There is a pervasive state of mind more addicting than any substance and, exponentially, more damaging to the human spirit. It is the state of “Can’t do.” It’s contagion is so prevalent and so deeply embedded in the American psyche, that it is one of the earliest ideas to be passed from generation to generation.
Somewhere in the first few years of life, the words spoken to a child shift from “You can do it!” to “You can’t do that!”
“You can do it!” is accompanied by an approving smile when the baby stands for the first time, holds a spoon or goes potty. And, often, that first statement is accompanied by a reward, a treat or a hug and a kiss. The second statement, too, often comes with physical contact, from being pushed away to being spanked, or worse. And, the combination of abrupt and painful contact along with “You can’t do that!” quickly and deeply establishes the “truth” of the message in the child’s mind.
We each are equipped with a mind designed to interpret the world on our behalf. For most of us, our minds will never cease interpreting the world as long as we breathe. We continually notice things that we long to do, from something to reach for and put into our mouths to something to read and put into our minds. Our natural selves want to interact with this fabulous world. Until we adopt the false belief that “We can’t do that!”
Once this false concept about our inability to act is embedded in our minds, the person who (most often unwittingly) planted it there can leave the room with the confidence that the most we’ll be able to do is try. And trying is never the same as doing. And there we are, left in the care of our own betraying mind, which continues to repeat the mantra, “You can’t do that!” With the entrancing quality of that statement immobilizing us, the words running incessantly in our minds, we stop ourselves even before our arms reach out. The fascinating, inviting world lies all around us and we are paralized at it’s center. And that paralysis gives birth to frustration.
And then, appropriately socially programmed to try, while chanting to ourselves that we can’t, we go to school. There, for more than a decade, what we can’t do and what don’t know is emphasized day after day year after year, until we graduate — or not — and go off to work. We walk onward into our careers, our marriages and our myriad of adventures, even those we have longed for years to do, still stepping to the beat of that self-defeating declaration, “You can’t do that!” What’s amazing is that some seemingly successful people admit that these words drummed in their ears, too, on their way to appreciable acheivement. So, there’s evidence that this self-deprecating mantra won’t always stop you. What it will do, however, is make you hate your mind and hate your life.
But, that self-hatred isn’t the only consequence. That frustration from not daring to do what you long to do but have come to believe you cannot do, will incite you to flee your own company and seek out those people who apparently still “Can do it.” You fall out of love with yourself (the first love you ever knew) and into love with them. Once this happens, their values, their goals, their interests eclipse your own. And then, you do all you can to model how they live in the desperate hopes that mimicking their lives will bring you their self-acceptance.
But, it never happens. True self-acceptance never comes from a counterfeit life, one lived in imitation of someone else. And, in many cases, the very person you may be modeling is one of those who taught you to reject your own unique perspective and inherent potential. And, the one who would teach others to reject their own minds and ideas, has already rejected his or her own potential, too. So, you will at some point, realize that the people you have been modeling were merely modeling another set of people or standards outside of themselves. Their peace is no less shallow and fragile than your own.
And, all of this will finally, in time, lead you to the mirror. There, you will once again see the one person who has all along known you can do whatever you allow yourself to do. And then, when he or she says again to you, “You can do it!” you will be so grateful, so happy and so alive in hearing this. From that time forward, you will be able to do what you and that reflected expression of yourself agree upon without ever again needing to turn to another for permission or confirmation of what you can do.