Читать книгу Superhero of Love - Bridget Fonger - Страница 23

While I love to laugh, the number-one method I use to fan my Mighty Flame is integrity. Integrity is jet fuel for your heart. It will feed your Mighty Flame. Having integrity means:

 You are your word. You do what you say you are going to do. You are known for keeping your promises.

 You empower yourself and others with your word, your actions, and your way of being.

 People know they can count on you, no matter what.

 Your friends and loved ones know you as someone who achieves goals and dreams. And in your most exalted state, you are a person who makes dreams come true for others.

 You speak well of yourself and others.

That last one is my Achilles heel. I am most often out of integrity when I disempower myself or someone else. Reining in my negative thoughts about myself or others is a challenge when my flame is dim. Yet reining in your negative thoughts is precisely what will make that flame grow. It's a practice. Whatever you can do to remind yourself that you are practicing, that you are in the game of empowering with your words, the better off you will be.

Working on integrity can be fun, because you can make it like a game. Shoot integrity hoops: have a goal, make a goal; give your word, keep your word. Aim for minimal disempowerment and maximum empowerment.

Being out of integrity comes in many forms, but here's a list of things you may be doing that won't help your Mighty Flame:

 Speaking ill of others

 Speaking ill of yourself

 Having your environment out of order (a reflection of internal disorder)

 Being chronically late

 Not keeping promises

For many people, the end of a relationship comes the moment they let their integrity slip, when they break a promise to themselves. I know a woman who told her partner she would not move in with him until he was sober. He cleaned up his act and they moved in together. Almost immediately, his drinking resumed. Did my friend redraw the line in the sand and move out? No. That was the defining moment that led to the end of their relationship. She knew she should move out immediately, but she didn't. The relationship disintegrated.

At one point in my relationship with Mr. X, he spoke of living together. I replied that I wouldn't move in without being engaged. I made this promise to myself years before and I let him know I intended to keep the commitment. Not too long after this, I decided I was not going to spend another summer without central air conditioning, and I started looking for a new place to live. Mr. X insisted we look for houses to move into together, that it made sense since we would soon be engaged and moving in together anyway. He made it sound fun and reasonable, and I threw my promise out the window as we sped off to look at the first possible house.

The excitement wore off over the course of the day. As we parted ways that evening, I felt as if something were really not right. My Mighty Flame was so dim that it left me chilled. My actions were not reflective of the promise I made to myself. Mr. X said he was going to ask me to marry him several months down the line, when his daughter went to college. He wanted me to trust his commitment. I didn't trust either of us at that point. I had drawn a line in the sand and was stomping all over it. On some level, we both knew it was over at the end of that day. We parted ways like two deflated balloons. We couldn't pretend to hold ourselves up, let alone our love within the relationship. Even though we had technically not yet parted ways, we knew we had come to the end of the line.

When one of my friends got remarried, she and her new husband blended their two families, Brady Bunch style. As much as their therapist encouraged them to make clear agreements with each other to help guide them during their merger, they instead trusted that their love would pull them through any conflict. Many disagreements ensued as their parenting styles clashed. They weren't working as a team, and they often disempowered each other in the eyes of their children. Love helps, but integrity makes everything work better. Integrity helps love grow, giving it healthy soil and a protective fence to keep it safe, nourished, and nurtured.

I mentioned that I had the great boon of being forced to move just a few months after this breakup. Although I had been dying to move anyway, it felt like horrible timing. I was in the middle of a crazy firestorm. Then I embraced it as an opportunity for a fresh start. It was the best thing that could have happened at that moment for my Mighty Flame.

When I moved, I gave away or sold almost every stick of furniture, donated several carloads of “the past,” and got rid of all that should have been gone long before. Not only did I get a much better, amazing house, but I also bought all new furniture and spread myself out in my beautiful surroundings in a way that allowed my soul to open up. I felt like a butterfly settling on a beautiful, newly bloomed flower, blissfully surrounded by more flowers, trees, and beauty than I could have dreamed.

Not everyone has the synchronistic opportunity to move after a huge breakup, but you can still work on the integrity of your home. Refresh and renew; let go and clean out. All of these actions allow your soul to breathe a little better. Clearing out the past is always life-giving and life-affirming.

Putting things in order makes your life flow and clears away obstacles—literally and figuratively. Tripping over clutter in either your physical space or in your mind keeps you from reaching your destination. Without integrity, life just doesn't work as well. In the laboratory of my life, I have evidence that this is true. When I am in integrity, the circuits are clean, and my energy and power can flow. I make things happen. My energy is lighter.

To recap, having integrity means:

 You say what you mean and mean what you say.

 You do what you say you are going to do.

 Your life (house, car, office, finances, etc.) is in order.

 You are on time, respectful of your time and the time of others.

 You are known as a person who can be counted on, who always keeps her word.

From the big things like moral character, to the small things like having a clean fridge, having integrity makes life work better.

Sometimes I think I don't have the time to stop and get things into integrity, but I know I get an extra kick in my step and a surge of energy when I do. Start noticing how being out of integrity can drag you and your flame down. With very few exceptions, even the messiest people don't feel good about sitting in the middle of chaos. It wears on you—often without you even realizing it—and it definitely inhibits your productivity. Chaos outside is a reflection of chaos inside. And chaos tends to invite even more chaos.

Buddying up in the name of integrity is always a good idea to make it feel more like a game. On any given morning, Monday through Friday, at the same time each day, you can find me on a call with two to four friends. We each declare three tasks we will do that day in three different areas of our lives we want to transform. The next morning, we report how we did—three out of three, two out of three, etc. If I don't hit three out of three, I always take responsibility for what took me out of the game so I can stay conscious of the patterns that derail my integrity.

One of the most powerful things I can do on these calls is to commit to at least fifteen minutes of getting something into integrity. I don't have to know at the time what work I will do. I let myself choose over the course of the day. There's always something that can be sifted through, reorganized, cleaned, or completed after being left half-done. Without fail, my flame gets a boost, and I always end up working on whatever I choose for far more time than I originally promised. I highly recommend having a buddy, or ideally a group of buddies, with whom you can practice this. Find people who care about making a shift in their own lives, who already have a strong relationship with their word, and who inspire you. You will become a source of inspiration in this game as well—like the Superhero of Love that you are!

When your flame is growing and your life is working with integrity like a well-oiled machine, you will start to hear the hum of your Mighty Flame. You may even be more inclined to sing spontaneously when that flame is burning bright. Anything that makes your heart and soul sing, or helps you hear your own song, is a good thing. When you are guided by your own song rather than the noisy chatter of your mind, you will see the world differently and interact with others in a new way.

The following exercise will help clear the airwaves so you can hear that beautiful song, by getting some practice with calming crazy firestorms and increasing your Mighty Flame's power.