Day 19 – Getting to Yes The Creative Way [Oprah and Deepak Chopra Teachings]

Getting Unstuck – Creating a Limitless Life – Oprah and Deepak Chopra 21 Day Meditation Experience

 

These are amazing notes – not transcripts –  from Deepak and Oprah’s meditation challenge, Getting Unstuck, Creating a Limitless Life, written by DoinTheGratefulDance .  I have enjoyed several of the meditation series Oprah and Deepak Chopra have shared.  I am not affiliated with them – just a grateful listener too and wanted to share these wonderful notes.    I couldn’t have done a better job!  Thanks for sharing these notes!

Day 19 –  “Getting to Yes The Creative Way”

“Deep listening is miraculous for both listener and speaker. When someone receives us with open-hearted, non-judging, intensely interested listening, our spirits expand.” – Sue Patton Thoele

 

 

Sanskrit Mantra:  

“Ma Vid Visha Vahai” (sounds like Mah Vid Vish-ah Vah-hai )
May harmony prevail”

Oprah says….

When we get in disagreements that become difficult to resolve, approaching them from a place of ego – making someone “right” and someone “wrong”, we’re “stuck”.   Think about improving a situation…it’s not a creative “Yes” when we try to be right and make the other person wrong.

Oprah quotes Eckhart Tolle, telling us the ego loves to make wrong in order to be right.  Being right places you in a position of imagined moral superiority in relation to the person who is being judged.  That superiority is what the ego craves.  The problem is  that the ego takes everything personally – emotions get riled up and people get defensive.”  Eckhart asks a great questions for situations like this – “Are you defending the truth? The truth needs no defense.  You are defending yourself or the illusion of yourself. Let go of ego and let your expanded awareness guide you through any kind of conflict and you will quickly feel the way toward resolution.”

She refers to Deepak’s saying we all need the same things –

• to feel secure,
• hopeful,
• accepted and
• able to express ourselves.

Oprah says she heard it every day from every person in 25 years of the Oprah Show.  During the commercial break, everyone would ask her, ‘Was that OK?  Did I do OK?’.  She says we all want to hear yes in answer to that question, we all want validation to be seen, to be heard.

She says that when we listen with our creative spirit open, listen with our heart, there is always a path to yes.

Deepak says….

“There are two ways to look at disagreements when they crop up..

• You can see it as an obstacle to getting what you want, or
• You can see it as a creative ferment – the stage where solutions are brewing that will satisfy everyone, for as many people as possible.”

If the process is negative, we feel coerced, bullied or manipulated but when the process is positive we feel relief and mutual satisfaction.  There will always be bumps along the road to finding solutions and getting past these hurdles requires attention and awareness.

Normally when people get a “Yes” – or “come around”, one person in a relationship or negotiation has usually felt manipulated in some way.  Usually one side is seen as losing and one as winning but a genuinely positive “Yes” only occurs when both sides feel they won.  Win-win.  In this event, both sides feel respected, listened to and understood.  A need has been identified and met on both sides but people usually have a difficult time stating their needs – don’t feel they can trust, feel judged, feel pressured not to speak up with honesty, or are too insecure to reveal what really matters to them.

Needs are pretty universal, not a mystery, and as our awareness expands with meditation, we’ll become more intuitive about what those around us really need, basically…

• A need to feel safe and secure
• The need to feel that we are gaining the good things everyone wants in material terms – rising above mere subsistence
• The need to be accepted
• The need to express ourselves
• The need to be “seen” as a person – respected, loved and valued

In a Win-Win situation, one or more of these needs is being met on both sides.   People will give us their best

• If they feel safe with us,
• Believe that we can be trusted
• And see that we take a personal interest

When these things happen, disagreements actually become the spark for rising to a higher level, giving all of us a feeling of gaining something we really need.  We all desire to have our own needs met, but it’s more beautiful and fulfilling to be the one who gives the other person what they need.  This is shaped from a level of unlimited awareness and creates a fairer and better world.

Repeat to myself,
I want a “Yes” that’s good for everyone
I want a “Yes” that’s good for everyone

Listen to some relaxing music, breathe slowly and deeply,  become more and more relaxed, and meditate for about 10 minutes using the Sanskrit mantra –

“Ma Vid Visha Vahai” (sounds like Mah Vid Vish-ah Vah-hai )
May harmony prevail”

Deepak says the mantra means”Together may we always find agreement and understanding”.

Ma Vid Visha Vahai
Ma Vid Visha Vahai
Ma Vid Visha Vahai

Continue meditating  for about 10 minutes and then release the mantra.  Concentrate on the centering thought:   being fulfilled and being who you want to be and repeating:

I want a “Yes” that’s good for everyone
I want a “Yes” that’s good for everyone

 

Reflections on Day 19-  write about it…

• Think of a current conflict in which I cannot find an agreement with someone and write 2 ways I can turn a negative into a positive (show more respect, make them feel that we are equals by asking for their thoughts?  Avoid making judgmental comments?)

• Using the same conflict, and imagining that I am the other person, express what they’re experiencing, their needs and what they feel and want.  Write about how this changes my perspective.

• Write down the top 3 things I want as an outcome from this conflict and arrange them with most important first.  Reflect on why this thing is important and set all other outcomes aside.  How can I clearly show the other person a way to cooperate on this one thing that would benefit both of us – and make it clear.  (i.e. if I want peace – make it clear and start acting in a peaceful manner.  Ask the other person if they want peace too?  Discuss what peace personally means to each of us.)

Oprah lessons  written by by DoinTheGratefulDance