a chatterbox's pensieve: Steve Pavlina's Interesting Thoughts

In January 2006, Steve Pavlina talked about Understanding Family Relationship Problems. I find some points that he made in this post extremely relate-able. Thought I do wish there is a clearer line between right and wrong instead of it being a choice. Snippets below...

For example, consider a problematic relationship between yourself and another family member. Suppose you hold the belief that you must be close to every family member simply because they’re related to you. Perhaps you’d never tolerate this person’s behavior if it came from a stranger, but if the person is a relative, then you tolerate it out of a sense of duty, obligation, or your personal concept of family. To push a family member out of your life might cause you to feel guilty, or it could lead to a backlash from other family members. But genuinely ask yourself, “Would I tolerate this behavior from a total stranger? Why do I tolerate it from a family member then?” Exactly why have you chosen to continue the relationship instead of simply kicking the person out of your life? What are the beliefs that perpetuate the problematic relationship? And are those beliefs really true for you?
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If you operate under the belief that family is forever and that you must remain loyal to all your relatives and spend lots of time with them, I want you to know that those beliefs are your choice, and you’re free to embrace them or release them. If you’re fortunate enough to have a close family that is genuinely supportive of the person you’re becoming, that’s wonderful, and in that situation, you’ll likely find the closeness of your family to be a tremendous source of strength. Then your loyalty to family closeness will likely be very empowering.

He also advices that to have a Soulful Relationships; we need to change our mindset about people.

"Everyone you meet in your life — even total strangers — is already intimately connected to you. The idea that we are all separate and distinct beings is nothing but an illusion. We are all parts of a larger whole, like individual cells in a body."

In April 2006, he blogged about Self-Acceptance vs. Personal Growth. His thought on the topic seems very logical yet foreign at the same time to me. I'm so used to measuring everything. What do we have inside of us? Refer some snippets below...

Why does there seem to be a conflict between self-acceptance and growth anyway? I think the conflict is actually a result of a particular mindset. I’ll refer to it as the linear mindset.
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Trying to apply the linear mindset to your self-image creates the conflict between self-acceptance and growth. Instead of merely measuring various aspects of your life and noting how they change over time, you identify with them.
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Instead of rooting your sense of self in your position, which is changeable, what would happen if you rooted your sense of self in something permanent and unchangeable? Stop identifying yourself with any form of positional status, and pick something invulnerable instead… like a pure concept that nothing in this world can touch. Examples include unconditional love, service to humanity, faith in a higher power, compassion, nonviolence, and so on.
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What I’m really getting at here is inner peace. When you keep your sense of self away from third-dimensional positions, your position can rollercoaster all over the place, and you can still be at peace on the inside no matter what happens. You don’t have to withdraw and be totally passive. You can enjoy being an ambitious overachiever and set and achieve goals like a maniac — and have a great time doing it. But meanwhile you don’t seek your identity in those fluctuating outcomes.

Moreover, if you are like me - lost in the middle of the hectic modern life and uncertain of your life direction - these links below (Special Thanks to Shanon :P) could be useful: