The Trouble With Always Trying to be "Bigger Than"

How many times have you tried to be “bigger than” something (or someone!) you are experiencing?
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That big something feels like it threatens to collapse us. Becoming bigger than it seems the only way to not get squished beneath it.

Becoming “bigger than” is a great way to describe what we are attempting to do energetically. We try to expand our field of love and acceptance to be able to include something that might otherwise be well outside our limitations to be able to include.  But we set ourselves up for a dangerous game when we do this – of having to keep getting bigger, and bigger, and BIGGER. And at some point, we will find that we just can’t grow anymore, and then do the very thing that we were trying to avoid – collapse!

So what is the alternative?

Accepting your limitations and shifting the weight OFF of the small part of you that is on the verge of collapse.

An amazing thing happens when we don’t take on the responsibility of making whatever collapse-inducing pressures are being exerted on us OK. It is not the pressures themselves that collapse us, it is our insistence on bearing the weight of them. When we just speak the truth at the very least to ourselves – “This is too big for me, and I will never get “big enough” to be able to include it.” – we do the equivalent of getting out from beneath the weight of it. And if we aren’t beneath it, then it certainly can’t collapse us.

Acknowledging limitations is hard for a whole bunch of reasons. Including that we must then acknowledge (and deal with) our own hurt and anger, guilt that we can’t get big enough for the other (often someone or something we feel deeply loyal to, like a parent or the family unit), and likely some subconscious fear as the risk of facing the loss of connection when we say NO to another is put to the test.

A large part of the work of family constellations is in offering a view where the client can see the bigger picture. This is very different than trying to become bigger yourself. From the big picture view it is often seen that each of us is, in fact, rather small, and, our attempts to wrap our little arms around the whole giant mess of a thing is not only impossible, but also unnecessary. When we see that we simply can’t get big enough to include what feels utterly intolerable or unacceptable, we might be able to see that although we can’t…something else can. The bigger picture view shows us that somewhere, somehow, all of what is happening is held in the arms of a force that is actually big enough to hold it all. Whether you call that the field of the family, the presence of your ancestors, the light of spirit, or something else, it’s there. Holding it all.

You get to be small and limited sweet little one, it’s not all up to you.