July 19, 2025  

Unlearning for Liberation: Reclaiming Your Authentic Self

We all inherit beliefs from our family, society, religion, or nationality, which shape our perception of what is considered "normal....

We all inherit beliefs from our family, society, religion, or nationality, which shape our perception of what is considered "normal." These teachings, often absorbed through repetition, might have once offered a sense of safety or survival. However, the journey to liberation begins when we ask: 

What beliefs no longer serve us and keep us from fully stepping into our power?

The How of Unlearning: Practical Steps

Unlearning is the robust process of questioning what we've always taken for granted. It’s about becoming aware of an inner current that signals, "something is off here." This process involves:

• Awareness: Identifying beliefs that cause you unease or hold you back. What feels "off here," even if "everyone around me may think xy&z, but it’s not sitting right with my soul"?

• Inquiry: Questioning the origin and purpose of these beliefs. Where did this belief come from? What purpose did it once serve?

• Deconstruction: Recognizing the "cracks" in old philosophies. Like Jeannette Walls, you might notice that grand schemes "rarely materialized," or that "freedom" meant "suffering for their children."

• Redefinition: Consciously choosing new truths and constructing an identity based on your own values, rather than those imposed on you. For Tara Westover, her education provided her with the tools "to examine her past critically, understand her family's pathology, and construct her own mind."

• Integration: Living out your new beliefs, building a life of your own design. This doesn't mean erasing your past, but acknowledging its profound impact while choosing not to replicate negative aspects.

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Real-Life Journeys of Unlearning

Jeannette Walls had to unlearn the idea that suffering made you strong and poverty was virtuous. Her memoir, "The Glass Castle," details her journey of questioning and ultimately breaking away from the unconventional teachings of her parents, who idealized a radical, anti-establishment worldview and often left their children to fend for themselves.

Tara Westover provides another powerful example. Born into a fundamentalist survivalist family, she was assigned the identity of a true believer who followed a strict worldview where suffering was a badge of righteousness. Through sheer perseverance and self-education, she earned a Ph.D. from Cambridge, allowing her to recognize that suffering can be exploited in systems of control and that healing and freedom are not signs of weakness, but of agency and self-respect." As she put it, her "years of study had been to purchase for myself this one privilege: to see and experience more truths than those given to me by my father."

Like these remarkable individuals, and my journey out of fear-based religious teachings, unlearning can be a gradual dismantling of ideas. It might feel disorienting, but when fear is no longer in charge, awareness expands.

Embrace Your Authentic Self

What belief were you taught to carry that now feels too heavy? 

Invite stillness and curiosity, not judgment. 

Discover what longs to be released. 

Who would you be without this belief?

Affirm the wisdom of unlearning as an act of alignment with the Creative Power of Life. 

Affirm that you are shaped by the Creative Power of Life moving freely through you now.