I understood very late down my path that healing simply meant the shedding of who I learned to be in response to the world.
Practicing being my true self was like walking outside my house naked - this is how deeply emaciated my authentic expression was. Encroaching more and more truth in all aspects of my everyday life felt revolutionary. Agonizing.
How I began my journey back home to myself was by imagining who I always wanted to be and believed I couldn't because of XYZ reasons. But I didn't know how to do it, how to be that person. It felt impossible and I felt defeated by how overwhelming it felt. Then I said to myself that I'll take it slowly, I'll put one foot in front of the other. Like learning how to walk again. All I told myself I would follow was what was true for me in the moment and built on that. Do I like this food or not? Do I want to go for coffee or not?
And now here I am.
Everything about me changed. Morphed.
If at first stepping into the skin of the woman I always wanted to be felt like I walked outside naked, soon I became ok with feeling "naked".
I didn't cut away any part of my true self anymore just for the need to be accepted.
People don't accept me. People think I'm conceited when I'm showing up in my power. People think I'm lazy for not working a 9 to 5. They believe I'm selfish when I put myself first, rude when I speak the truth and weak when I'm soft.
And it's their right.
5 years ago this would have made me crawl under my bed and die.
Today it makes me smile.
It's ok to not be accepted by everyone. That's not your goal when you're looking to unapologetically embody your highest version, which is your true self.
Your goal is to show up as the person you always wanted to be. Your goal is to show up in integrity. To make your own rules. To not make sense to other people. And be ok with it.
And remember: if it feels impossible to be the person you always wanted to be, it doesn't mean it is. It simply means you don't know how to do it yet.
Getting in touch with and embodying your true self transforms your life in very big ways. Living truthfully to who you are and what you believe in begins with the decision to choose that.
Truth is simply an idea, an abstract term until you realize how fundamental it is to your life. You can't build a house without bricks just as you can't live your life your way without reclaiming and owning your truths.
Before you understand this, you say the nice things and do the right things that you're expected to. Your thoughts about your life graduate around "How can I make myself into who I'm supposed to be".
Anytime you are looking for a way to be in this world other than how you actually are, you're denying your own magic and you put a muzzle on your own truth. The truth of your life is raw and unrefined.
You cannot curate, manicure it, contrive it, distill it into something more digestible without at the same time losing something vital and terribly zestful. Your soul yearns to be in the world uncontrived by sane rules and reasonable moderation.
Anytime you say yes to the things your body screams no at, you're chipping away at your aliveness. You're telling yourself you're not good enough until you lose sight of who you are in your most raw state. You say your true self is not beautiful and acceptable enough, it's too loud or its too quiet, it's too emotional or too intense. You're looking for an even keeled, predictable existence. You're not meant to live a life that is flat and toneless and formulaic.
You're not meant to postpone joy and playfulness, singing, dancing, crying, laughing and screaming for when it is socially acceptable to be that way. Who decided that being expressive with your authenticity can only happen in a container approved of?
Let's look at the subtle, but extremely potent ways in which becoming your true self transforms your life:
1. You're able to receive your partners touch.
Believe me when I say this - when you don't know yourself and all you do is live an armored life through the adaptive intricate mechanisms you unconsciously created for yourself, you cannot be present in your relationships. You do not feel. You cannot feel through the shield you are wearing. And you have no clue you can't receive touch, you can't let yourself be embraced, caressed and ultimately loved because of how many layers of what is not you you're carrying. I noticed this subtle change in the way that my flesh melts under my partners touch. I rejoice and bathe in being held, whereas in the past, because of the amount of pain and restrictive rules I made up for myself to keep myself safe, I didn't have the capacity to open myself to receive.
2. You take up space
I walk like I own every little inch beneath my feet. Because I do. It's my space. I get to choose how I show up in the world and I move, I tread confidently. I am no longer atrophying my spark and my presence out of fear I may offend, trigger and make others feel uncomfortable. I am not above anyone, nor below anyone. I am not better, nor less than. I know I am unique and authentic and the power that comes from that eases the way you carry yourself.
3. Joy doesn't come in small glimpses
In the past, I didn't let myself feel joy unless it was for a very good reason, as if joy needs that. I had to earn the right to being joyous. I had to first work hard and only then I could allow myself to feel that joy. But i didn't know I can simply be joyful. I can simply elicit this bublly feeling without any cause and basis. I know I have the capacity to be, feel, think and move the way I choose to. I utilize my free will to help me grow more, uncover more and be more of who I truly am. And hearty enjoyment of life is who I am at the core. I believe in allowing your life to be the most exciting adventure. Every day. In the smallest and biggest of ways.
4. Fear/trauma don't dictate how your life unfolds
Your best version is not exempt from contrast, from unwanted emotional states and sometimes, for some of us, even from reliving past traumas, old stored emotions etc. Trauma healing is the healing of the meanings you assigned to your self and the world you inhabit. And in most cases this entails a willingness to feel over and over again certain emotional states that are uncomfortable. If in the past, as your old self, this would have felt like the end of days, it no longer feels this way now. You know it's all just a matter of choosing to sit with and allow these emotions to flow through. You give them the foreground while you notice, witness and hold space without bringing up the old meanings that you used to assign to them, because that would reinforce and revitalize the old trauma. As your embodied true self, you know this and you feel are in control of what is happening within you. You know not to make decisions, choices in the spur of the moment when this is happening because you know it would be the past making decisions and choices for you. Technically, it would be your old self making unconscious choices for your future and present self. This is the actual definition of determinism, which trauma is all about. As your transformed version, you are aware of it. You are in your personal power.
5. You're no longer a response to the world. You are a raw expression of your truth.
As an adaptive self that treaded lightly for fear to be judged, labeled and ostracized, you were actually the embodiment of the response that the world wanted to get from you. The need to defend, shelter and hide away is not part of who you are.
"And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom." Anais Nin
When you're only experiencing life as a mask, you come to believe it as the only way to live.
Stop treating life as a rehearsal.
Hoe do you know you're no longer engaging with people from your adaptive self? You'll experience the newness of life. It will feel like learning how to walk again after a crippling accident. It takes bravery to reveal your rawness, but the rewards are greater than you'd be able to imagine.
6. You move from possibility
Your True self doesn't know what it means to be bound. It can't know. It's like saying God has limited imagination.
Living from your heart and from your truth opens up realms of possibility that from the previous level of consciousness you couldn't even tap into.
As your true self, you feel unfathomable. There is an unrepentant need to stretch beyond what the average mind could consider sane. As your authentic self, you are not sane. You can't be. The society's norms for health cannot contain what the boundless nature of the integrated self, which is the true self, understands by health.
When you have the awareness of being unstoppable and unshakeable, you don't need certainty to move. You move from possibility. Because you know yourself and your capacity, you aren't afraid to take on and embrace what feels too big.
You are always in control of everything in your life. That's your territory.
7. You know that you can get what you want even if right now you may not know HOW to get it
This has been huge for me. This shift was everything. Why. As someone who was raised in an enmeshed family dynamic, I was not allowed access to my own desires. I was at the mercy of my mother's willingness or lack thereof to meet my needs. Whenever I wanted something, she made sure to make me feel unworthy and tell me that I wont have it. No explanation, no compassion for a child who was powerless and helpless in being able to do anything about it. And whenever I did try to fulfill my desires by myself, I would get in so much trouble! As this chronically unfolded and her adamant obsession to control me suffocated me more and more, I had no other choice as a child but to disown my ability to desire. . Slowly but surely, I forgot how to want and what it felt like when you got what you wanted. This was a very potent and triggering journey for me, as I had to reclaim my right to want and desire things. Now as my true self, I love to play within the realm of possibilities that my mind cannot reach yet. I let myself believe that even if I don't know how to get something I want to get, it's a matter of finding out the right information and applying it. Whereas in the past not knowing how to achieve a goal used to send me in downward spirals of excruciating self defeatist patterns, self shaming and self hatred. I know now that my wish will be granted if I claim it and persist in my faith in it . The only thing that can stop you from getting what you want is if you quit pursuing it and decide its not worth your time and energy. That's it.
8. People see you for the first time
This is actually something that hit me like truck on a highway. The more I uncovered and owned my personal truths, however uncomfortable and clumsy I did it at first, the more I noticed people looking into my eyes and seeing me. It may sound crazy or nonsensical when you put it that way. But when you think more deeply about it, it does make sense. Why. Because the more you reveal your being as is by unlearning what is not you, the more people start seeing you for who you are. I felt seen for the first time in my life when I was 37 years old. Until then all I did was to conceal, minimize who I actually was. The reason was that I was convced who I was at the core was wretched and I had no power to make it better, so I dug it as deep as I could. Of course people didn't see me bevause there was no me to see. It was only a mask or the bits and pieces of me I considered acceptable to show.
You will never feel seen unless you let your true self be seen. And that feels scary as hell. That's why I know this type of work is not for the faint of heart.
9. You're in your personal power not just when things are going good, but especially when things are going bad
There is a misconception and a misinterpreting of what personal power of inner power actually means. Personal power does not mean being arrogant, believing you're superior and better than others, personal power has nothing to do with using others to your benefit etc. All of these things are simply the shadow aspects of what genuine inner power actually means.
My own definition of personal power is the understanding that you have the ability to bring about the changes that you want in your life. As your true self, personal power is an organic byproduct. When you show up true and in integrity to the best of your abilities, you are powerful. You don't need to resort to gimmicks, tricks and all sorts of tactics that are false and detrimental the long run in order to feel empowered. You don't need to learn how to be powerful, that's not sustainable. Because there is nothing more empowering and more revitalizing than speaking your truth, standing by your truth and living as your true and authentic self.
And it's easy to feel empowered when things are going good. But how do you keep that feeling, that faith that you have the ability to change your life the way you want to when reality shows you the opposite? This is how you know whether personal power comes from the real you. When things are going bad, as your true self embodied you know that your power resides in knowing that you will find a way if you speak the truth and act in integrity.
10. You make the right decisions with ease without needing permission or validation from others that it's the right decision
One of the most problematic areas of my life was decision making. I was paralyzed by the fear of making the wrong choice, that eventually i either ended up not making any decision or someone else made it for me. As a person who feared mistakes to the point of it being completely debilitating, I never understood why for some people it looked so easy to be confident and certain enough to take one path over the other. Ruminating was my middle name. But that's because my adaptive self was a conglomerate of defensive mechanisms that couldn't allow me to fail. And the downside of that was that these defense mechanisms subsequently didn't allow me to take action because to take action meant risking the possibility to fail. What transformed my life completely and irreversibly was when I allowed the understanding that there are no wrong decisions to sink in. I know this probably sounds like either overly optimistic or like a void blanket statement. But hear me out. You cannot make any decision without it leading you to the next step. That's pretty self explanatory. However this next step provides you with new information, new insight that allows you to have a much comprehensive view of the situation you're in, letting you hence course correct. With this wrong step you understand more of what is actually right for you moving forward. Bottom line is It doesn't matter if you come to the realization it was the wrong decision or the right one (in which case you don't need to correct anything), staying where you are and not moving is ten times worse than making the momentary wrong decision. As I revealed more and more of my true self, it became easier for me to make decisions from this new perspective and understanding that everything leads you to where you need to be for your highest good at that point in time.
Embodying your true self is a two fold journey - unlearning the conditioning and the true self liberation work which is a matter of having the courage to expose yourself to the world. Discernment is crucial because too often what we believe to be our real self is just a deeply embedded conditioning to adjust to a sick society.
It's a hell of a ride to liberate your authentic self and it quickly becomes, if you let it, the adventure of your life.
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