People Don't See You. They See Themselves.

Have you ever been surprised by the way somebody sees you?

Perhaps you've been called intimidating by one person and inspiring by another.

Warm by one person and distant by another.

How can both be true?

In this episode of Mystic in Training, Melissa explores one of the most liberating and confronting realisations on the path of self-discovery:

Most people don't actually see us. They see us through the lens of themselves.

Together, we explore:

• Why we live as different versions of ourselves in different people's minds
• How our wounds shape the way we relate to others
• The difference between wound-to-wound and soul-to-soul connection
• Why people pleasing and shape-shifting create disconnection
• How fear of rejection often causes us to dilute ourselves
• Why aliveness is one of the greatest clues to who you really are
• The grief of letting go of the version of you that exists in somebody else's story

Because perhaps freedom isn't being fully understood.

Perhaps freedom is knowing who you are, even when others cannot yet see it.

Memoirs of a Mystic In Training, by Melissa Amos is available on Amazon

Learn more about Melissa by visiting her website melissa-amos.com and download a free hypnotherapeutic series, Intuition Rewired. 

Follow her @themelissaamos across the platforms 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hello and welcome to the Mystic in Training podcast with me, your host, Melissa Amos. I remember the first time that somebody actually said to me, Melissa, I find you really intimidating. My face must have said it all because I was so surprised that anyone could find me intimidating. Because I've also been told that I'm inspiring and warm and kind and curious and all of these things. Since that day, you may or may not be surprised to know, but more than one person has told me or been reflected back to me that before they met or when we first met, they found me really intimidating. This was not something that I ever tried to portray. Um, but there it was. And the fact that this came from more than one person led me to coming into some, I would say liberating but also pretty uncomfortable uh realizations and inquiries. With all the work and the discussions that we've had over the last few months around the hidden agreements and the lenses in which we see the world, I realized something actually quite fundamental. That most people in our interaction and in our relationships don't actually see us, but they see us through the lens of themselves. They see a version of us through the filter of whatever it is that they are moving through, whatever their model of the world is. And with all of this talk about freedom and freeing ourselves from the limitations that we face ourselves in or that we have created through our woundings, I wonder if there's also a part of this that is about freedom from, and I wonder if part of this is freedom to managing the versions of us that actually live in other people's minds. Like, how many times do we find ourselves in situations where we might behave like one person in one group of people, but we wouldn't dare behave like that with another? That when we are in this situation, we find ourselves in this version of ourselves. But when we're in another situation, perhaps tell me if this is true for you in times where it's with people that have known us for a long time or have known us through a through a certain context, that we won't allow those certain aspects of ourselves to be shown. Now, probably this isn't conscious, but I've heard this time and again, and I've I've certainly seen this in myself, where people have said, well, that that behavior is not appropriate there, or or even they don't know me as someone like that. And when it's somebody that's really important to you, your spouse, your parents, your children, your clients, your school friends, social media, it's really quite easy to go and default into, well, this is what's expected of me, this is what is known about me, and so therefore, this is how I'm going to behave. What I see that causes is this real fragmentation, because we probably live as a hundred different versions of ourselves in other people's minds, which is fine in the way that who I am to my mum will be very different to who I am to my kids, which will be different to who I am to my client, which will be different to who I am as a mum at school. I'm gonna say this like it is quite normal, but the the question really becomes if we're speaking about freedom, if we're speaking about liberation, if we're speaking about the journey into really becoming ourselves, which one of those versions are we trying to satisfy? Because if you're trying, if you're working from the space of I am trying to satisfy the version of me that is expected, well, it's kind of impossible. Because if you live as a hundred different versions, you're never gonna be able to satisfy everyone. And so what ends up happening, and this is what is really interesting, is we start to build ourselves from those other people's perceptions and expectations. If we are coming in the wound, if we are coming from this space of whatever my core wound is, so we've spoken about mine in the past of that I'm I've never truly been seen or heard. So if I take that as the lens in which I see the world, then I am responding to other people's wounds or versions that are going to mirror that in some way. If we call my I'm never truly see or heard lens as the orange lens, right? And you are holding a similar wound or a similar lens, then does it not make sense that you're going to see me from the version of me that makes sense to you? Because if I'm going around with the with the lens of, well, I'm never truly seen or heard, that means that I'm never gonna really allow myself to be seen or heard, or I'm gonna go like super loud to try and make myself seen and heard. But all you are going to hear or see is the version of me that you can expect. And the more I live from the wound, the more I am resonating with your lens, your orange. That is how resonance works, right? And so that I find that I will be tracking the room and shape shifting and anticipating what other people want and asking myself, well, what version of me here will be truly seen and heard? I'll start diluting myself. I'll be like, Well, I can't really put myself here because then they'll be judging me from this. None of this is happening consciously. This is all happening under the surface, and then we wonder why we're in these situations, and we're like, why do I feel so drained? Why do I feel so tired? Why do I feel so unseen? Why does this feel like such hard work? But the more I live from the wounds, the more I was trying to satisfy everyone else's. That's what we do. I think what's happening in that situation is that we are in some way relating wound to wound. That all the while that while I'm wearing these orange glasses is unconscious, and so I'm just seeing the world through the orange tint, we are assuming that everybody else is seeing the world the same way as I am, and they're not. Um, and we are filtering out the truth of all of the other colours and doing it for other people. And so, what then seems to happen is that my needs, my wounded needs of say to be seen, might activate your fear of being abandoned. If we take the Melissa you're really intimidating, my need to be seen or liked or heard, then activates your wound of feeling like you're inadequate. And so this dance goes on and on and round and round because rather than us both being able to make this soul-to-soul connection, we're both activating and projecting these other things. And so I'm looking at you in your fear of inadequacy, thinking that, oh, I'm too much. When actually you're looking at me going, I wish I could be more like that. And that feels really intimidating. And so then I'm going, well, they're rejecting me because they're, you know, it perpetuates and it goes round and round. And yes, we can have connections in this point, and yes, it can feel almost familiar, and yes, we can find ourselves then in similar relationships with all of the people that are around us, because we are constantly going wound to wound. But when we are in this other, when we are in Namaste, the light in me recognizes the light in you. When we are truly soul to soul, when we are with the people that are in that same pathway as us, which by the way is why I think looking back, I have spent the last few years really curating my friendship groups and my social circles to be with people who are in this element of growth, who want to know themselves better. When I look at soul space, it is for my membership community, it is full of people who are wanting to develop into their soul. And so when we come and we recognize ourselves soul to soul, it feels different. And I think this is why it is. I think that the soul will recognize fundamentally, intuitively, all the way, it recognizes coherence. The soul's like, okay, this feels true. And so when we're in that space, so when our light is not filtered through these different lenses, the soul immediately recognizes that. And when we find friendships like that and relationships like that, and even client and mentor relationships like that, it makes all of the difference. But here's the really interesting thing. The more that I have moved into my own truth, the more work that I've done on myself. And you've heard me over the last few months really speaking about the hidden agreements and the unconscious patterns and what is it that I'm working towards, and getting closer and closer into the congruence of my soul and acting from that. Something really interesting is happening. I find myself more accepted than ever. And this has got me thinking. I was out this weekend with um an incredible bunch of humans, and some of them I knew, and some of them were new to me, and and some we've met online, or and you know, there's there were there was a really diverse group. I realized that the response to me, when the last time I saw them, was maybe six months or a year ago, was completely different. There didn't seem to be the intimidation that I had felt from other people before. I didn't feel the need to shrink down, and also I didn't feel the need to perform, although I was on the karaoke to give them the performance of my life. Um, but there was there was a truth there, and I had so many people say these words to me. Melissa, you feel really magnetic at the moment. Melissa, it's like you're radiating light at the moment. And sure, it might be the collagen, but it's more than that. It's this truth of me, it's this congruence of me that's coming out. And so that people are their soul is responding, and then their woundings, because we all have them, but their woundings don't feel like they need to be so activated all of the time. Maybe it is that my response to them, my wounded response to them, is not then perpetuating this because the nature of the soul is acceptance. Not in a resignation way, in an evolution way, but the nature of the soul, at least how I see it, is this is love, is pure love, is non-judgment, is everything I speak about through my work in Akashic Reiki. Somehow, when we are coming from this space, when we're coming from this truth, it means that the projections, I think the projections are still there. I think that yes, people will see you always from the level of their wounding, but the relationship back begins to change. But part of this is how I am responding. Because if I'm in my wound and I'm want to be really seen and heard, like one of the symptoms of that is, well, I'm afraid of being rejected, for example. And so if I'm afraid of being rejected, what am I going to do? I'm going to perform, I'm going to people please, I'm going to hold back on that confrontation that might need to happen. I'm going to perform in whatever way. And again, this isn't conscious, this is just what we find ourselves doing. I'm going to hold back in whatever way that is, or overcompensate. And so actually, then what that relationship is doing is it's creating some form of disconnection. Because if people can really feel soul to soul, and that is where this true connection happens, then the flip side of that is we can feel when there is this incongruence. And it's in that dilution that creates the disconnect, which then appears to prove the original wound that I was beating in the first place. Yeah, C, no one really sees me. Yeah, C, when I'm myself, then I get rejected. Yeah, C, I'm not good enough, smart enough, funny enough, whatever. Because they're not seeing your truth. They're seeing the lenses are blurring what it is that's actually moving through. And so actually, it turns out that we're not really in relationship with the person that is in front of us. We're in relationship with the wounding that is then being reflected back by the person in front of us. And then we are looking at them like, well, they're intimidating, they're activating this in me, they're performing. We feel it, they're not themselves, they're putting on an act or whatever it is, because you you can feel it, you can know it. Like, how many times do we make assumptions about ourselves? Like, this is not the thing that I do. Like, I well, I I don't sing in karaoke, I do. Um, or I don't go and spend loads of money on posh meals, or this was me. I don't fly first class, even if I had all the money, why would I fly in first class? Where we've decided this thing isn't you, but actually, is it not you? Or is it that your partner doesn't like it or know you as this? Is it because your parents don't approve of this thing? Is it because your friendship group doesn't do that and they'll judge you and maybe reject you? Or is it because the collective, the society, your workplace, your whatever has told you that something like that is weird until you find yourself with the microphone in your hand and you're like, ooh, I feel alive, even if you can't sing. And it's that aliveness that's the clue. It's that aliveness that can sometimes shock you and go, oh, maybe this is me. You know, I went to the ballet a few weeks ago. I didn't think that was me. If you'd have said to 20-year-old me, you want to go to the ballet, I'd be like, Yawn's so boring. Why? Because I had an image of what it means to go to the ballet. Um, but when I'm there and I was seeing this expression, I've recently got into poetry. And when I'm reading these things and I'm like, oh, I feel alive here. I have this strange thing. Whereas, where did that come from growing up, where going to the ballet meant that you were too posh or too old or reading poetry meant that you were, you know, sad or whatever it is. But you try these things and you feel alive, and then you come home and you're like, I read this poet, and blah blah blah, and they're looking at you like, well, who even are you? And then you're like, Oh, oopsie whoopsie, I better put that back in the box. But what if you don't put it back in the box? What if you're like, well, hey, look at me now? I've reached my fourth decade, and ballet and poetry seem to be something that that I respond to. That grabbing the mic and going clubbing seems to be the thing that's lighting me up at the moment. That having these conversations or wearing this certain thing or listening to this certain type of music is actually bringing an aliveness to me and a truth to me. If having this opinion, if speaking this truth, if sharing this concept, if realizing this philosophy is true for me, then maybe what I'm actually letting go of is the version of me that existed in someone else's story of me. And you know how easy it is to put that back in a box when you see somebody look at you and go, Well, that's not you. Somebody you love, somebody you admire, somebody that looks after you, your parent, your spouse, your child, your boss, your best friend. And then we have a choice point of well, do I carry on being the person that I was or do I move into the direction of my aliveness? And if you choose the second option, maybe some of this grief that I spoke about before is to allow yourself to grieve the version of you that exists in their mind. And for them to grieve that of you, and to ask whether or not it's more important that you uphold the version that they've created of you or that you evolve into the version of you that truly wants to come through. Because I tell you this, maybe freedom isn't actually about being fully understood, but maybe it's about knowing who you are, even when that doesn't exist in anyone else's mind yet. And I wonder if part of this journey isn't just about reconciling the different versions of us that live inside our own minds and the different parts that we adhere to, but actually learning to differentiate between the versions of us that live in other people's minds and perceptions and projections and the soul version of us that is constantly trying to break free from them. But so, dear listener, that's your mission to notice what's your soul trying to express through you today. Where are you willing to become more of yourself, which may mean that we become less of the version that someone else holds from us? Because I don't think you'll ever satisfy the hundreds and maybe even thousands of people that you have access to, especially with social media. And the moment we take the lens off of their projection, we become more alive, and then we break free, and then we become even more of who we are, and are seen for even more of who we are, and are recognized for even more of who we are. And that I think changes everything. I hope that next time I see the real you.