I’ve found myself in an interesting place lately - on the edge of taking off.  In a way, it’s like I was the last one to realize that I had become a different being. And so, I kept responding as though I were the same being. It’s like letting a creature out of a cage and watching while, for a time, it continues to occupy the same small space. The creature has learned to live and breathe and move in the shape of that space. And so, even when the shape of the space changes, there’s a time when from habit and fear and misplaced sense of safety, it continues to occupy the same space.

When we do that, it’s often  because where we were wasn’t a cage.  And becoming is more organic than being released from a prison.  It can sneak up on you. Still, when suddenly there is space, continuing to keep ourselves small, cramped, operating in an outgrown paradigm holds us back. People always blame comfort - we’re constantly told to push past our comfort zone.   I wonder though, if it’s really comfort that holds us back.  Who, really, is comfortable being cramped?  Being forced to try to move through life as though they are smaller than they are?  I think, sometimes, the harder problem is habit.

One of my guides once told me that in times of stress (and becoming does have some stress of change) we (humans) always resort to our most basic habits and so, it behooves us to make sure those habits serve us. I think that’s easy to do physically. Sure, it takes Will, but if we focus our will, we can build up a set of habits of doing that serve us well. I think the harder habits to recognize and break (or replace) are those of reaction, the emotional habits we have. We are not taught to believe that emotional states can be habitual. But they can. If we always walk the same path, there will be a path worn in the grass and dirt. As above so below, as within so without. When we become accustomed to reacting in the same manner over and over, we build emotional habits.

The waters become much murkier around these kinds of habits than around the habits of behavior.  Why? Because these habits don’t become habits through the force of our will or the impact of others. They become habit because we are, initially, in a place where the response is organic. But, emotional habits can outlast the place where they are authentic and organic. When we grow into a new shape and size we often have more emotional responses available to us, as long as we can see past our habits and toward the being that we have become.

What are you becoming? Do you have emotional habits keep you responding as though you occupy a smaller space than your new shape?