There are a lot of rules to my game. Too many to follow it seems. There are the rules I’ve learned from others. And then there are the ones I’ve wrote myself.
It can be easier to see the rules and expectations others have imparting on me, but the ones I impart of myself are the most limiting.
Those rules, those self-imposed ‘shoulds’, are what keep me in victim mode, limited and continuing to play my games, even when I don’t want to, nor acknowledge I am.
I’ve been noticing it in myself, my game playing. I usually start playing when I approach a relationship issue with the notion there are only two solutions or outcomes. I have to do this OR I need to that.
I make rules for how the problem can be solved. I make rules for something that, in reality, has no rules. I am creating constraints so that I can feel more safe and secure, more in control of something I can not be the master of. No matter what I choose to do, I can not control what You do.
Perhaps before I felt like I was playing my game well, or maybe I didn’t know I was playing at all… I’d learned my set of rules so long ago that they seem so natural and true. It didn’t feel like I had a choice in playing, or how I played. But I do and always have.
When I feel frustrated, I have the power to explore the rules I’m creating that are leaving me feeling limited, and I have the ability to commit to using my energy to find other choices. I have the choice to check in with myself and truly make sure I want to start play the game I am unwittingly starting.
photo credit: StudioTempura
