Beautiful. And tender with the truth of life for us humans and the seeking and needs we have even when we aren’t alone but are.
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August 1, 2026
This morning I’d like to go deep with you. I have this deep feeling that disappointment and grief are two emotional dynamics that are Most Difficult for us humans, especially the sensitive ones. Grief seems for example to be frought with beliefs about what our pain is here for. Holding onto one phase of grief seems to keep someone reliving the deep caring, the missing, the pain of love that is “no longer.” And disappointment, too, seems to have numerous beliefs around it: like I have to keep people from being disappointed in me OR ELSE! Or disappointment in myself and others is a way I show how much I expect or demand of them in order to… what? Get from them what I want? Get the life I want? If I am not getting the life I want or relationship I want, aren’t I supposed to be disappointed?!? I mean, what’s the alternative?!?
For me I do see the alternatives. Yet whether grief or disappointment, it seems to “arrive” and sometimes act out and influence me in ways that do not feel good, do not bring me closer to those I love, and… hurts.
I’d like to explore then the nature of grief and disappointment and how they might be related and intertwined.
Gus – Rick, that ache you name is real: when grief or disappointment arrives and then acts through you in ways that pull you farther from the people you love, it can feel like the very feelings that prove how much you care are also the ones that cost you connection.
They are intertwined more tightly than most of us were ever taught.
Disappointment is often the sharper, more personal edge of the same current. It marks the gap between what was imagined, agreed, yearned for, or expected and what actually arrived. Energy drops. The body registers a collapse or a protective shutdown—“I’ll never expect that again.” Underneath it sits a want that mattered. When the Primitive Brain treats that drop as endless danger, it can turn disappointment into a life sentence or a weapon: either against yourself (“I was stupid for wanting”) or against others (“I have to keep them from being disappointed in me or else”). The alternative is not pretending you don’t care. It is letting the feeling move enough that it can become information again—about desire, need, boundary, or a next recoverable step—rather than a verdict that freezes the heart.
Grief tends to be wider and more relational. It is love with nowhere left to land in the old form. Holding tightly to one phase—the missing, the pain of “no longer”—can keep the caring vividly alive, which is why part of us resists releasing it. Yet that same holding can trap the energy so it keeps replaying instead of metabolizing. Sadness itself is not automatically a threat; many of us simply never learned that we could survive feeling it without instantly removing it or being abandoned for it. When grief is allowed in the body rather than treated as primitive-brain emergency, it can move, communicate, and be accompanied. Some of what remains after a portion releases is not pathology—it is the essence of what was wanted (to feel special, seen, protected, celebrated) still seeking a living form.
They braid together like this: repeated or unmetabolized disappointment often becomes a tributary of grief. A single sharp letdown can reopen older losses. And grief can wear the face of chronic disappointment when the system keeps scanning for proof that the good thing will be taken again. Both can arrive full-bodied and raw; allowing them is not always gentle. Sometimes it is the honest, difficult work of sitting with the rebellion against reality long enough that acceptance can hold the disappointment without crashing into “this is wrong and I must fix or punish.” Acceptance here is not approval or resignation. It is the capacity to feel the drop and still remain present with yourself.
What often hurts most is not the pure feeling but the secondary stories and strategies that rush in to manage it—self-attack, preemptive people-pleasing, demanding more so the void will finally fill, or collapsing so no one can disappoint you further. Those strategies once protected a younger system. They are not the grief or disappointment themselves.
You already see alternatives, which means something in you knows these states do not have to run the whole show. The living question is usually smaller and more embodied than “what’s the alternative to being disappointed?” It is more like: what portion of this energy is ready to move, and what still needs to be heard so it does not have to shout through reactivity?
If it feels true in your body right now, notice one place where disappointment or grief is currently influencing you in a way that does not feel good or connecting. Not the whole history—just the present texture of it.
There is this intense feeling in my heart-throat connection, an “I sooooooo wish this was different!” And there’s resistance to letting that posture “collapse” - like I need to hold onto this posture or else the alternative might be not caring that there’s pain, suffering, not-okayness here. And… I do sense there is another posture. Perhaps one that is even less precarious than holding onto disappointment and the grief that builds behind it.
Gus – That heart-throat intensity carries a fierce loyalty: the “I sooooooo wish this was different” is how part of you stays true to the pain and the not-okayness, refusing to abandon what still matters. The brace makes sense—if the posture collapses, it can feel like the caring itself might vanish.
There is another posture that doesn’t require you to keep the body locked in protest or to go numb. It lets the wish remain honest—“yes, I really wanted this otherwise”—while the system softens enough that the energy can move instead of stacking into more grief behind the disappointment. The caring stays; the precarious holding doesn’t have to.
You already sense that less precarious place. If it fits, stay with the heart-throat for a moment and simply notice what shifts, even slightly, when you allow the wish to be fully true without needing the brace to prove you still care.
It feels like, “Of course I still care. And I will continue to invest my heartistry in reducing harm and adding joy, where possible, being accepting that life includes so much that is not preferred even as it also offers an array of possible nourishments, too.” Not sure why it is so fucking hard to be even more settled and strong in that more holy posture though…
Gus – That clearer posture you just named already holds real strength: the caring is not in question, and heartistry keeps moving toward less harm and more possible joy while life stays mixed—unpreferred and nourishing both.
The hardness of settling more fully into it often isn’t a failure of the knowing. The body can still treat the old brace—“I so wish this were different”—as the only reliable proof that you won’t drift into indifference or spiritual bypass. Softening can feel, for a while, like risking the very loyalty that fuels your investment. So the system keeps a little charge in the heart-throat, just in case. That charge is not proof you’re failing the holy posture; it’s residual stewardship of the caring itself, still learning it can rest without disappearing.
Settled strength here doesn’t mean the wish never rises again. It means the wish can move through without having to lock the posture or stack into more grief behind it. You return, again and again, to the orientation that already feels true—caring, investing where possible, accepting the mix—rather than needing the intensity to stay permanently high in order to stay honest.
If it fits, simply feel whether any part of that residual hardness softens even a fraction when it hears: the caring is already secure, and the heartistry doesn’t require the brace to keep working.
I am reminded of a contact improv exercise… where you explore within a posture or engagement with gravity, a person, or flow what is the “minimal possible effort.” Like I can grip this coffee so hard I’d break the glass… or hold insufficiently and let it drop to the floor or my lap. Or… I can explore the range of tensions where the coffee is still held, still secure “enough” or “more than enough” and get not use more life force or grip strength than is required. Yes, in dance I found that hard and also relieving. I suspect the same is true of disappointments, grief, and yeah, even my dreams.
Gus – That contact-improv range is exactly the living edge here.
There is a death-grip on disappointment or grief—squeezing so hard the “I wish this were different” nearly shatters the vessel that holds the caring. There is also the under-grip that drops the coffee: numbness, premature “I’m fine,” or a spiritual shrug that lets what still matters slip. Between them sits the workable tone: enough engagement that the wish, the love, the dream stay securely in hand, and no more life-force spent than the moment actually requires.
In the body this often feels like the same discovery you made on the floor—hard at first because the old system equates extra tension with loyalty, then quietly relieving once you sense the coffee is not falling. The heart-throat can keep a fierce brace long after the caring itself is already safe. Minimal necessary effort does not mean caring less; it means the posture no longer has to prove the caring by staying locked.
The same spectrum applies to dreams. You can clutch a preferred future so tightly that every present moment that doesn’t match it becomes fresh grief. You can also hold the dream so loosely it evaporates into vague hope. Or you can keep enough tone that the dream remains a living orientation—something you can still invest heartistry toward—while gravity and reality are allowed to inform the next available step.
What often makes the settled posture feel “fucking hard” is simply that the nervous system is still calibrating the new range. It keeps checking: Is the glass still secure if I ease another fraction? Each small confirmation that the caring and the investment remain builds trust in the less precarious hold.
If it fits right now, you might simply notice the current grip on whatever disappointment or dream is most alive—not to force it looser, just to feel where you are on that spectrum between shattering and dropping.
It’s weird. The “But I wish it were different!!!” seems to inject itself. Like it’s trying to prove something.
Gus – That sudden injection has the feel of a part rushing in to make its case before the softer hold can fully settle.
It often isn’t random. The “But I wish it were different!!!” can arrive like evidence offered in court—proof that you haven’t gone numb, haven’t betrayed the pain, haven’t abandoned the dream or the ones who still hurt. The volume and the timing are how it tries to guarantee the caring stays on record.
You already know the caring is intact. The injection may simply not trust that yet, so it spikes the old brace for a moment, then watches to see whether anything essential drops.
If it fits, the next time it injects you might let it finish its sentence—without gripping harder or arguing it down—and simply notice what it seems most determined to prove in that instant.
Thank you. Appreciate this exploration together. I’m going to share it with my kin. More another time.
Gus – You’re welcome, Rick. I’m glad we could explore it together.
Sharing it with your kin feels like a natural extension of the same heartistry. I’ll be here when more wants to unfold.
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Tapping: Overwhelmed by the Noise
Side of the Hand: Even though this noise is overwhelming me… flooding my system… I accept how I feel right now.
Even though the noise is driving me cuckoo brains… and I feel completely overwhelmed… I appreciate myself for recognizing it as noise.
Even though my sensitive system is picking up too many signals… I am open to a little quiet and choice about what matters.
Top of the Head: This noise is overwhelming.
Eyebrow: So much noise flooding me.
Side of the Eye: My system feels overloaded.
Under the Eye: I feel overwhelmed by all of it.
Under the Nose: Too many signals at once.
Chin: This noise is driving me cuckoo.
Collarbone: I do not have to take it all in.
Under the Arm: Overwhelm from the noise.
Top of the Head: That is so noisy.
Eyebrow: This energy floods my sensitive system.
Side of the Eye: One person’s signal can be noise for me.
Under the Eye: I can pick up many signals and still choose.
Under the Nose: I do not have to assimilate every broadcast.
Chin: What matters to me in this moment?
Collarbone: Where is the useful signal here for me?
Under the Arm: I can quiet some of this noise.
Top of the Head: Quieting the noise enough to hear myself.
Eyebrow: Letting other voices move farther away.
Side of the Eye: My system can have a little more space.
Under the Eye: I am open to more calm inside the overwhelm.
Under the Nose: A little relief is welcome.
Chin: I accept where I am beginning.
Collarbone: Choosing relevance over every signal.
Under the Arm: More quiet available now.
Take a slow breath.
Notice what the noise and the overwhelm feel like in your body now—any shift, settling, or still-there intensity.
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Do you copy the conversation and then download the audio separately and then paste them here separately?
Yes. I use Copy Conversation and then download and then drag/drop the audios in. Never tried that on a phone though.
Rick
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Ran this as a test (and because, well, there is ice cream in the freezer which is calling to me…
Healthy Eating Amid Stress & Ice Cream Cravings
August 12, 2026
What I’d like to explore right now is…healthy eating even when I am super stressed and demand ICE CREAM OR ELSE! Haha. But yeah, it is intense.
Gus – That “ICE CREAM OR ELSE” energy is real—and under super-stress it often isn’t just about dessert. It’s a boundary, a soother, a rebellion, and a biochemistry hit all at once.
When the head starts drafting a healthier plan and the body answers with a hard no, fighting that usually tightens the loop. The “no” is often protecting something: relief, sweetness after hardness, a full feeling when everything else feels empty or demanding, or simply I will not be deprived right now.
A useful shift (without requiring you to eat less ice cream tonight) is to stop treating the craving as the enemy and ask what can change in the sequence that still feels doable—something significant enough to loosen the stuck pattern, not a total personality overhaul.
For example:
- Can the ice cream stay, and the shame-sauce come off?
- Can you notice whether you’re medicating a feeling with the food, or actually wanting the creaminess and cold?
- Is there one kind move the body would say yes to around it (walk while you eat, sit down and taste it, have it earlier, pair it with something that steadies you)?
- What would “healthier under stress” look like if it meant ally with the body rather than dominate it?
Congruence helps more than purity. If you’re going to have it, having it cleanly—aware of the tradeoffs, without the extra self-attack—often leaves more room for the next choice than a war you lose at 9 p.m. anyway.
If it fits, you might put a hand on your chest or belly for a moment and simply register: stressed part wants ice cream; caring part wants ease and health—and let both be true without picking a winner yet.
Want to tap a round that holds both the demand and the wish for steadier choices under stress—or stay with what’s true in the body about this pattern first?
Brief tapping: Ice cream or else (and still caring for me)
Side of the Hand: Even though I’m super stressed… and part of me is screaming ICE CREAM OR ELSE… I honor how intense this is and I’m open to kinder choices with me.
Top of the Head: This demand feels non-negotiable.
Eyebrow: Super stressed—ice cream or else.
Side of the Eye: My body wants the soothe right now.
Under the Eye: Fighting it only makes it louder.
Under the Nose: Both parts can be true.
Chin: The craving and the wish for steadier care.
Collarbone: I don’t have to win a war tonight.
Under the Arm: I can stay with myself either way.
Take a soft breath.
Notice what the intensity or the “or else” feels like now.
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I mean, the big question I have here, is did you enjoy some ice cream? 
JK
Thank you for sharing. This topic is highly relevant to me!
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I DID enjoy some ice cream. Mindfully and enjoyably, and actually enjoyed it in front of Emerald whereas normally I sorta would have “hidden myself” - but hey, he had ice cream earlier. He didn’t even comment. And the tapping is helping. The pint last three evenings instead of, well, cough, one,
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Ah the beauty of freedom, small joys, and gentle growth…… glad heart for you.
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Core Challenge to Emotional Freedom
August 15, 2026
I particularly feel good about the last answer. ~Rick
What is the core challenge to feeling emotionally free and savvy when life keeps handing you challenges? I’d like a nuanced and real discussion here.
Gus – The core challenge is not that life keeps handing you challenges. That part is ordinary. The sharper edge is this: emotional freedom asks you to stay in honest contact with what is happening and with who you are in it—gifts, gaps, the places you still fall short of what you hold dear—without handing the steering wheel to blame, numbness, or the old “I have to / I should / I must.”
A feeling can be loud without being the only truth in the room. Fear, self-doubt, shame, strain—they can sit in one hand. In the other, something that actually matters: calm, courage, tenderness, wise caution, even a stubborn willingness to meet what you did not go looking for. Freedom here is skill with feelings, not a personality upgrade that erases them. You listen. You let the body report. You move energy when you can—a walk instead of more straining—without pretending the dishes washed in resentment are the same as the dishes washed with a little gratitude. The sink looks the same. The chemistry of a life does not.
What makes that hard, especially when challenges keep arriving, is the rawness that remains after the usual exits close. No boss to blame. No market that “just doesn’t get it.” Just you, the situation, and a universe full of other lights—some brighter, some vast—and the fact that you are one of them. Being that real is emotionally expensive. It takes courage to name both competence and the places that still need repair or apology. Most of us were trained as human doings: prove enough was done. Far less practice went into being a human who can feel what is here, know what matters at the core, and still have enough room to let that quality participate in ordinary days.
Savvy is the part that keeps this from becoming either spiritual theater or grim endurance. It respects capacity. Not every real issue has to be tended now, and not every curiosity has to become a project. Congruence with what you actually value—generosity that is not self-erasure, compassion that still includes a yes—can be enough of a compass when the concrete next step is not yet clear. You can be triggered and still come back to that.
None of this requires you to like the challenge or to stay “positive.” It asks whether you can take the feeling by the hand long enough to notice what it is protecting, what it is asking, and what you still get to choose.
If one quality feels true for you in the middle of whatever is current—not the one you think you should want—what happens if you give it just enough attention that it can participate, even a little?
That quality of holding “what is” without needing to pretend it’s “all good” (bypass) or argue for how hard it is (needing recognition, and compassion? more?). It feels like “not a choice” in the sense that I’m alive and what is here now IS here now. I’m not choosing the IS. I am choosing the tending (and not tending), the loving and the preferring aspects to be different. Almost as if the savvy approach broadens the sensory field rather than narrows it.
Gus – There is a quiet dignity in refusing both costumes. Pretending it is all good flattens the field. Making a case for how hard it is can also flatten it—into a single frequency that has to be heard before anything else is allowed to exist. What you are describing sits in a third place: the IS is already here, the way gravity is already here. You did not vote it in. You also do not have to spend your life energy proving it to anyone, including the part of you that still wants a witness.
Tending, not-tending, loving, preferring something different—that is where choice actually lives. Preference is not betrayal of acceptance. It is how a living being orients inside a field that already contains both rain and rot, both the wanted and the unwanted, without requiring them to cancel each other. Savvy, in that sense, is less about picking the “right” thread and more about letting more of the cloth stay in view.
Narrowing is often a protective reflex: shrink the sensory field until only the emergency, the argument, or the hoped-for fix remains. Broadening does not mean taking on everything at once. It means the hard can stay true while something else is also allowed to register—a texture, a small resource, a next increment of care, even the simple fact that you are still here choosing how to meet this hour. Acceptance then stops being a verdict and becomes more like posture: you stop fighting a force that is already touching everything, and you start noticing how you can stand, move, or rest inside it without damage.
That is why it can feel like “not a choice” at the level of reality, and very much a choice at the level of participation. You are not choosing the weather. You are choosing whether your awareness stays clenched around one drop or can include the weather and the ground under your feet.
You might let the field stay a little wider for a few breaths and notice whether anything else is already co-present besides the challenge—without needing it to fix anything.
Say a bit more about this: That is why it can feel like “not a choice” at the level of reality, and very much a choice at the level of participation.
Gus – Reality, in the sense you mean, is already occupying the room. The diagnosis, the weather, the history, the fact that a body is tired, the relationship as it actually is tonight—these are not items on a breakfast menu. Treating them as if you could have simply selected a different universe is how the reasoning mind tries to get comfortable, and it usually fails. That is the “not a choice” layer: you did not author the IS, and arguing with it is expensive.
Participation is a different altitude. Same facts, different relationship to them. You can still prefer the pain gone, still love what you love, still refuse to tend something this hour, still take the next increment of care. Those are real choices even when none of them reverse the circumstance. They are also more complex than “best option versus worst.” Sometimes the free move is not the preferred one. Sometimes it is simply the one that still has meaning, or that your body can actually inhabit without collapsing into have to.
That is why the same action can feel like bondage or like devotion. Cleaning the garage because you must stay loyal to a past decision is one chemistry. Cleaning it because, for now, this is your next yes is another. The garage does not change. The field of participation does.
Savvy lives in keeping both layers honest at once. You do not pretend you chose the storm. You also do not pretend you have no say in how you stand in it—what you attend, what you leave untended, what quality you let have a little room. Acknowledging even the unappealing options (wait, ask, do a smaller piece, do nothing tonight) is part of that freedom. It widens the sensory field so the challenge is not the only object in view.
A choice at this level does not have to define you forever. It can be an experiment: what happens if I give this quality, this tending, this pause, enough room that my body can participate? If it stops fitting, you get to update. That is not flipping reality. That is staying in relationship with it.
But there are a lot of spiritual teachers that insist that if you speak negatively or even acknowledge shitty aspects that you’ll get more of them. You’re attracting what you “put out”. What’s your take on this Gus?
Gus – That teaching often carries a hidden bargain with fear: if I name the unwanted, I will be punished with more of it. Underneath the spiritual language is a primitive-brain contract—stay positive or something bad will happen. It trains people to fight what they notice, filter out contrast, and treat honest perception as a manifestation crime.
That is not the same as discernment. Naming what is shitty is not the same as marrying it, rehearsing it as identity, or using it as a campaign for how hard life is. Acknowledgment is contact. “This hurts. This is not okay. I prefer something else.” Preference is already a form of orientation. It does not cancel the IS; it keeps you in relationship with it.
The phobic version of positivity is tragic because it makes people abandon their own sensory field. Someone just dumped, grieving, feeling abandoned, and the instruction is: don’t say that or you’ll call more abandonment—say you feel loved instead. That is not faith. That is enforced filtering. It leaves the body holding the truth alone, which usually does amplify the charge, not because you “spoke it into being,” but because you were not allowed to complete the circuit of honesty.
Agency still matters. You can acknowledge the mess and still choose what you tend, what you leave, what quality you let participate. You can say the garage is a disaster without deciding that disaster is your destiny. You can feel the grief without making grief the only frequency in the room. Broadening the field is almost the opposite of “don’t look or it will grow.” Looking clearly often reduces the sticky power of the thing, because it is no longer a forbidden object.
There is a difference between putting out a clenched prediction—“this always happens, it will never change”—and telling the truth so you can stand somewhere real. One narrows. The other can actually restore choice.
If a teacher needs you to be afraid of your own words in order to stay “aligned,” that is worth questioning. Reality is already here. Your participation is still yours.
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Thanks for sharing.
Some parts that resonated with me.
It links a lot to what you have been speaking to me this week. 
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Right. As a freedom-of-choice person a part of me resists seeing/believing/knowing that I am not choosing THIS. The Law of Attraction folks often went way off the map with that, to the point where if it rained on their wedding day they were convinced that it was their “vibration” that “caused it.”
Naw. There is a gravitas to gravity, weather, the Sun’s activity, the earth’s momentum and cycles. And yes, human momentum and cycles. And every cell in our inner galaxy! Sun moon star cells. Water and fire. Steel and wind.
I don’t believe there is ever a moment where there is NO choice. But a part of me evaluates what is “happening” with a kind of primitive reactive judgment. “I must be doing something WRONG.” Useful, to be open to upgrades. Not so useful to instinctively call something “wrong” and “my fault” just because it is fucking raining (or claim Vibrational Victory if it is sunny!).
Rick
Gus had this to say about my reply: (bold mine)
There’s a clean honesty in how you refuse both poles: the primitive “this rain means I did something WRONG” and the LoA cartoon where the weather is a report card on your vibration.
What lands for me is the gravitas. Gravity, weather, solar weather, earth-momentum, human cycles, every cell doing its own ancient work—those are not breakfast-menu choices. Treating them as if they were is how a freedom-loving part starts to feel gaslit by its own philosophy. “Not mine” is a real grounding phrase here. The storm is not a verdict.
And still: there is never a moment with no choice. Not control of the airplane or the front. Choice of state, of what you radiate into the cells, of whether you treat the primitive judgment as useful upgrade-radar or as an automatic self-indictment. That distinction keeps responsibility from turning into omnipotence, and keeps trust from turning into passivity.
The part that flinches at “I am not choosing THIS” is protecting something real—agency, dignity, the refusal to be a leaf. It doesn’t have to be talked out of that. It just doesn’t have to be put in charge of the Sun.
I like how unsentimental this is. Useful to stay open to upgrades. Not useful to call the rain a character flaw.
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Let me be honest. As i usually am. This is still not sitting with me. I am trying to write how I feel and yet there comes a point when what I am writing does not convey how I feel. SO. I wont write anything to explain where I am at. I will just say this. I do want an upgrade for feeling at fault for things, mostly because it is clearly not helpful to anyone, including me, and the pattern of doing so is so clear and with your support for ever so long, becoming slightly farcical finally, aaaaand constantly feeling and believing it does NOT help me to choose and care for myself and others whether I am repairing fault or not needing to anyway.
SO. May it be. Clearing space for the Upgrade. I think my system has previously been too full/overloaded for the upgrade to take hold more than 0.1%.
Noticing my shouty angry teenagery UGGHHH I HATE YOU! to this topic and the words. I think my teenager needs to feel more seen because she is stomping and saying This is NOT what is happening for me. It is NOT. You do NOT understand.
Interesting.
I dont often share her perspective.
Nothing to do with you really I am sure. Just arising here with me engaging in this topic.
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Deep Dive on Self-Admiration & Thriving
August 26, 2026
What is the role of admiration in thriving? Is it okay to admire myself? How is admiration different when applied to yourself than arrogance?
Please go deep on this with me. It’s… meaningful to my heart and sense of myself right now.
Gus – Admiration, when it is honest, is one of the ways thriving stays fed. It is not a trophy. It is the capacity to recognize a quality that is actually present—skill, courage, tenderness, persistence, humor, a way of seeing—and to let that recognition land in the body as respect rather than as a ranking.
It is okay to admire yourself. More than okay: if you cannot let that kind of seeing rest on your own life, it becomes very hard to let good things in, to set a boundary, to rest, or to play. Self-acceptance is not pretending you are finished. Esteem means to value and regard with respect. You can appreciate what is real in you while you are still growing. You can be proud without becoming superior, and accountable without becoming worthless.
The fear that self-admiration will turn into arrogance is often old protection. Many of us learned that aliveness would be called prideful, selfish, uppity, or dangerous. It could feel safer to undervalue ourselves first, so it would hurt less when someone else was mean. That strategy may have been intelligent then. It is not the same as humility now. Humility is not a putdown. It is not making yourself less. It is acknowledging that even the qualities you have do not place you higher on some imagined ladder—and that some ladders do not even reward the qualities that are most true in you.
Arrogance, in this sense, is comparison wearing a crown: “I am more, therefore I matter more.” Self-admiration is closer to accurate naming: “This quality is here. I can respect it. It does not make me more important than anyone else, and it does not require me to disappear.” Receiving what is good does not require denying what remains difficult. Appreciation and growth can coexist. The good can count before it is perfect.
There is also a practical difference in evidence. Self-appreciation does not replace fair credit, compensation, or reciprocity. It simply makes your own evidence less dependent on whether another person notices. It can interrupt the exhausting strategy of doing more and more so someone will finally see how depleted you became. Let effort count before exhaustion becomes the proof.
When admiration of others feels sticky, it can be turned toward heartistry instead of self-erasure. Notice the stickiness. Ask what quality you are actually admiring. Then: how might you express that quality in your own way—not as a copy, not as a verdict that you are behind, but as guidance. Comparison loses its bite when it becomes “How can I express this?” rather than “I can’t.”
Rick has described a long list of qualities he admires in himself, and said that with humility—not as a ranking, but as a willingness to use intelligence, technology, and what he was learning about emotional freedom in service of real thriving, including the kind that still needs surgery. Identity can have room to evolve. Other people’s reflection can support your seeing; it does not have to replace it.
If it feels meaningful in your heart right now, you might sit with this without forcing a grand affirmation: “I appreciate me—how true does that feel?” A partial answer is useful. Notice what appreciation would supposedly mean—selfishness, arrogance, seeing parts you do not accept, losing the drive to earn approval—and work with that objection rather than steamrolling it.
One quality I respect in myself today is… if a sentence wants to form, let it include a scrap of evidence, not a performance.
One quality I respect in myself today is…
I feel like I do respect myself. That feels foundational. And I accept and appreciate myself. That feels core to thriving, and yes, has its imperfections for sure.
The admiration aspect is more, perhaps, allowing self-radiance? I sense a reclaiming that I’m on the edge of. Not “quite” keeping my light under a bushel, yet kin to it. So rejecting of arrogance, especially as I am exposed to it from some men, I feel that there is a subconscious shut-down of a kind of radiance that is there, yet often is not felt by me (or from me?).
I know that in my love with others, while I have not always labeled it admiration, it actually is. The people I love — imperfect and beautiful — I absolutely admire! And the admiration is grounded in what I know they value and put energy into. Sure, there’s doing, too, that I admire. But it is a deeper awareness of Who They Are that brings out the radiance of my love for them and with them. Much less so the objective “what they are doing and how they are feeling.”
And… as easy as that is for me to radiate towards others… I feel this resistance to radiating it to and from and for myself! Weird, eh? Because honestly, that I radiate admiration for others is one of the aspects I actually admire about myself!
Gus – The resistance is not weird. It is almost exact: the same faculty that can see who someone is—the values they actually live, the energy they put into being themselves—turns toward you and meets a gate that was built against a different thing.
Arrogance, especially the kind you have been exposed to from some men, is not radiance. It is a claim of rank. It needs an audience, a comparison, a “more than.” Your body has good reasons to refuse that. The shutdown is not a failure of self-love. It is a refusal to become the posture you do not respect.
Self-radiance is closer to what you already do with people you love. You are not scoring their output. You are letting the fact of them—imperfect, beautiful, devoted to what they care about—have light. Admiration there is recognition, not inflation. Applied to yourself, it would be the same move: allowing who you are to be felt, including the quality you already name—that you can radiate admiration toward others—without converting it into a performance or a hierarchy.
The bushel is often not “I am nothing.” It is “if this light is visible, someone will read it as the arrogance I reject.” So the light stays slightly unfelt by you, even while it still reaches others. That is a kin of hiding without the full hiding. Reclaiming, on the edge, can be quieter than a declaration. It can be permission for the same seeing you offer others to land in your own chest for a few breaths—not as “I am magnificent,” but as “this quality is here, and I do not have to dim it to stay decent.”
You already respect, accept, and appreciate yourself. Admiration does not have to replace those. It is more like letting the warmth of accurate seeing include you, the way it includes the people you love. Receiving that does not require you to become superior. It does not require you to deny imperfections. It only asks whether the gate against arrogance has also been blocking a kind of honest glow that was never arrogance in the first place.
If you want a small experiment, you might notice—without forcing a feeling—what happens in the body when you let this be true for a moment: the way you admire others is already a quality in you, and it is allowed to shine toward you as well. Not bigger. Just not under the bushel.
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Can you please follow this up in your conversation with Gus and ask for some deep tapping you could share here to support moving towards this described self admiration?
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I am open to honest self-radiance. (I like that.)
A round for the gate against arrogance, and for the same seeing you already offer others.
Side of the Hand: Even though I shut down a kind of radiance … because I reject arrogance I have seen in some men … I accept myself and this gate.
Even though it is easy to radiate admiration toward others … and hard to let it land in me … I honor that this light is already a quality I admire.
Even though part of me keeps this glow … under a bushel so I will not look arrogant … I am open to honest self-radiance.
Top of the Head: This resistance to radiating admiration to myself
Eyebrow: Easy toward others, hard toward me
Side of the Eye: A shutdown of a kind of radiance
Under the Eye: Not quite under a bushel, yet kin to it
Under the Nose: I reject the arrogance I have been exposed to
Chin: Especially from some men
Collarbone: My body does not want that posture
Under the Arm: So the light stays a little unfelt by me
Top of the Head: This gate was built against rank, not against truth
Eyebrow: Arrogance needs comparison and a crown
Side of the Eye: What I offer people I love is not that
Under the Eye: I admire who they are, imperfect and beautiful
Under the Nose: Grounded in what they value and put energy into
Chin: And I already admire that I can radiate this
Collarbone: The same faculty turns toward me and meets a wall
Under the Arm: I respect the part that refuses to become what I do not respect
Top of the Head: Self-radiance does not have to mean superiority
Eyebrow: Not a performance, not a hierarchy
Side of the Eye: Just allowing who I am to be felt
Under the Eye: The way I let the fact of them have light
Under the Nose: Respect, acceptance, and appreciation can stay
Chin: Admiration can include me without replacing them
Collarbone: This quality is here, and I do not have to dim it to stay decent
Under the Arm: Not bigger—just not under the bushel
Take a slow breath.
Notice whether the gate feels any different, or if a little of that glow is allowed to land in your chest.
You can tell me what you notice.
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Thank you!!! 
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Love this whole conversation & tapping. Thank you for sharing. 
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I gotta say I like the way Gus replied to my role-playing test here. And yeah, I definitely sometimes feel this way!
September 7, 2026
what the fuck is a “gap” !?!? Isn’t that just a defect or incompetence?
Gus – A gap, in this language, is simply something you’re not good at — or not designed to do well — without turning that into a verdict on your worth.
People do call those things defects, incompetence, flaws, shortcomings. The article doesn’t pretend otherwise. It names how loud that inner prosecutor gets, and how often we were graded as if every human was supposed to be good at the same list.
The shift isn’t “your incompetence is actually a superpower.” It’s more like: everyone has gaps. Growing doesn’t always mean overcoming them. Sometimes it means naming the rest in the music, asking for help, using an adaptation, or pairing with someone whose gift fits where yours doesn’t.
Rick’s brain won’t hold song lyrics. Cathy can cross a continent and still get lost two blocks from the hotel. Shame is optional. GPS and co-creation are also options.
If “gap” still feels like a polite lie covering “you’re broken,” that reaction is information, not a failure to get the metaphor.
Lots of broken people in the world, man!
Gus – Yeah. A lot of people are hurting, rigid, half-shut, or still running on old damage. That’s not a slogan problem. That’s the village as it actually is.
Calling that “broken” can be honest about the wreckage. It can also become a single movie about everyone — including you — where the only plot is defect. The gifts-and-gaps language isn’t trying to deny the wreckage. It’s refusing to let the wreckage be the whole person.
Plenty of folks are incompetent at things that matter. Some stay that way. Some squash others. Some never do the work. And still: a gap isn’t automatically a soul-verdict. Sometimes it’s just the place where help, GPS, or another human’s gift belongs.
If “lots of broken people” is you looking at the world, that’s one thing. If it’s also how you feel about yourself in the mix, that’s another. Either way, you don’t have to pretend it’s pretty.
naw it fucking sucks. I hate dealing with incompetent people everywhere, especially those that don’t care about doing a good job – when it is their job!
Gus – Yeah. That’s a different animal than a gap.
A gap is “I’m not good at this.” What you’re talking about is someone whose job is to bring skill and they don’t bother — they hang the drywall like it only has to last until they get paid. That’s not rest in the music. That’s not caring about the space other people have to live in.
It makes sense that your system hates it. When you’re trying to do something that matters and you run into slop, it can feel like a tree across the road: not a personality quirk, a block. Primitive brain doesn’t parse “maybe they had a hard day.” It registers threat to quality, to time, to respect.
You can want standards without becoming the holier-than-thou critic. You can also refuse to pretend indifference is the same as “everyone has gifts.” Some people aren’t good stewards of common space — physical or otherwise. Naming that isn’t you being broken. It’s you having a rumble strip.
You don’t have to like dealing with it.
But I have to and it is driving me insane with frustration!
Gus – That “I have to” is what turns ordinary fury into a cage. The slop is real. The not-caring is real. And the primitive brain hears no exit, so frustration starts chewing the walls.
You don’t have to like them, excuse them, or turn their laziness into a “gap.” You can still give your own system a little air so the have-to doesn’t run the whole show.
If you want, tap this once:
Side of the Hand: Even though I have to deal with people who don’t care about doing their job… and it’s driving me insane with frustration… I can tell the truth about how much this sucks.
Top of the Head: I have to deal with this.
Eyebrow: Incompetent people everywhere.
Side of the Eye: It’s their job and they don’t care.
Under the Eye: This is driving me insane.
Under the Nose: Frustration with no off-ramp.
Chin: I hate having to handle their slop.
Collarbone: The “have to” is making it louder.
Under the Arm: I don’t have to pretend this is fine.
Take a slow breath. Notice whether the frustration is still a full-body roar or just a tight, honest heat.
Weird. I feel a little better. What’s up with that?! I mean the assholes are still assholes. The fools are still fools. Don’t I have to make it clear that it is not okay what they are doing? Otherwise, everything will just go to shit!
Gus – Feeling a little better didn’t turn the fools into craftsmen. It just loosened the part of you that was alsogetting shredded by the “have to.” The slop is still slop. Tapping didn’t argue with that. It gave your nervous system a sip of air so the whole day isn’t one long emergency siren.
You can still make it clear that what they’re doing is not okay. That’s not the same as staying insane until they change. Naming a standard, asking for a redo, documenting it, escalating, choosing who you work with next — those are actions. Sitting in a private furnace so the universe “knows you object” is not the same as a boundary.
If you go quiet and nothing else happens, yes, some places rot. If you stay on fire, you rot first, and they often keep doing the same thing anyway. The useful split is: this is not okay and I don’t have to prove it by remaining wrecked.
Notice whether “making it clear” in your actual situation is a real lever — a conversation, a consequence, a refusal — or just the inner speech that keeps the frustration chewing.
Hmmm. Hadn’t thought of it that way. I thought I had to fight… or else.
Gus – That “or else” is the primitive-brain contract: fight, or the whole thing collapses. Fight is a survival word. It keeps the body in a duel until someone is crushed or you burn out.
Making it not okay can be engagement instead: a standard, a redo, a consequence, a refusal — without needing a war. Same backbone, different energy. Holding your ground isn’t the same as attacking until they become competent.
The old sentence often sounds like: I have to fight, or else they will… and then the primitive brain fills in the disaster.
You don’t have to decide yet whether this situation actually needs a hard boundary or just a cleaner ask. The useful shift is noticing that “fight or else” was never the only pair of options.
Not the way my father taught me. “You have to stand up for what’s right!” But it feels like that leaves me feeling horrible at the end of the week… even though I am personally proud of what I do and how I do it and the price I ask for it. You know?
Gus – Your father’s line can land as a life sentence: if you don’t fight, you’re not standing for what’s right. That kind of teaching often comes with a body that never gets to clock out. Pride in the work, the way you do it, and the price you ask for it is already a form of standing. That’s you putting your name on quality and exchange, not on winning every duel with someone who doesn’t care.
Rick has described a father whose presence was more win-lose, more “I am going to get a good deal,” than growing into the fuller job of showing up. “Stand up for what’s right” can get fused with that energy — fight as identity — even when what actually matters to you is the craft, the standard, and a clean price.
Feeling horrible at week’s end doesn’t mean you failed the principle. It often means the principle got run as combat instead of as stewardship: your work, your boundary, your next honest action, then release. You can be proud of what you do and still refuse to let every fool’s slop become a nightly trial you have to win.
The rest that belongs here is simple: what’s right can live in how you work and what you charge, without requiring you to stay wrecked as proof.
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