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<p>Me and pedestals don't mix. </p>
<p>Until recently I was under the assumption that they were just a normal part of life and that there were bound to be others you put "up there" and vice versa. I believed that there were situations where others came first or deserved more than I did because they were winning something, achieveing a certain thing, hurting and needed their moment, did the same thing for me so I had to reciprocate or had something I wanted in my life. I was completely unaware of their destructive power and how poisonous they were to the soul, a testament to the fact that, as Iyanla Vanzant put it, "you don't know, what you don't know." </p>
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<p>It's sometimes so subtle that we build them up for others and don't even catch it as it happens. My life experience has seen an overwhelming amount of them built for others. I don't think I can honestly recall a time where I tried to put myself above another because it was always the other way around. Yes, my self-perception and image was that bad. That's not what I want to emphasize though, because I chose to make it so; in many ways I want to change my voicemail to, "If you're looking for the woman I was before I knew mySelf, she's left and taken the victim with her so if you're ready to speak to the Divine place of power within, leave a message at the beep." I simply wanted to point out that in a lot of the experiences and examples I use, I'm coming from a place of being someone who built those pedestals and made others more important. </p>
<p>Before going any further, I want to identify what I'm talking about here, so by my definition, a pedestal is any thought we hold about another person that presents us with a perception that they are of greater importance/worthier/made of better "stuff" than us. </p>
<p>The first thing I'm tempted to do when a thought like this comes to me is to look at the how. Analyzing was the one thing I was perfect at because it meant that all I had to do was understand something on an intellectual level and parrot back to another person, the theoretical points, staying disconnected from the heart of it. </p>
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<p>How have I implemented this way of thinking in my life? How did I let these beliefs be the one controlling the gas pedal? How did they start? How are they working now? </p>
<p>What I realized tonight, which was so quietly beautiful was that if you put someone on a pedestal, the question to ask is not how they got there, but why you feel the need to make them more important than you. </p>
<p>Let me rephrase that to offer another way of understanding this powerful thought: Why do I need another person to be worth more than me, made of more stuff that makes them "enough" more than me and why do I need to provide others with the ability to hurt me and call me by a name that isn't my own? </p>
<p>There is often more to it than just saying, "Your needs take greater precedence in my life than my own." Women around me have done that so wonderfully though, that I feel like saying, "Once that music stops will you have any other dance to keep beat to a new song?" While it was frustrating to sift through, I will say that I'm so lucky to be realizing this now and in this point in my life and am grateful for the women who taught me to see myself this way. Moreover, it's such a blessing, through and through, to have my life unfold the way that it did because I could not imagine a better set of circumstances to awaken me than the ones that have unfolded as such. </p>
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<p>Once you answer the why, it might be safe to look at a few of the "hows", provided that you don't make a career out of that perspective and make that your biography. Only you can know for sure. I couldn't take more than a peek because I understood that my pattern up to this point was to dwell in the story that dictated my pointed insignificance and the sweet taste of pointing out how I might be perceived as "wrong", was too rich to introduce. </p>
<p>Some I unearthed tonight: </p>
<p>When you... </p>
<p>-Ask another person's permission to feel something by apologizing for your emotions... </p>
<p>-Need someone or something in your life to make you feel a certain way... </p>
<p>-Live in blame more than your own power... </p>
<p>-Believe that in order to appear beautiful you need to wear a certain piece of clothing... </p>
<p>-Envy the way another person looks... </p>
<p>-Feel nervous that someone might not like you... </p>
<p>-Make someone else's issues more important than your present moment... </p>
<p>-Fail to act on the urgings of your heart because you 'care' so much that you don't want to hurt someone else's feelings... </p>
<p>-Listen to another's advice without choosing to because you don't want to upset them... </p>
<p>-Feel guilty for the way something happened before that you no longer have control over now... </p>
<p>-Keep topics off the table even though you feel in your heart that you want nothing more than to talk about them... </p>
<p>-Believe that another person, thing or situation causes you to be stuck... </p>
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<p>...you ignore that you're enough, you're worthy, you're important, you're the physical expression of Divine Love and in doing so inform the world around you that you're willing to be treated as "less than" because that's who you believe yourself to be. Until you stop constructing pedestals and the reasons that make up the rungs of the ladder up to it that argue for your limitation, you'll continue to give others reasons why it's okay to treat you poorly. </p>
<p>There is no virtue in placing another person in a place of greater importance than you. When I tried to think about at least one or two situations where someone else could be more deserving or worthy than me, I realized that all I would do is deny the other person the opportunity to experience their magnificence. I would rob them of the chance to know the God that lives within them and realize what that means for the direction of their life. If there's a definition of selfish, I'm coming to believe that might be it. </p>
<p>The most beautiful part of it all is the realization which filled in the spaces between the silence this evening: without the feeling of being more important than one another, there is nothing left to do but become the champion of your existence because you're left with mountains of reasons why you are worth it. </p>
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<p>It is because I love myself that the only time I put anything or anyone "up" in my life, it's going to be great memories I'm tucking away on a shelf for later viewing enjoyment.</p>
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