. Move into a deeper conversation.
If too reactive you may need a third party or watch the cups of connection.
People place control on another person to get a need met.
If I control Doug with money I am trying to avoid abandonment.
Doug: I was working with middle school teachers today. One was controlling and bossy because she has abandonment issues. Her controlling is unconscious.
Aleya: invite higher self to lift needs for connection and respect off that person so I can shift that behavior. Ask your partner: do you feel free? What emotions come up when you think about money and me? Make any answer safe.
Men are more sensitive than women. They get defensive or they get emotionally full very fast.
How do you feel when you think about money? Curiosity.
How do you feel about money and other people?
How do you feel about money and our relationship?
Help your partner cultivate greater self-awareness.
Many people are taught emotions are bad. They are clueless how they are feeling. They lash out in frustration.
Men can’t investigate their emotions until they feel safe.
The safe has to be “womb” safe. Secure and comfortable. Feeling totally protected.
How can you create that safe space?
Safety is about trust. It takes time. It is a process.
Invite your higher self and body deva’s divine self to create safety in your divine line. Pull yourself into your divine line. As you find safety in your divine line you can learn to create safety for others.
Doug: here is a fundamental truth. I was awarded my black belt. I was asked to leave and go to master Tai Chi. You never master it. The softer you are the stronger you are. The more vulnerable you are the more powerful you are. This didn’t resonate with me. My teacher was 70 yrs. He didn’t touch me, but he threw me across the room with his energy. As I practiced I realized the truth of this. Strength comes from being soft. Power comes with vulnerability.
Aleya: watch your body. How does each part feel? This cultivates self-awareness.
Doug: learn to core message and affect label. When inmates learn these skills they get more self-aware. I feel frightened and angry. As they label themselves the emotions dissipated and they could walk away without losing face or power.
Learn to reflect the emotional experience of others. Give you self-awareness, self-control, compassion.
If you are empathically sensitive you teach yourself discernment between your emotions and the emotions of others. Hold a compassionate space instead of controlling the reality of others to create a safe environment for others.
If I hold a safe space for others my empathic sensitivity decreases. Can hold boundaries better.
Doug: this is worth learning. Remarkable. Dedicating my time to doing this work. It is simple, but so transformative. These are foundational skills of life.
Aleya: the struggle goes away. We talked about money the entire time. You can use the same skills to technology abuse or addictive behavior.
Identify your needs. Meet your needs in your core. Release that person from meeting your needs. Hold your own needs and meet them in your divine line. Once I do the inner work I can communicate in a more empowering way.
Doug: don’t try to control them or threaten their autonomy. The next day in a quiet environment when the timing is right you can deal with it. Would you be open to some ground rules about when we use our phones? The law says you don’t have to be available 24/7. This is creating lawsuits. You need time away.
The other excuse is boredom. There is a need being met externally. Find the core inner need that technology is used for.
Create ground rules.
Aleya: exercise to do in relationships where everybody sits down with a piece or paper or have a big piece of paper. Hang it where everyone sees it. Identify qualities you want to have in your home or relationships. Identify behavior that supports those qualities.
Check in: is the behavior I’m engaged in right now supporting our intentions?
Doug: can’t break habits but we can make new habits. What can we do to make this work? Autonomy challenges generate conflict.
Build up your shared values and add new behaviors. Schedule them.
Doug: it is all about choices. There are lots of distractions. Set consequences for being unconscious.
Aleya: can be more gentle by being patient and commit to one thing for a year. Move in the direction you want to go.
I have been working with a trainer once a week for 11 months. Now I am ready to make some other changes too. So pick one thing to focus upon to move in the direction you intend.
Aleya has meditations to assist on her website. Play meditations in the space when no one is in it. Sets up an energy in the space, but this is slow process. I choose a more coherent environment. You hold that container and they can show up or not show up.
Keep using your higher self to assist. Ask for help from the higher realms.
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