The Left Slipper and the Best Gift Ever

What if the best gift you could ever receive was the truth about yourself? This episode explores the Masonic symbol of the Left Slipper—representing a promise fulfilled—and reveals how personal honesty becomes the cornerstone of transformation. We examine what it means to confront the subtle lies we tell ourselves and the courageous work of aligning behavior with values.

🔑 Key Takeaways

• Honesty with oneself is the foundation of all meaningful self-development.
• The Masonic path requires confronting comforting illusions in favor of authentic self-discovery.
• True courage lies not in external deeds but in internal clarity and integrity.

💬 Featured Quotes

"self development activity you're going to undertake moving forward is this single skill" — [00:00:08]
"as a discovery process is difficult because you are the easiest person to lie to." — [00:00:38]
"to understand that being honest with yourself is an act of courage." — [00:03:23]
"This is not an investigative process where you're attempting to find all the places you" — [00:03:29]

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Creators and Guests

Host

Brian Mattocks

Host and Founder of A Mason's Work - a podcast designed to help you use symbolism to grow. He's been working in the craft for over a decade and served as WM, trustee, and sat in every appointed chair in a lodge - at least once :D

What is A Mason's Work?

In this show we discuss the practical applications of masonic symbolism and how the working tools can be used to better yourself, your family, your lodge, and your community. We help good freemasons become better men through honest self development. We talk quite a bit about mental health and men's issues related to emotional and intellectual growth as well.

One of the single hardest things to do in terms of self development and central to any

self development activity you're going to undertake moving forward is this single skill

or attribute and that is the ability to be honest with yourself.

This is, to say this is vital as an understatement.

When we talk about being honest with ourselves, it's important to understand that as a process,

as a discovery process is difficult because you are the easiest person to lie to.

Something is a strong term and I don't really like the moral underpinnings of lying as a

concept.

How about mislead?

Let's say you're the easiest person to mislead.

Sometimes you do lie to yourself, but the mechanics of this are a little bit easier if

you consider that this is the deception or the part of you that is misleading you is not

doing so idly.

It's doing it in theory to either protect you from pain or avoid dealing with additional

suffering and pain and all of the other stuff that comes with it.

It's not malicious in its nature, it is protective.

Fundamental idea that this part of you that is misleading you is protective does take

a little bit of time because to sit with and reflect and contemplate because in a lot

of cases you're going to come to the realization that the thing it's protecting you from is

more often than not the thing you most need to do.

I'm talking in vague terms, but when it comes to sitting down and being honest with yourself

as in reflection or looking at your own motives, that process to go on that investigative journey

is going to require multiple steps.

It's less of a finding bedrock kind of thing and more of a slow process of refinement.

Imagine if you will, a filtration process where you're going from mud to drinkable water.

This is the same kind of thing because you are going to be discovering truths in yourself

that, again, initially will not be clear.

Even when you bite on the first little bit of honesty that comes with that facing the

truth and the courage that comes with that, you may find that you don't discover the

whole truth into you continue digging or continue refining as the case movie.

When we talk about the process of being honest with yourself, it is vitally important

to understand that being honest with yourself is an act of courage.

This is not an investigative process where you're attempting to find all the places you

screwed up or all of the things that are going wrong and how you've caused them.

Those are sort of elementary applications of the self-discovery process and those applications

don't yield a ton because they're oftentimes used just to run yourself down.

When you are undergoing this courageous process of being honest with yourself, the other

thing that must accompany that process is compassion for yourself, for all the prior

versions of yourself who suffered with things that you've long forgotten.

As you go through this process of becoming honest with yourself and really pursuing this

discovery, that compassion and courage will be both the cutting edge and the healing

edge of your self-discovery.

Go through this.

I think you'll find that it gets easier, the better you do it, the better you get at

it kind of thing.

One thing that you can do as well to get a third party take on whether or not you're being

honest is always ask yourself or other people around you for the opposite opinion, right?

Or the opposite truth or, hey, I think I behave in this way.

Can you help me understand how you see that behavior?

That third party feedback will be useful in helping you sort of calibrate your own honesty

and when it comes to that self-discovery.

This, again, this honesty and self-honesty and self-discovery, no one can call you out

on it.

It's yours.

You're going to figure it out and you're going to be honest with yourself or not.

Like any one of the self-improvement activities you're going to undertake, it is always the

eye of the needle you must go through.

There's no one that can do it for you.

There's no one that's going to see what happened when you made it through.

This is like any of the kind of life events.

None of them or most of them are invisible on your person so people from the outside cannot

see anything that happened.

What you will though be able to do is essentially in your own conscious experience refine your

conscious awareness based on how willing to be vulnerable and honest and courageous you

are, the quality of your life will improve.

Trust me on this, it's going to take a minute through the first couple, first couple

sort of shadow paths that you go down, but it gets better, it gets better, I promise.