Episode 61
Barriers and Roadblocks to Soul Progress #16 Defiant Dishonesty | EP 61
Dr. Judith connections her last episode on righteous retaliation and the “path” of not being good enough with the episode focus on the barrier and roadblock of “Defiant Dishonesty” and gives the example of the “white lie” and also discusses the Johari Window playing a role in how we see ourselves and those around us, and for the seeker to think about pivoting from dishonesty to self to see the world as it is and being truthful as the antidote.
About the Host:
Dr. Judith Holder’s passion is empowering people to be their best selves! Dr. Holder is the founder and executive director of Unique Pathways™ (www.uniquepathwayscoaching.com). She is a leadership coach-psychologist, facilitator, consultant, and author.
Our paths are filled with many adventures in which Judith believes can be seen as growth opportunities, even during challenging times. She likes to think about, discover, and discuss personal and professional life’s circumstances as you journey through life, through the lens of Christian values, Buddhist precepts, Ascended Master teachings and Esoteric Principles to gain greater clarity and mastery in daily living.
Dr. Holder is the author of Mastering Life’s Adventures: On the Beam – Essential Insights for Growth and Self-Mastery, and an e-book, Opening Up to Your Divinity: Practical Strategies and Practices for Soul Growth.
On a personal note, Dr. Holder sees herself as a perpetual student/seeker learning from her everyday adventures, which she considers as a part her ongoing growth and evolution of her SOUL. The fun part is we are all walking similar journeys together!
Judith enjoys spending time with family, vacationing at beaches and mountains sides, reading, walking, partaking in mindfulness practices, and is a certified yoga instructor.
Dr. Holder’s books on Mastering Life’s Adventures: On the Beam and Opening Up to Your Divinity: Practical Strategies and Practices for Soul Growth can be found at -
https://www.uniquepathwayscoaching.com/services/spiritual-inquisitiveness/
Mastering Life’s Adventures “How to” Downloadable Courses at www.uniquepathwayscoaching.com under the Tab “Offerings”
- Course 1: Mastering Life’s Adventures mini-course
- Course 2: Opening Up to Your Divinity mini-course
Learn more about “Mental Fitness for Busy People”, at www.uniquepathwayscoaching.com under the Tab, “Offerings”
You can also check out Dr. Holder’s at
LinkedIn page: https://www.linkedin.com/in/judith-c-holder-phd-ms-pcc-bcc-a1a4a57/
Executive and Leadership Coaching website: www.uniquepathwayscoaching.com
Speaking Engagements (for Women New to Leading): www.drjudithholder.com
Thanks for listening!
Thanks so much for listening to my podcast! If you enjoyed this episode and think that others could benefit from listening, please share it using the social media buttons on this page.
Do you have feedback or questions about this episode? Please leave a comment in the section below!
Subscribe to the podcast
If you would like to get automatic updates of new podcast episodes, you can subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Stitcher. You can also subscribe in your favorite podcast app.
Leave us an Apple Podcasts review
Ratings and reviews from our listeners are extremely valuable to us and greatly appreciated. They help our podcast rank higher on Apple Podcasts, which exposes our show to more awesome listeners like you. If you have a minute, please leave an honest review on Apple Podcasts.
Transcript
Welcome to Mastering Life's Adventures, an educational podcast about tapping
Speaker:into your true self, the soul, your soul, the substance of your life, to discover
Speaker:what life's ups and downs are really about, and how to have a greater sense
Speaker:of purpose, peace, joy, and fulfillment.
Speaker:I am Dr.
Speaker:Judith Holder, your host, coach psychologist, fellow seeker who enjoys
Speaker:diving into the connections between spirituality, psychology, wellness,
Speaker:and your everyday life's adventures.
Speaker:All preparing and polishing you, like the fastest of magnificent
Speaker:diamond, to be your best self.
Speaker:If you're craving more from your life, you are in the right place.
Speaker:Come let's journey together and transforming what you know
Speaker:and to who you really are.
Speaker:Mastering life's adventures begins now.
Speaker:Hi, I'm back to talk about another barrier roadblock to our soul
Speaker:evolution, and this is to defiant dis.
Speaker:Defiant dishonesty.
Speaker:I was making a comment in my last episode.
Speaker:I was talking about righteous indignation.
Speaker:And you can go back and listen to that.
Speaker:This is related in terms of defiant, in terms of defiant dishonesty.
Speaker:And what we're looking at, and I left off the last time, was about a comment
Speaker:I made about how righteous retaliation was hanging out with this quality
Speaker:underneath that righteous retaliation is the possibility of not being good enough.
Speaker:And that's why we're being triggered in moving into this righteous retaliation.
Speaker:My thoughts about this as it relates to defiant dishonesty.
Speaker:I will talk a little bit more in a minute about how it relates to soul.
Speaker:Let me first talk about the dishonesty component.
Speaker:As I've been thinking about this, and the soul, and our psychology, and our life
Speaker:experiences, and cultural experiences, and societal experiences that we do have.
Speaker:When you think about dishonesty, you think about a sham.
Speaker:You think about something's fake, that is deceptive, or duplicity going on with it.
Speaker:And the word that comes up to my mind is, untruthfulness.
Speaker:The person's not being true.
Speaker:They're not saying the things that are true.
Speaker:And there may be many reasons why people get into this dishonesty with
Speaker:themselves and dishonesty with others.
Speaker:And, uh, one of the things I was thinking about that, maybe simple as, like, for
Speaker:example, we say sometimes that we're happy or content in our life and, or
Speaker:we're, or better yet, that we're happy with the project and how it turned out.
Speaker:And then when we, we're happy with it.
Speaker:But then when we give it to other people to look at or to give some
Speaker:critique around or information about, they say, that looks great.
Speaker:We think it looks great.
Speaker:But they're not really sharing with you, maybe one or two things that could have
Speaker:been done a lot better with the project.
Speaker:But overall, the project was pretty good.
Speaker:But again, they're not sharing with you the one or two things that could
Speaker:make that project to be exceptional.
Speaker:Because they're afraid of or fearful about being offensive.
Speaker:Or some things, saying things that rock the boat, or getting into a conflict.
Speaker:There's many people who just don't like to be in conflict.
Speaker:Therefore, they don't say the truth.
Speaker:They only say partial truth.
Speaker:Or they only kind of gloss over things and not giving you really a holistic view
Speaker:that could be helpful to your evolution and your own particular growth in the area
Speaker:of work or in your personal relationships.
Speaker:or in any of your experiences that you have.
Speaker:With this dishonesty takes place, it really puts us in a situation in which we
Speaker:know that we're not being totally truthful because, like I said, various reasons.
Speaker:We don't want to hurt people's feelings and want to be nice to individuals.
Speaker:But we also have to be true.
Speaker:And we have to find out, find ways in which we're sharing and talking
Speaker:about things that are maybe a little bit more difficult to talk about.
Speaker:That may be more helpful for the other person, especially if they
Speaker:ask for the feedback from us and looking for some sincere, genuine
Speaker:comments that you can be able to give.
Speaker:But what happens if this kind of takes place?
Speaker:One of the things my mind went to was the Johari window.
Speaker:Which came out in 1955, maybe some of you know.
Speaker:It was with two individuals who were interested in helping people
Speaker:to understand themselves as well as their relationships better.
Speaker:And they were psychologists who created the Johari Window.
Speaker:And it was Joseph Love and Harrington Ingram.
Speaker:What they ended up doing was taking their names, their first
Speaker:names, Joseph and Harrington.
Speaker:And they ended up pulling together to make the Johari window.
Speaker:So that's a little bit of background of how the Johari window came about.
Speaker:It became very helpful for many people when it came out
Speaker:in the 50s and the 60s and 70s.
Speaker:and even to this day, it's what people refer to, you know, in their, um, talking
Speaker:about these blind spots that we have, or talking about leadership development.
Speaker:We're talking about helping to coach people through situations
Speaker:and circumstances that they may find themselves in.
Speaker:For our purposes, we're talking about it through the
Speaker:perspective of defiant dishonesty.
Speaker:And, but that, that analogy or that statement that I used or example that I
Speaker:used earlier about this project and the person not really getting true feedback
Speaker:and they are getting more kind of the higher order of feedback because they
Speaker:want to be nice and not about the two or three things that can really help
Speaker:the, the project to shine so much more.
Speaker:And they're generally looking for feedback because we don't feel
Speaker:comfortable giving it for various reasons.
Speaker:We don't give it, which is a lost opportunity.
Speaker:What the Chahari Window says, that may explain some of
Speaker:this, there's an open self.
Speaker:There's four quadrants.
Speaker:It's like a box and you put kind of a diagonal line, a horizontal
Speaker:line, and you have four quadrants.
Speaker:And each quadrant relates to the understanding of self and
Speaker:the understanding of others.
Speaker:So in one quadrant, there is the open self, which is kind
Speaker:of known as the public self.
Speaker:And that is things that you know and other people know about you.
Speaker:And then there's another quadrant in that Johari window, in that square, which is
Speaker:kind of known as the hidden self, or the mask, or the private self, or the secret
Speaker:self, or all words that have been used.
Speaker:And that is known to ourselves, as well as can be unknown to others.
Speaker:So it's known to self, and unknown to others, that hidden aspect of self.
Speaker:And then another quadrant of that window is the blind spot.
Speaker:Or the blind self, or the unknown blind spot.
Speaker:That's usually unknown to ourself and known to others.
Speaker:So other people can see something about us that we don't see about ourselves.
Speaker:That's what that quadrant really focuses around.
Speaker:And it can be something simple as, for example, you're smirking.
Speaker:And so other people know that when you're smirking, you're about
Speaker:to tell a joke about something.
Speaker:But you don't know that, that that's your kind of way in which you're
Speaker:announcing to them because you're in your own self, so you don't see yourself.
Speaker:But they can see that you're smirking.
Speaker:And so that's an example of kind of the, that aspect of the quadrant in terms of
Speaker:the blind spot that can happen to us.
Speaker:It can be something simple as that.
Speaker:Another actually thought is when a person tells you something about yourself
Speaker:and you're surprised, and you don't think the assessment or the statement
Speaker:that they said to you is correct, so you don't, since you don't see it.
Speaker:You don't believe it, even though it may be true.
Speaker:But again, that's why it's called the blind spot.
Speaker:There is the...
Speaker:Unknown self.
Speaker:I'm talking about this, again, from the aspect of defiant dishonesty
Speaker:and what may happen there, which I'll talk more about as I put out
Speaker:this last quadrant and helping you to understand this Johari window.
Speaker:So we talked about the open self in one quadrant and another
Speaker:quadrant is the hidden, the mask or the private or secret self.
Speaker:And then in another quadrant, there is the blind spot.
Speaker:And then what I'm talking about now is the unknown self.
Speaker:And in the unknown self, these are things that you don't know about
Speaker:and others do not know about.
Speaker:And literally, some people say it came out of the blue, whatever happened.
Speaker:Oh, I didn't realize that just came from somewhere.
Speaker:I don't know where.
Speaker:That's usually known as the, uh, unknown self or the mystery self, the mystery
Speaker:aspect of the quadrant in ourselves.
Speaker:It's the unconscious level that we don't readily know all that's there
Speaker:and it comes up during times of stress.
Speaker:or during times of just unexpectedly.
Speaker:All these different levels may be operating within us.
Speaker:There's some things we know at the conscious level, and there's some
Speaker:things we don't know, which may be subconscious or unconscious to us,
Speaker:and how we behave and why we're doing what we're doing, and our expectations
Speaker:about ourselves, as well as in our interactions with other individuals.
Speaker:With that window in mind, and understanding, and going back to
Speaker:dishonesty, There may be within the hidden, and which is that known to
Speaker:self and not known to others, and in the blind spot that is unknown to you,
Speaker:but known to others as well as in the unknown self, that dishonesty may happen.
Speaker:But I'm just gonna focus on these two areas, which is more of the, the hidden,
Speaker:the mass, the private part of ourselves in a blind spot happens now, and what happens
Speaker:is, is, is that it's understandable.
Speaker:While there may be some dishonest play going on with ourselves, we also don't
Speaker:see certain aspects of ourselves.
Speaker:That's why it's called blind spot.
Speaker:Or there may be aspects that we know that others don't know that we're trying
Speaker:to opaque and not want our people to see about our insecurity, for example.
Speaker:But what we're trying to do...
Speaker:is bringing to surface, especially those things that may be uncomfortable
Speaker:to us, that may make us feel insecure, or that may be truly a blind spot that
Speaker:someone is bringing to our attention, that we're willing to look at and see
Speaker:if we're walking a spiritual path, if we're kind of on this soul journey.
Speaker:Because we're always trying to have a better understanding of ourselves,
Speaker:so that we are continuing to grow and advance in our awareness.
Speaker:about how we're showing up in the world and how other people are experiencing us.
Speaker:And that's the beauty of being around people.
Speaker:That they're always helping us to see something about ourselves
Speaker:if we're willing to see it.
Speaker:And then, we, in our own way, find ways to be able to make the change.
Speaker:If we need to, and move out of the dishonesty to really wanting
Speaker:to see things as they are.
Speaker:And the trueness of, and being there for us to look at it.
Speaker:So, yes, there are non awareness, and there's awareness that we do have, too.
Speaker:This is what the Johar window shows, about the things we know about ourselves, and
Speaker:things that others don't know about us.
Speaker:And then that last quadrant, about there's things in which others
Speaker:don't know, and we don't know.
Speaker:Okay, I get that.
Speaker:But we're going to talk about that piece of things today.
Speaker:At some point in the future, we may talk more about it.
Speaker:But we're talking about more of the things that relate to the
Speaker:open, the hidden, and the blind.
Speaker:Aspects that others are bringing to our attention that we become more aware of.
Speaker:This brings up the next aspect of the dishonesty is the defiant dishonesty.
Speaker:Defiant.
Speaker:What happens is with the defiance, I mean you think of defiance, think of such
Speaker:things as resistance, maybe being more obstinate, not wanting to see or look at
Speaker:something, or willfulness, disobedience.
Speaker:You know, we know it's not the right thing when the people says,
Speaker:please don't do this, but we do it anyway, because we just wanted to
Speaker:see if we could be able to do it.
Speaker:But they're saying it's not the right time for you to do that.
Speaker:But that's kind of the quality of mimicking disobedient to what is being
Speaker:asked of you at the point in time.
Speaker:Then it can also, this defines, can be recalcitrant.
Speaker:That it can be something that is, has its tracks, you know, deep written trenches.
Speaker:Why we're continuing to move into a defiant.
Speaker:And I'll tie this all together in terms of defiant dishonesty in a minute.
Speaker:As we're thinking about the Jahari window, and we're thinking about
Speaker:what defiance means, it also can move us into being more argumentative.
Speaker:Because, again, there may be things that people see about us that we're not seeing,
Speaker:that we're not willing to entertain.
Speaker:And instead, we become as argumentative about it.
Speaker:Interestingly enough, the dishonesty becomes entrenched.
Speaker:Knowingly or unknowingly, our dishonesty and defiance that we have
Speaker:becomes more entrenched in its heart to be able to let it go at times.
Speaker:Let me give you an example.
Speaker:We live in a society where we believe it's okay to share quote unquote white lies.
Speaker:We think it's acceptable to do.
Speaker:Because everyone does it, they don't tell you the total truth,
Speaker:they kind of give you, they kind of puff it up a little bit more.
Speaker:And they're getting into giving you a story that is a little bit
Speaker:blown out of proportion, uh, to the reality of what really took
Speaker:place in that particular situation.
Speaker:And so we, we find that...
Speaker:With this, these white lies that we can tell, and that we have
Speaker:experienced, and what people are saying, because we sometimes say,
Speaker:well, I'm not sure that person told, told the truth, or I think they're
Speaker:exaggerating, or telling half truths.
Speaker:Oh, there's some falsity to what is being said, which then sets us,
Speaker:you know, our spider sense up and saying, can I trust or believe what
Speaker:this person is truly telling me?
Speaker:And I think we all want to be trusted in what we're saying and what we're doing.
Speaker:But getting back to this defiant dishonesty, you know, these white
Speaker:lies actually is a place that we need to begin to make a shift.
Speaker:And then you start thinking about, are there other ways?
Speaker:in which I get into a defiant dishonesty towards myself or towards others.
Speaker:That I know I'm being dishonest, or people have brought it to my attention
Speaker:that so, but I don't want to look at it.
Speaker:I want to be obstinate.
Speaker:I don't want to say no, because you want to save face.
Speaker:You want to appear good.
Speaker:Yes.
Speaker:We all want to be looked at in a favorable light.
Speaker:But we need to pivot, because at the soul level, This dishonesty is not
Speaker:helpful to soul progress or growth.
Speaker:It is truthfulness, is what the soul was wanting.
Speaker:How can it be truthful?
Speaker:And knowing that it's not always going to be easy, but it's worthy.
Speaker:It's a virtue.
Speaker:It's worthy of something to strive for because it's more an alignment.
Speaker:to the purity of what the soul is looking for.
Speaker:It's more in alignment to being what I've talked about in one of my past
Speaker:episodes about being more Christ like.
Speaker:And being more Christ like, that's one of the qualities of being more
Speaker:Christ like, is being truthful.
Speaker:When we are able to be more straightforward or more truthful,
Speaker:and know when we're kind of moving towards exaggerating, what went on
Speaker:in a particular situation or in our interactions with other individuals.
Speaker:Either we can take one or two paths.
Speaker:We can take the path of defiant dishonesty, that would define what
Speaker:we know is really truthful and clear about what we need to say and what we
Speaker:need to share with other individuals to build that degree of trustworthiness.
Speaker:Or we can pivot and we can move towards honesty, truthfulness.
Speaker:Now, if we came from a family background, which it was funny and it was, and
Speaker:it was great for people to kind of exaggerate the truth, we know where
Speaker:that some of that's coming from.
Speaker:So we want to keep the humor.
Speaker:We would just want to throw out the parts that are fabricated, that
Speaker:are not truly what really happened.
Speaker:We're doing it because we want to get in greater laugh or get a joke about it.
Speaker:But if we're walking that spiritual path, we realize it's not being honest.
Speaker:It's not helping the soul to get clear and to have greater attunement to
Speaker:what is real truly and what is false.
Speaker:The other thing is when we get back to this quality of not good enough,
Speaker:that is based upon some degrees of illusion and maybe even delusion
Speaker:that has been fabricated by these qualities, uh, defiant dishonesty.
Speaker:So the righteous retaliation underneath that is what I said in the last
Speaker:episode was this not good enough.
Speaker:And then on top of that becomes because we feel we're not good enough that
Speaker:we move into defiant dishonesty about what we say and how we say it because
Speaker:we want to be accepted, we want to be liked, we want to be appreciated,
Speaker:we want to be valued in some way.
Speaker:And what I would say to you You have to begin to know you are worthy.
Speaker:Your soul, the essence of who you are, regardless of the circumstances,
Speaker:situations, or the persons that you have found yourself in, the core of who
Speaker:you are is God focused, Christ focused.
Speaker:It is the essence that that goodness in you, that is, is
Speaker:there, is embedded in you.
Speaker:And sometimes because of all this caked over of experiences that we've
Speaker:had, we feel that somehow, that we are not good enough, or that we
Speaker:are somehow damaged in some ways.
Speaker:I'm not going to say that life experiences and traumas and pains
Speaker:and difficulties can't create some challenges with us in our sense of self.
Speaker:Self and our self esteem and this quality of good enough.
Speaker:But I would say also it's a judgment.
Speaker:And I talked about judgments in my episode number 12 about the five
Speaker:judgments that we tell ourselves.
Speaker:And that's one of them that we're not good enough.
Speaker:But if we're coming from our true source and our true self, our source is God,
Speaker:the I am presence, the Atman, then we have to realize we are more than worthy.
Speaker:They're more than good.
Speaker:And it's not about the enough piece of things.
Speaker:And we have to be willing to say, the core of me is good.
Speaker:Maybe some of my behaviors or some of the things that have happened
Speaker:to me hasn't been so great.
Speaker:I, I understand that.
Speaker:But the core of who I am and how do I begin to build on
Speaker:that core that I am worthy.
Speaker:And if you do not believe that, then you start to think about I
Speaker:am worthy, make me worthier still.
Speaker:I am worthy of goodness, of, of all the great things to come into my life.
Speaker:And if there's things I need to work on, make me worthier still in
Speaker:the outer aspects of who we are.
Speaker:But the core essence of who we are is good, is on a foundation of goodness.
Speaker:We are from God and we are returning back to God.
Speaker:We are from God, have an experience in this physical world that are teaching
Speaker:us certain lessons and giving us an opportunity to be more clear and
Speaker:discerning about how we want to speak, how we want to think, how we want
Speaker:to feel, and how we want to show up in relationships at work or at home.
Speaker:That we are here to learn certain lessons and why not embark upon that
Speaker:in a conscious and intentional way and get out of these little qualities
Speaker:that create barriers to soul progress.
Speaker:And the barrier that I'm talking about today is that defiant dishonesty.
Speaker:That we continue to be dishonest, and to the point of being defiant and stubborn,
Speaker:stubborn about it, and obstinate about it, because we're used to doing it.
Speaker:We're used to engaging in a particular way.
Speaker:We're used to getting laughs, or we're used to appearing
Speaker:very smart and intelligent.
Speaker:So sometimes what we have to do is check ourselves, and just say, is this true?
Speaker:And if it's not true, you say, I need to really not say anymore, and, or
Speaker:correct it, and say what is true.
Speaker:We need to work on it, because as I said earlier, these are white lies.
Speaker:And so, we think that they're harmless, but in the grand scheme of
Speaker:things, over a cumulative period of time, it's not harmless to the soul.
Speaker:The soul needs purity, and these white lies.
Speaker:Quote unquote.
Speaker:Create a stain on the purity of what the soul is evolving
Speaker:and trying to advance towards.
Speaker:in order to kind of unite with its higher source, purpose, meaning, interaction.
Speaker:And think about the white lies like, uh, mosquitoes that are
Speaker:flying around, or gnats, better yet.
Speaker:Gnats that are accumulating and flying around.
Speaker:And you're trying to say, I don't need these gnats in my world.
Speaker:I don't need these energies in my world, because it just
Speaker:creates more disturbance for me.
Speaker:And my ability to see.
Speaker:What I need to do and how I want to be in the situations that surround me and
Speaker:the things that come my way as testings and as initiations to say, to see how
Speaker:am I doing with this quality and what we're talking about today, a defiant
Speaker:dishonesty, what we talked about last week when we were talking about this
Speaker:quality of righteous retaliation.
Speaker:Well, how am I doing in that or all the barriers that we've talked about so far?
Speaker:So that you can continue to learn how to progress in your soul
Speaker:evolution to be your best self.
Speaker:Something to think about.
Speaker:Bye for now.
Speaker:Thank you for joining me for this episode on Mastering Life's Adventures.
Speaker:Being your best self through soul evolution.
Speaker:If you have enjoyed what you've heard today, I would be delighted if you
Speaker:would share this episode with others.
Speaker:Leave a thumbs up and subscribe to my Mastering Life's Adventures podcast.
Speaker:Look forward to your joining the next episode.
Speaker:Please leave any comments or suggestions you might have below.
Speaker:Bye for now.
