To be spiritually dominated is to lose the outcome you want or need, period.

We’re talking about things that trigger a bad feeling. Maybe your spirit’s being dominated in the way it would have been in your family of origin. Or junior high. Or when you were dating. Maybe your spirit’s being dominated because of a connection to someone or something in the past that gave you a deep fear about yourself or your character.

How many girls got slut-shamed in school?

Were there flaws in your male friendships, so trusting male friendships made you devastated by them?

Who thought you were a bad person for some reason?

Do you have persistent fears about yourself?

Does it make sense that the whole point of our personal growth is to get insight and an indomitable spirit so we can be free, make choices, pursue outcomes and goals without limitations?

And all of that is just another way to describe maturity.

When you feel that you have your spirit dominated, what do you see or what do you feel that makes you know when your spirit hits something that limits it?

SPIRIT DOMINATING BELIEF #1: SUFFER BY COMPARISON

Carol:

“I feel like I’m constantly missing something. It feels like everybody is ahead of me and I’m not keeping up—just not getting it.”

This means she’s adapted to believing other people are ahead of her. And in the beginning, when she meets them, she appreciates them for real and does enjoy them—but the whole time, what’s dominating her spirit is that she deeply believes she suffers by comparison.

And in order to not be wrong, or ‘less than,’ she will hide her successes or her assets from herself and them so her ‘inferior nature’ can’t be seen.

This can be enormously devastating to your business success, finances, and opportunities for deep connection with other people.

Now take that in. If you think you suffer by comparison in one way or the other, or you’re assuming rejection or negativity when you show your real self, you won’t take the risk… you’ll hide the good parts from yourself and others.

It’s a real thing.

So back up to a wide overview, and recognize this is just a straight-up, everyday, ordinary fear of scrutiny that needs to go away.

Everything you want to feel is on the other side of you taking that risk.

SPIRIT DOMINATING BELIEF #2: CAN’T LET GO OF CONTROL

Jeanie:

“Recently while visiting relatives, I stepped into my role I had as a kid where I was ‘in charge.’ I did all the housework… I just stepped in. I started cleaning and cooking for everyone, even the people who lived there who weren’t supposed to be there! I became everyone’s maid and cook, without any thought of my needs, which was definitely going back into an old role. But it seemed so normal in the moment. It took me three days to become resentful.”

It should have taken 350 years after her death for Jeanie to even consider being resentful… and even then she should have realized there’s nothing to be resentful about because she made it happen that way.

And it was for a reason.

The picture of what she’s describing is precocious development. Being responsible for things and people much earlier than you should be… In essence, Jeanie was put in charge of things or people long before she had the maturity to do so. She came to believe it is her responsibility to take care of the needs of others without a lot of concern for hers.

This is devastating to do to a child!

Your spirit feels risky when you let go and let loose what you think of as control. What to do?

Let loose anyway and wait.

There are times where your best move is to do literally nothing whatsoever—when you need to give space for you to just not be in charge and see that the world continues to spin anyway!

SPIRIT DOMINATING BELIEF #3: FEAR OF BEING WRONG

Jake:

“Probably the biggest one is not being competent or doing something incorrectly or not being ‘right.’ It’s also when I perceive I’m not being understood.”

So if we back up, we see that what dominates Jake’s spirit is he’s doing an auditory digital processing inside his head. And so when somebody has more experience or has a different viewpoint or they can see the big picture of the issue better, it’s very frustrating for him—because he assumes they’re not believing that he gets it even when he is getting it!

His biggest fear is being seen as wrong or incompetent.

The point is he has belief that he has to be right in how he sees things or he is ‘less than.’ He values getting that hit of self-validation at the expense of chasing growing or learning.

You never want to be “right.”

Right is not your move.

Right is never your move.

The move is being curious and in a mood of discovery about what you want to know next instead of feeling crappy about how much you know now—that allows you to chase the goal you want.

You have this issue when you’re not surrendering and backing up to engage with the teaching moment or learning situation before you contrast it to what you know or may not know.

So the correction is: you say, “Oh, I can see I need this,” or “It helps to see it your way.”

To get to the learning, the connection, the insight, the skill you want—you probably have to go through the experience of being wrong about how you saw it or originally responded to it, so you can expand your awareness into the bigger picture or new information that would be useful toward your goal.

SPIRIT DOMINATING BELIEF #4: SORTING BY DISTINCTION

Tracy:

“When I start sorting by distinction in my head or disagreeing with what someone is saying, that dominates my spirit because I miss what I need to take in. Then I can’t feel the way I want to feel or learn what I want to learn. It feels like I always have to be contrary.”

We’re noticing that Tracy’s not being external or remembering any outcome, but rather reacting inside of himself as the spirit is dominated.

His reaction is not to the outside world, but inside of himself. And as he does that, then he’s defending his reaction or position, rather than reacting to the reality of what’s in front of him.

The opposite of this is sorting by agreement, or what you are willing to take in and accept first, which puts you in a bigger perspective. It also tends to keep you externally focused, rather than internally noticing what you are contradicting in your head.

Your outcomes should be seen as out in front of you.

You can always notice what you disagree with second, which won’t make you miss the point in the first place.

SPIRIT DOMINATING BELIEF #5: OLD PARENT OR SIBLING INFLUENCE

Macy:

“What dominates my spirit is when a friend or family member—particularly a female—thinks that my intent is bad when I’m complimenting them or I’m doing something helpful for a good purpose, and they think I’m doing it with an ulterior motive. That, I cannot recover from very easily. I have some issues being incompetent at basic things like cooking and cleaning—I feel like I don’t measure up—but I can get myself out of that easier. A female person thinking I’m a bad person—it takes me a very long time to get over that.”

So if we back up from that, we see that Macy’s issue is still a fear of scrutiny trigger. But what we also see is it has to do with loneliness with regard to connecting to other people or sibling rivalry.

Your spirit is always extremely dominatable if you desperately need approval from anyone.

Think about how much you need family or sibling acceptance. As you’re growing up, how they treat you and what you then believe about yourself can be very damaging. It often controls your perception of how you assume other people see you later on too—as Macy does—so you can totally believe things that aren’t actually happening.

To worry about what that sibling or parent thinks, or not get positive attention from those family members as a child, can dominate your spirit right on into adulthood.

When you’re having to defend against bullshit from a sibling or from other kids, or because somebody is going through a mental health problem or there’s a crisis here or there, your whole life is a defensive position. And even when you’re succeeding in it, you’re still doing it on top of defying the negative thing you were afraid of.

You have an indomitable spirit if you can unconditionally accept yourself and you believe your actions toward others reflect your good intentions—because of your own self-concept and self-acceptance, not because of what other people with a harmful agenda think.

It’s literally assuming the opposite of what Macy assumes now—and just go with that!

Your Spirit Can’t Be Dominated If You Can Do This

It’s profoundly important to know that to develop an indomitable spirit means you have a mastery of every attachment you have with people.

For most of you, when your spirit starts to be dominated, you go into fight or flight mode… or you go into blaming, placating, judging, or distraction (as in the Satir Model)—and you don’t even know you’re doing it.

And aren’t we usually proving ourselves right in some weird way?

Do you have an example where you can admit reality was actually better than the way you saw yourself, and that you should have changed your self-concept to reflect that reality in a calm, easygoing way?

But instead, what happens is you blow up and go into ego-high pride or ego-down blame and doubt—and then you find out your pride, entitlement, pity party, or low self-esteem game is wrong too, and you get another ass kicking.

What If You Could Level?

What if we were able to level?

(Leveling = expressing feelings and thoughts directly and respectfully, without an agenda of any kind—and focused on a mutually acceptable outcome or resolution.)

What if there was no way to dominate our spirit?

How would it go once you got used to it?

Easy and comfortable?

Safe?

Pressure off?

Yes.

Whatever we were, wherever we were going, whatever the outcome, the triggers would probably still be there—but we would be able to comfortably level with ourselves and others, be vulnerable, be able to safely take in feedback, see the situation differently, practice different skills, and continue to move on without being emotionally derailed.

Sounds pretty good, right?

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