Stupid Beliefs
Beautiful flowers on your bed, crystal clear blue water, and a fresh cool breeze….for most this spells paradise. We all hope that nothing could possibly upset us while vacationing in such a Garden of Eden. Not so for Kim Kardashian.
Kim reminded us in a recent episode of “Keeping Up With the Kardashians” that no matter how much money, power, or fame you possess, stupid beliefs can wreck your day. In addition, beliefs can drive our family and friends insane. Just ask her fiancé (now ex-husband)!
The Kardashian-Jenner family took a dream trip to Bora Bora to celebrate Kris (mom) and Bruce Jenner’s twentieth wedding anniversary. They arrived in their beautiful suites, and Kim lost it. There were flowers all over her bed. Her need to have things clean, neat, and comfortable arose; and she franticly moved the flowers off the bed and on to the dresser.
Her fiance said, “I never saw this side of Kim.” He had such a confused look on his face. He seemed to wonder how something that would be pure beauty and bliss for someone else could make her so insane. I’m sure he was wondering if he should marry this crazy woman (of course, we now know that he ignored that warning). The seeds of future Kardashian episodes had been planted, which are a Ph.D.program in stupid beliefs. We watch as they create problem after problem because they rigidly hold on to their beliefs. And they usually fix those beliefs with money.
This is what stupid beliefs do to us. We can’t say exactly what Kim was thinking or where her belief came from, but we could guess that it was about things being messy or out of place. Perhaps she sees herself as a neat freak or OCD (a really common therapeutic label these days). But those labels just make the problem worse. They turn mere stupid beliefs into complexes that feel real and unshakeable. Once Kim thought that belief (whatever it was), emotions arose in her nervous system. If she hadn’t tried to run from those emotions, she would have heard beliefs arise in her mind. The emotions were simply proving that the beliefs that she was thinking were false.
Kim did what we all do. We think something false. We feel emotions in response to that false thought. Then we believe the emotions mean that our thought was true. We reinforce the belief by accepting it — holding on to it. It comes up again and again. This way of using our mind can result in depression, mental and physical suffering, and even disease if it’s not corrected.
It was obvious to us as viewers that the emotion did not feel good to Kim or her fiancé. It was also obvious to us that her stupid beliefs were completely ridiculous. She was not going to be harmed in any way by those flowers. She needed to realize that her thinking was false and useless to her well-being. If she had let go, she would have become calm again. She could have enjoyed the flowers like everyone else.
Emotions Remind Us to Let Go
Kim Kardashian is not unusual. We all have stupid beliefs. People who put themselves on television or in the public eye become our examples — they’re paid very well to serve that role. We all have those moments where our mind is feeding us garbage, and our emotions are driving us insane. When those moments occur, we usually think that the emotion means the belief that we’re thinking is true. Most of what we think is false. If we felt emotion every time we thought a false thought, we’d be in a constant state of emotion. So we learn to psychologically reverse our mind so that the false thought or belief is treated as the truth; and the truth is believed to be false. It solves our emotional problem. But it removes our incentive to let go. We were, in fact, trained to think that way. Just about everyone thinks that way. But just because everyone does it, doesn’t mean it’s right or healthy.
Our mind wrongfully uses that uncomfortable emotion as validation that it is telling the truth when it is actually lying. Our minds lie all the time, causing emotions, stress, disease, accidents, and havoc in our relationships. Sometimes, we express those emotions (as Kim did by frantically moving the flowers), and we feed them even more. We make the people around us miserable. We even want them to fix our emotions for us.
The Answers to Life are Simple
The answers to life’s problems are always simple. But if everyone knew that, the therapists, pharmacies, and doctors would be out of business. If we can merely realize that what our mind is saying in this moment is not true, the emotions will dissipate. I promise you — I’ve done it thousands of times. Once we let go, the emotion has no purpose.
Of course, this is usually not what we do. The answer is far too simple for the intellect. Instead, we accept the belief and its accompanying bad feeling as true. We then feel stuck in a world that doesn’t work for us. We spend days, weeks, even lifetimes fixing the world so we don’t have to drop our belief.
Superstitious Stars
We often hear of stars that have ridiculous requests for their green room. They can’t perform without Evian water and Godiva candy filled with truffles. Give them Perrier and Hershey, and they lose it. They need olive colored slippers and a purple robe with two pockets. They’re afraid of black candles in their dressing room. The world supports their superstitions so they don’t get emotional. No one wants to see a crazy movie star. But isn’t that like giving a two-year old candy every time they scream in the grocery store?
Those of us who don’t have money, power, or fame to bend the world to fulfill our crazy needs have to live with the piercing emotions associated with our own beliefs. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing. We’re much more likely to let our beliefs go when we can’t fix them with money, fame, or power. And when we let go, we always move one step closer to paradise.
With every belief we let go, our world transforms wherever we are. We don’t expect Bora Bora to make us sane or happy. In fact, it is our sanity and joy that gets us to Bora Bora and allows us to really enjoy the trip.
