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Into Me See: How to Create Deeper Connection with Yourself and Others
374 Plays1 year ago
We all crave deeper connection with ourselves and others. In this short episode, Kevin Kaiser reveals the simple truth about how to create more depth in all our relationships. It all begins with intimacy, which is the compound interest of consistent, courageous connection.
Do you need to get clarity on what your higher purpose is so you can begin fearlessly living the more authentic life you know is possible?
If so, we invite you to the FINDING YOUR PURPOSE Virtual Accelerator, a workshop hosted by Kevin Kaiser designed to help you quickly gain clarity on who you are and why you’re here so you can experience more peace, joy, and freedom in your life.
Learn more and register now at https://findmypurpose.net
Follow Kevin Kaiser:
Website: www.kevinkaiser.co
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kevinkaiser.co
Follow Laura Coe:
Website: www.lauracoe.com
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/laurascoe/
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Transcript
Introduction to Soul School Podcast
00:00:00
Speaker
You're listening to Soul School with Laura Ko and Kevin Kaiser. On this show, we dive into life's biggest questions. Who are we? What are we here to do? And how can we fearlessly live as our truest, deepest selves? Soul School is the spiritual education you never received. So if you're ready, join us as we explore together. Soul School is in session.
Focusing on Relationships
00:00:25
Speaker
Welcome to this week's episode of Soul School. We are back again. Kevin and I are here to do another short episode and Kevin's going to lead us through this one on a topic around relationships. I don't really know exactly what we're doing, but hey Kevin, how are you?
What is Intimacy in Relationships?
00:00:43
Speaker
Good, good. Yeah, this is a little something that came to me one day while I was walking in the woods, as I tend to do. And it really, yeah, it's all around relationships. And first of all, everything in life is a relationship. A relationship to ourselves, a relationship to the others in our life, relationship to circumstances and reality itself.
00:01:13
Speaker
Right? But I want to talk about relationships with ourselves and others. And here's the idea. The idea is to run intimacy and how intimacy is the compound interest of consistent, courageous connection. So I'll say it again. Intimacy is the compound interest of consistent, courageous connection.
00:01:41
Speaker
So I just want to interrupt and say that this is what you hit me up with right before we hopped on. And I was like, wait, I'm just gonna stop you there. Let you say that to me live. Cause that's awesome. Okay. Go ahead. Yeah. So what, what is that? I mean, I know what that means a little to myself, but what does that mean to you?
Self-Intimacy as a Foundation
00:02:00
Speaker
Yeah. So let's unpack it, unpack it a little bit because, um, first of all, nobody ever hit the intimacy power ball.
00:02:08
Speaker
you know, as much as we would like to, you know, we want to all in one big lump sum, so to speak, where it's just like instantaneous. But the truth of any kind of real intimacy is, it is like these small deposits over time that just build and build and build. And the secret, like the secret to the whole thing is hidden in the word itself, intimacy, into me, see.
00:02:34
Speaker
it all comes down to your willingness to not only see, let's start with ourselves, like really look inside of ourselves, like the deep willingness to see ourselves, to know ourselves to our very core, even those things that we have been taught not to love about ourselves, because you can't give others what you don't have yourself. So out of your own brokenness, you'll bring that brokenness into
00:03:04
Speaker
your own, your other relationships. So the first thing is in order to have true courageous intimacy with others, you have to have it with yourself first, right? So let's just go through the main parts. Intimacy is the compound interest of consistent, courageous connection. So it has to be consistent.
00:03:24
Speaker
And the more important part of it, though, is that it has to be courageous. You have to go beneath the surface. You can't just have surface level, you know, deposits. You can't have surface level seeing and knowing. You actually have to be seen and known, into me, see. I mean, really, isn't that everything that we're craving from our closest relationships? We really want to be seen and known in so much of our
00:03:54
Speaker
the sense of lack in our relationships is that where it doesn't feel like there's any depth.
Origin of Intimacy Concept
00:04:00
Speaker
So yeah, I was walking in the woods one day and that whole concept just dropped dropped into me as a complete concept and it hit me at exactly the right time because I was like everybody else and really
00:04:16
Speaker
most of my struggles and growth opportunities are in relationship with instance. Relationship with oneself and others, right? Yeah.
Overcoming Egoic Barriers
00:04:27
Speaker
What's really, I mean, there's so many things that I feel like I could bounce off of from there, but the first thing that's really striking me is being seen. Mm-hmm.
00:04:41
Speaker
And I feel, and I'm curious what your thought is on it, but the problem with being seen has two issues. One is, on an egoic level, you might see all of my humanness.
00:04:58
Speaker
And my humanness meaning sometimes, right? Let's just be honest, I'm not the greatest. I may have jealousy or I may act out of accordance or anger or whatever, right? Be over-approvaly or whatever it is, right? And there's some
00:05:17
Speaker
lack of desire to show people the quote, negative qualities, right? We want to just be seen for our, our higher functioning self. And then, and because we don't want to be judged, we don't want to be judged, right?
Impact of Childhood and Society
00:05:32
Speaker
And then the second part is, and I would love to hear your thoughts on both, but to be seen is to know how to allow people into the essence of myself, right? The sort of non egoic soul self, which is the stillness of me.
00:05:46
Speaker
which takes a lot of comfort in the discomfort to do that, because it's almost, in my mind, like going through this barrier of egoic self to allow that self to just present. What are your thoughts on that? Yeah, so the, yeah, being seen and being known, I mean, so much of, so much of our energy is spent
00:06:14
Speaker
basically protecting these narratives that we have about ourselves, stories that we have about ourselves. And I like to, I like to go all the way back to when we were little kids, even before we learned language. And you can just watch little kids. I mean, our neighbors have little kids and they are not self-conscious. They're simply being themselves. And somewhere along the way, early on, we learned that it's not okay to be ourselves.
00:06:43
Speaker
I mean, if you think about, that's actually what shame is. Brené Brown talks a lot about this and how guilt is, you did something wrong,
Hiding True Selves and the Garden of Eden
00:06:50
Speaker
shame is, there's something wrong with you. That's right. And so much of the pain and the hiding in our relationships, it really is that. I'm not good enough, there's something wrong with me, and if I show people who I really am, then they won't accept me.
00:07:09
Speaker
Yeah. And Kevin, you make like this, right? Because when kids are little and they're angry, we tell them to stop. When they're showing genuine honest emotion, we want to regulate them back to some kind of central place. Even if they're overly giggly in the wrong moment, we don't like that, right? So there's this organization around
00:07:30
Speaker
base emotions and experiences, forgetting, showing their essence, right? That second sort of part of them, but just these very human, you know, kids are honest. They're like, when they're mad, they're mad, you know? And they don't feel guilty. And that's something we learn.
00:07:45
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. And we, you know, and we just learn early on to, to hide, like to hide ourselves, to, to, to sort of put on these costumes for the sake of survival and for the sake of acceptance, you know, within these social, within these social settings. If you want to take this all the way back to our founding myths as people, like what we're talking about is the Garden of Eden, you know, where they were ashamed of themselves and they hid themselves.
00:08:13
Speaker
So in the story of the Garden of Eden, they eat the apple and God comes around and they're hiding and they say, look, we hid from you because we're naked. And God's like, who told you you're naked? Who told you that you're naked? And so we learn, we really learn this shame in hiding ourselves really as a way of being accepted.
00:08:38
Speaker
But that's the very thing that keeps us separate from each other, separate from ourselves. And this is why it takes a lot of courage. It's consistent, courageous connection. Because of that level of connection with ourselves, it's a risk because you don't know how people are going to respond. You don't know if they're going to be okay with the way you are. It may not meet their
00:09:03
Speaker
their idea of who they think you should be. In the same way, we have ideas around who we think other people should be. And ultimately, really, that's where our relationship level is. I have an idea of myself, and that idea of myself has a relationship with my idea of you.
Effects of Self-Judgment
00:09:22
Speaker
Right? Until we're actually able to strip away the stories and the ideas and really see each other. That's right. Like I said, it's the essence of the person.
00:09:33
Speaker
I think what I'm hearing you say is your relationship with yourself is first, because who's judging who mostly? We like to blame other people, but in reality,
00:09:48
Speaker
It's hard to be seen because we are trying to hide from ourself. So can you even sit with your own personality without judgment? Because if you can't accept you, then when somebody comes around and pokes one of those buttons that you're not accepting of yourself, you blame the other person as really problematic in your life.
00:10:09
Speaker
But are they? Because, you know, like, if I were to sit here, Kevin, and say to you all day long, like, you're just the shittiest father ever. You're awful. Nobody, like, thinks you're good at it. You're awful. You're awful. Like, you know, that's not true. But I know you well. And I could pick on something that you're a little more insecure about. And it would create this discomfort. And you'd want me to stop. So, right? Yeah. Yeah. But you're right. Ultimately, nobody's judging you.
00:10:37
Speaker
not really, not in a way that can hurt you. And this is why when people say nobody can hurt you, they're telling the truth. Because if you were to say those things to me in Mandarin Chinese, which I don't speak, you would just be making noises at me. And my mind would have no way of wrapping it in meaning and going,
00:10:58
Speaker
oh, well, yeah, she's right, or no, she's wrong, and I need to prove that she's wrong. Whoa. You know what I mean? That's so, I haven't heard that before, dude. That's so deep, right? Right. It's like, take away the ability to even understand the language, and the same things are being said, and I can't be offended.
Understanding Others' Judgments
00:11:16
Speaker
That's so clever. Yeah, because language is just, you're just making meaning, right? It's a this or it's a that. And yeah, I mean, strip away,
00:11:27
Speaker
all the meaning which i mean only you are doing anyway yeah so if somebody like if you said that to me. It only triggers me because somewhere inside of me like you said i'm insecure and i believe that on some level and i hate that i think it's true or you know i feel threatened and so i have to push back against it.
00:11:51
Speaker
And I do think it's important. I always sort of love to throw this caveat, asterisk, asterisk in this one part of these conversations that
00:12:00
Speaker
I mean, the reality is, right? Like if somebody comes and brings a knife to my throat or like comes in my face and starts screaming at me, you know, massive profanities in a violent kind of way, there is of course going to be pain that arises within me. Like that is not a comfortable or acceptable experience for me, but the meaning is the part that gets in our way, right? And we think
00:12:25
Speaker
Because that person's acting in some way that is a judgment upon me and then I don't want
Triggers and Insecurities
00:12:33
Speaker
to be seen and then I go back further and further within myself and we build relationships from these sort of narcissistic positions really, right? Because this idea that nothing's actually happening to you, it's just happening around you.
00:12:45
Speaker
It's so hard to take that in, right? Because in a moment when somebody is behaving in a way that's very unpleasant and truly like sometimes it really is a problem. I mean, right? We don't want to underestimate child abuse or violence or those kinds of things. But it's still weirdly the other person's experience just it happens to be around you just like a tornado comes through your house.
00:13:13
Speaker
In a bad weather day right yeah yeah and to like it has nothing to do with you when they're upset either that's right i mean that took me a long time to fully get like get to my bones that no this is somebody else's stuff that's their issue.
00:13:32
Speaker
And I don't have to make it my stuff. Right, but this spiritual bypassing of saying, but I feel nothing is the mistake, right? I still can feel really uncomfortable in the presence of somebody who's super angry or something, right? But it's still not about me.
Building Intimacy Through Service
00:13:50
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. And I would say that that's where a lot of the gold is too. You know, because one of the best things you can do really is to go out and get good and pissed off and get triggered.
00:14:02
Speaker
Because what it's going to do is it really is going to reveal the stories that you have. Yeah. Inside of you, the things that you really believe about yourself are insecure about so that you can really investigate them, see if they're true. More than likely they're not. I mean, you probably shouldn't believe most of your thoughts. So Kevin, this idea of like building this slow, how did you put it again?
00:14:32
Speaker
It's the compound interest of consistent, courageous connection. Compound interest of consistent, courageous connection. So it's doing it consistently and that builds and compounds over time, right? So say somebody is out there and they're like, okay, I hear you ready to get going at it. Like is the first step to sort of start to get comfortable with oneself and
00:15:02
Speaker
allow people in more? How would you say to move forward in this in life? Yeah, I think that there are two ways, two simple ways. One is with yourself. And if you can't find ways to be open, to make yourself seen and known, do things for others.
00:15:30
Speaker
you know, serve others, do kind, just be kind, show up for other people, ask them, you know, how you can be helpful or ask them how they're doing, be genuinely interested in them, right? Because a lot of people do find it difficult, they're like, how do I be in accessing my own self? It typically happens in the process of engaging with other people.
00:15:55
Speaker
and showing up because when you give kindness, when you give love, when you see others, you actually are being seen at the same time. This is where giving is receiving at the same time. And then it actually becomes easier to do it for yourself. So... Yeah, particularly in moments when people are in distress and perhaps
00:16:18
Speaker
the energy levels get a little harder to be around because that challenges you to connect even deeper within yourself to be in service to them.
Vulnerability and Connection
00:16:27
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. And another thing too is really just sitting down and talking with a friend and being really honest. Share something with them that makes you feel uncomfortable. This is the only way.
00:16:44
Speaker
I mean, if you really want, if you don't want intimacy, that's okay. Don't do these things. Um, stay small, you know, have small relationships. That's all good. Nothing wrong with that. But if you do want to go deeper, like somebody has to be the first mover and you know, so you have to open up and share, you know, your anxieties, you know, where, where you feel afraid, what you feel like you're struggling with right now. And you know, most of the time people won't see that as weakness.
00:17:14
Speaker
Um, they'll say, Oh wow. Like you too. Like I feel this way too. I mean, this is, you know, I've gotten, you know, from our, just our friendship and our, our conversations when you are open and you share with me, it makes me want to be open and share more too. Like we just kind of opens up this gap, you know, and people just kind of relax a little bit. And you know, they don't feel like they have, they have to have all of their shit together.
00:17:41
Speaker
It's okay to feel fear, sadness, anxiety, all of these things. And then you can be there for each other. I love it.
Invitation to Virtual Workshop
00:17:52
Speaker
More walks in the forest. Deep thoughts with Kevin. Thank you for sharing. Oh, my pleasure.
00:18:00
Speaker
Do you need to get clarity on what your higher purpose is so that you can begin fearlessly living the more authentic life you know is possible? Well, so I invite you to join me for the Finding Your Purpose Virtual Accelerator. It's a 90 minute workshop that will help you quickly gain clarity.
00:18:16
Speaker
on who you are and why you're here so you can experience deeper peace, joy, and freedom in your life. Simply join me at findmypurpose.net and register for this virtual workshop. That's findmypurpose.net. I hope to see you there.