On Authenticity.

Sometime – oftentimes, even – we get scared about expressing ourselves honestly.

There is a part of ourselves that is scared about how what we want to say will be received, and we choose to take care of that part by not speaking up.

Maybe we’re at the hairdressers, and we’ve been given a haircut we’re not completely happy with. Maybe we’re at work and the boss says something that doesn’t meet our needs for consideration and respect. Maybe we’re part of an online community, and something someone says just really isn’t working for us.

When I say ‘we’, I’m including myself in this: I have been at the hairdressers, at work, in online communities not saying anything about my discomfort.

But the thing is this – each time we don’t voice our discomfort out of fear, we give up on our authenticity.

What is it that is so scary about speaking up? What do the monsters* have us believing?

That we will wind up with no friends? That we will get fired, and end up living homeless in the streets? That people won’t like us, and this will prove that we are in some way not good enough?

This last year has been a turning point for me in really starting to face this fear, to give it love and acknowledgment, but also to see how following its advice doesn’t serve me.

Without fear running the show, I still have the option of not speaking up – but the difference is that it can come from a place of sovereignty, of connectedness, of choice.

When I see my patterns and my fears clearly, when I am centred in my heart enough to know that they don’t say anything about who I am, I can choose to respond to them in a different way. Fear tries to stop me from looking at my stuff. It tells me there is something too big, too scary, too awful underneath, and that if I look at it, I won’t be able to handle it.

But this isn’t true. This is just fear speaking. This is just what fear does.

When I look at this stuff, it is painful to see how many times I have given up on my need for authenticity to try and protect myself from the suffering – the death, even – that fear promised me was imminent.

* * *

I have a friend who would chose a need to be her ‘need of the week’ – maybe one week it would be reassurance, maybe one week creative expression, maybe one week respect – and so on. She would pay particular attention to that need for those seven days, noticing when it was met, when it wasn’t, what it felt like, where she felt it in her body. She would journal about it. She would get to know that need intimately.

In this spirit, I declare this my month of authenticity. Time to go play detective…

*monsters = A Havi-ism meaning the voices in your head that say hurtful things.  Here’s a post she wrote about the subject.

Comment Zen

Adorations to everyone reading!
If you’d like to leave a comment, I’d love to connect with you in this small spark of a way.

My comment zen is adopted (and slighty adapted) from Havi: As always, no advices unless requested, please! This is a letting people have their experience space, and also a taking responsibility for our stuff space – which is about creating safe space.  Adorations again!

P.S. It has been brought to my attention (thank you, Shanna!) that my comment link is, though aesthetically appealing to my eye, somewhat pitiful discreet. If you’re wondering, it’s that little grey speech bubble icon up by the post title.