Classroom Talk: 5/16/2003 - There is no human being on earth with the power to grant us what our heart of hearts longs for: the end of that empty feeling that as we are, we are simply not enough. And the struggle to resolve this unwanted feeling -- by selling our souls to win the approval of others -- is to run off a cliff while chasing the end of a rainbow!

It is our fear of being alone and in doubt, of wanting to feel certain that what we are doing is right, that compels us to seek the approval of others.

Seeking and receiving approval from others is like sitting down hungry to an imaginary meal. You're invited to eat all you want, but no matter how much imaginary food is served, you can never get your fill. Your hunger remains. No fictional feast ever satisfies. But this fact isn't so apparent when it comes to our appetite for approval. We still look to others for our sense of self even thou...

Whatever is True, Right, and Real in any human being need no more seek approval for its own nature than does an eagle in full flight hope to hear the "caw-caw" of some crow below it, calling out to it about how confident it looks soaring alone through the wide open sky!...

Trying to change ourselves in order to please others -- so that we can feel temporarily whole for having won their approval -- is like cutting a flower into pieces so that it will fit into a vase.

You have always believed that the better people feel about you, the better you can feel about yourself. However, you may have never really considered that the opposite of this belief must hold equally and unhappily true, and that is: The less you are approved by others, the more alone and uncertain you feel. This helps to explain why you think you have to please people as well as why you resen...

Seeking the approval of others -- in the hope of measuring the worth of ourselves -- makes as much sense as looking for our reflection in a falling drop of rain, with the main difference being this: A raindrop actually lasts longer than does that fleeting sense of self we win for having sold our soul for another empty smile.

Topics covered: sorry, apology, apologize, regret, remorse, spite, compassion, thoughtlessness, inconsiderate, seeking approval, looking for approval, approval...

Have you ever limited yourself with what you thought was a power at the time you started it? Sometimes you can do something that takes you twenty years before you begin to suspect that it's a limitation and not a power. You think to yourself, "I'm really going to empower myself by getting an education, because when I have that new education, I'll have the approval I want, I'll feel accepted, a...

Waiting on others to approve a change you know you must make in your own life -- an action you must take that will likely lessen your dependency upon them, and perhaps drive them to make changes in their habitual choices -- is like hoping that a snowman looks forward to a spring thaw.

There are parts of us that seek the approval of other people. And the degree to which we seek the approval of another is the degree to which we are owned by that person. But this also applies inwardly, as we seek approval from what we call "ourselves." To be more specific, we actually seek approval from "our" negative states. For example, we constantly ask the state of fear whether or not it...

Time and time again, we come to the same spiritual lesson: no one can give us that which can only be found within our Self.