You know the moment you have an internal dialogue with several voices in your head when it is time to get out of the bed.
Or when you have to go for a run but it is raining outside?
There is more than one person that complete us. That is why it is important to understand them and live in alignment.
I love watching movies and TV shows that make me think. One of those shows is Mr. Robot. If you haven’t seen it, I highly recommend it.
Elliot is a genius hacker with a split personality, so in the essence, he is a hero, an anti-hero, and everywhere in between. He thinks he is batshit crazy. At times, he doesn’t remember what he did because his other personality took over.
Elliot constantly speaks with himself, his other personality, his imaginary self. ( I don’t want to go too much into details as I don’t want to spoil it for you.).
The main point is, he doesn’t always like what his other self-does and therefore he decides to fight it, conquer it, eradicate it from his life. Elliot tries to medicate himself, beat himself up and do things that would compromise his health and even life in order to get back in control.
But the more he fights, the more his other personality resists. It becomes more violent, blackmails him more, and even takes control over him completely to show him who the boss is.
SPOILER ALERT
Once he decides to go all in, to play the game with his other half, his “evil” part, it ends in a pat situation. No winner, no loser. Again and again. At that point, Elliot understands that he can never win nor lose.
We all have different voices in our heads, constantly talking to us, although they are less pronounced than in Elliot’s cased. The exaggeration in the show points it out perfectly!
In the Jungian psychology, they are called archetypes. The king, warrior, magician, and a lover. These are the main four archetypes within us. We all have them. Even the most scared person has a warrior within. They might just have a problem to access it, but if cornered, the warrior takes over.
When we experience a conflict within us, with our other part, we typically do things to silence these voices, we try to ignore them, push them back, fight them. Sometimes they are too loud and we give into them (fear).
But they are there to protect you because they are a part of you.
The way of the voice
The way is to live in alignment.
- Acknowledge – First, we need to accept that the voices are a part of us and it wants to point our attention to something. We don’t need to like it, often we don’t, but we should always listen to it. Maybe you will not like what you hear, but voices are to be heard.
- Appreciate them – they want to protect you, this is their intent. Acknowledge it and appreciate it.
- Govern – you don’t need to act according to what different parts tell you. You can discuss with them. Ask what would warrior say. What would the king say? What would the lover say? What would the magician say? You are like the governor and the voices are your advisors. You make the final decision