Tomorrow is the last day to sign up for Launch Pad. Needless to say, I think it's a great program and I would love for you to join if you haven't already. But even if you're not participating or you're already in, this is the message I want to give you as we're about to start this Saturday.
Sign up for Launch Pad!
How do we get the things we want in our life? We can often times buy it, get it from somebody, or with luck it just falls on top of our laps. It seems like these are plenty of options already on how to get something we want. In that case, why do we constantly live in a state of non-resolution? Why do we keep yearning for more, why do we feel incomplete, and in other words: why do we suffer?
What good is a gold medal if I got it because all the other competitors forfeited? What good is a successful business if I just inherit it from my father? We all have a deep yearning for something that doesn't come naturally to us because that is naturally where we feel the most deficient, incomplete in.
It's the mechanism of suffering. We get used to the pleasures and resources we have and we take it for granted. We start noticing other deficiencies because we remember how it felt to have our needs fulfilled in the past. So we keep striving to fill our lacks. Some lacks are contextual and time-bound. But what about our lacks that are so deeply personal to us, bound by something you might even think is "fate"?
Most people stay here their entire lives and regret it on their deathbed. Wishing they had done more, thinking "what if" and "if only". The more I work with people across the globe the more I realize this is a global human experience.
But my clients are not "most people".
When you work with me, I'm always going to challenge you in a way that it builds up your answer to suffering.
Why do you want the results you want?
What do you need to do to create the results you want?
Why didn't you do the work to get the results you want?
These questions don't seem like much but they demand a lot of you because they have you looking at somewhere you never really look: inside yourself. Throughout the program you'll meet my wonderful students who have been at this work with me for a while and I would hope that they would tell you 1) how difficult this work is and 2) how rewarding this work is.
All of this sounds super hardcore and discouraging. But this is where I need to clear up a misunderstanding: though my approach is difficult I am not punishing you, I am not torturing you, and I am not pressuring you. When you don't do something, I am going to insist on you finding the real reason you didn't do it.
I don't ask you to admit to your shortcomings. I don't ask you to make you feel bad. I don't ask you to stress you out. I'm asking you to look beyond the reason you are so used to taking for granted as the truth, and see the actual truth.
The first mantra of the week when we start is "I will say yes and do first". This already triggers feelings of deep resistance and I completely understand why because believe it or not, I've been on the other end of inaction as well.
But there's a part of you inside that knows that this is what you're yearning for. Being the person you want to be, rather than the person you were born to be. Resistance, looking into its eyes and looking past it... That is where the work is. Let's get to that work this Saturday and I'll see you in Launch Pad.
Billy Seol
P.S. Now that I'm reading the title once again, I feel like it could apply politically as well. In times of oppression and forced change, looking into the discomfort of resistance will demonstrate where our society will need to take its next step towards.
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