Ever play hide-and-seek with a four-year-old?
Don’t be surprised if they “hide” behind a couch with their feet sticking out, or stand behind a lampshade, hiding only their head. Early childhood psychology refers to this as Object Impermanence, a developmental stage where the child doesn’t yet grasp the fact that objects exist and events occur even when they cannot observe them directly. In a game of hide-and-seek, it’s super cute – when you’re four. But we grow up and develop beyond Object Impermanence to Object Permanence. This is the understanding that just because an object or event isn’t right in front of you, or isn’t immediately available, seen, heard, or touched by you, doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist or that it isn’t possible.
Like, when you drive at night. Your headlights allow you to see thirty or so feet in front of you, yet you know, of course, that the road is longer than thirty feet.
But – we forget this fact when it comes to our dreams, goals, and desires.
“Don’t start a business, most fail within the first three years.” “Don’t travel by yourself, it’s too dangerous.” “Don’t leave that relationship. You might be alone forever.” “Don’t become an artist, you’ll never make any money…”
All too often, we’re told something isn’t realistic, and we cling to that. If you’re told “no”, your brain tells you “It’s not realistic.” If you try and fail, your brain tells you “It’s not realistic.” When we defer to what other people say is realistic, we cling to self-limiting ideas.
Like the road hidden beyond the glow of headlights, and the kid behind a couch thinking they’re hidden when they’re not, the reason what you want feels so elusive, unrealistic, or frustrating is you have been socially programmed to believe status quo conventions and false constructs – also known as “brules.”
In writing my book The Brules of Life, I adopted the word brule – sassy slang (you can find it in Urban Dictionary) for “bullshit rule.” One way to spot a brule is to look for social constructs or commonly held beliefs that are so baked-in to our cultural understanding and worldview that they generally go unnoticed and unquestioned. Until we break such brules, they’ll keep us from believing in our dreams and goals.
Like, for example, “Be Realistic.” People said the computer would never change the world. Going from NY to London in less than a day, was a fool’s tale. It wasn’t all that long ago that phones were connected to the wall and talking to someone on the other side of the ocean while seeing their face on a screen seemed incomprehensible! Now we do all of it while 35,000 feet in the sky.
Your definition of “realistic” is a direct reflection of your current level of belief and your current level of understanding about the Realm of the Possible.
While it’s important to acknowledge the indisputable impact and influence of systemic brules in our world (brules about gender, race, age, ablism, class, culture…), it’s also important to discover the ways we unknowingly limit ourselves. This happens when we believe our own BS or adopt social conditioning and make “brules” our own. It’s like putting a hand in front of your face and saying, “You can’t see me, right?”
When we put our hand in front of our face, we see our hand, but we can’t see every other thing around us, every other possibility, every other option.
When we get stuck in life, it’s like walking around with a hand in front of our face, and “unrealistic” becomes anything outside of that. In other words, sometimes your dreams seem unrealistic because you can’t see them. And you can’t see them because of brules.
Blind spots happen when “brules” become embodied beliefs.
This is why dreams and goals often get set aside, put up on that dusty old shelf for “later” or “someday.” It’s also why – convinced that they can’t move the hand, that they can’t move the block – many people give up on their dreams and resign themselves to believing that they simply aren’t realistic.
But, like the driver who knows the road extends beyond what’s revealed by the vehicle headlights, your dreams are possible despite the brules.
Overlooking this and instead focusing on the belief that you can’t is “the brain behind the brules.”
When your brain thinks something over and over again, neural pathways get wired in. If this pattern remains uninterrupted, it will keep you habituated into default patterns.
This is your brain on brules.
Brules are plentiful, and sneaky, often hiding in plain sight. When left unnoticed and unquestioned, they become psychological and behavioral blind spots that limit and impede you from thriving, saboteurs of growth and transformation.
While it might sound silly, do this powerful pattern-interrupt exercise to get started:
- Put your hand in front of your face and stare at your hand.
- Bring to mind the dream that excites and intimidates you the most, so much so that maybe you’re afraid to say it out loud.
- Hold it in your heart, and move your hand.
- Breathe. Deepen each breath.
- Look for evidence that your dream is possible. (Thanks to those well-tread neural pathways and “the brain behind the brules,” your instinct here may be to want to revert to believing, defending, and even protecting brules like “Be Realistic.” Do your best to resist the urge to focus on why you believe the brule.) Challenge the brules you’ve adopted or embodied up until now. Do this with a sincere and open heart, and you may be surprised how quickly you can find it.
What if dream realization is really about self-actualization and in order to be the full-expression you, your dreams must be pursued? When this becomes your mission and mantra, brules beware!
Your dreams and goals are possible. What stands in the way are the brules to break.
© 2023. Tara Sage
