Why it's so frightening to be different from everyone else
Episode 17 · July 13, 2023
The Truth Hurts · Episode 17 · audio in Hebrew
There's one question that's hard to get away from: what are you really avoiding in life? Almost every time, the answer comes back to your parents, sometimes by way of a promise you made yourself not to be like them, and without noticing you became another version of the same thing. Gili says we're certain we're way past the previous generation, and in reality we're stuck on exactly the same issues, except that nobody stops to ask where it leads. It all starts before we understood anything: the need to be loved collides with the need to be ourselves from the very first moment.
Gili says that trying not to be like your parents can, ironically, lead to exactly the loss of authenticity you were trying to protect, like the story about a mother who spent years making sure she wouldn't be like her own mother.
The feeling that we're far ahead of the previous generation is misleading. In reality we're stuck on exactly the same issues, and nobody stops to ask where that's even leading.
Nobody ever really taught us about our emotional system, about the subconscious, or about the voices running through our heads all day.
The need to belong is a survival need at its root, planted in tribal culture. Anyone left outside the tribe feels guilt and shame.
According to the story she brings, in an experiment conducted at a hospital in London babies had every physical need met but got no human touch, and half of them died. Here love turns out to be a condition for survival, not a luxury.
There's a basic collision here: authenticity is the whole point of the soul's journey, and up against it is a deep survival need to belong, and it starts before we understand anything, maybe already in the womb.
Because we don't know any other way, and that's the simple answer given in the episode. We don't stop to ask ourselves questions, and instead we cave to what society, morality, religion and received values dictate, just so we'll feel we belong. The result is belonging without real authenticity. You feel like part of the group, but you aren't true to yourself.
At a hospital in London they set up a lab where babies had all their physical needs met (food, a diaper change, sleep) but no human touch. Half of the babies died. The conclusion that comes up in the episode is that human beings can't survive on having their basic needs met alone. They have to have human touch and a feeling of love to exist.
There's no choice but to be authentic, because the moment you stop being authentic you start serving some character you created so people would accept you. So even when you get love, it isn't real love. They love the character and not the person actually standing behind it, so either way you lose.
The tip given in the episode is to check it with every small choice, like deciding whether to go to a party or to a dinner, and notice where your answer is coming from: from real desire, or from people-pleasing and worry about what people will say. You can also choose an answer that is both a happy one and an authentic one at the same time, and according to the episode that's a key to a feeling of inner freedom.
Has it ever happened to you that you signaled left and turned right?
Sometimes we're so busy with what we don't want to be instead of what we do want to be that we turn into exactly what we don't want to be!
Why does that happen?
Because we aren't familiar with anything else and we don't know anything else.
We give in to social dictates just so we'll feel we belong.
But, and there is a but here! Not necessarily authentic.
In short, one of the strongest conflicts there is in human life.
Listening to The Truth Hurts feels like sitting in on a healing session.
The truth can hurt. It’s right there in the name. But we’re not here to cause pain. Quite the opposite.
In each episode, two women sit down for an honest conversation: an Emotional Healer and her client.
We talk about healing and consciousness, faith and science, the body and soul, personal growth, energy, and different approaches to healing. Above all, we face the truth no one says out loud: everything around us is upside down.
You don’t need any prior knowledge. You only need the desire to explore a wide range of ideas and discover practical guidance for living.
Gili Man Wolner, Emotional Healer. Helping you heal and grow through Jewish wisdom.
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