Recently I posted something on Facebook that I felt really vulnerable about sharing. It went like this:
Living life as your full self is no joke.
It’s not all sweetness and light. It’s not always easy.
And though it is your birthright, it requires courage and energy to lay your claim.
And though it is your birthright, you are in a privileged position to have access to enough resources to be able to strive for full-Self living. Too many of us on the planet are not in this position.
Let’s stop talking about this like it’s some dainty idea that makes a nice accessory, like it’s a “statement” necklace that’s designed to get attention and ask nothing in return. Let’s stop talking about the quest to become your Self like it’s suitable for polite conversation over brunch or something that can be fit in between sips of red wine.
Committing to living as your full self is committing to standing up for your values even when they’re unpopular, to speaking your truth when it’s painful or inconvenient, to taking care of yourself, to playing the edges of your own capacity and feeling the places where you’re weak & needing to grow. It is a commitment to showing up again and again at the forge where your own soul will be honed and refined by the challenges of your life, the fires of your passion, and confrontations with your own shadow.
Yes, it’s worth it. And if you’re lucky enough to have a chance to even grasp a single one of your fingers around the chance to become the most fully expressed version of yourself—-take it. And in the tough moments, hold on with everything you’ve got.
When we only focus on the “positive”, we end up missing a lot of the deeper, scratchier parts that come up when we really do the work of growing into our full selves.
We have to fall down and feel some sort of incapacity in order to grow.
We have to feel the areas in which we are not strong before we can build strength.
The friction that you feel, the places in your life that aren’t working…these are not things to just gloss over. They can actually be windows into your own growth if you can face the discomfort that comes up when you are not succeeding or living up to your own dreams.
The deeper parts of you, the strengths you didn’t even know you had and the newness that can emerge- that doesn’t need to come up when you’re feeling on top of the world and when you feel competent, capable and you’re doing everything perfectly. It’s in the moments when your greatest strengths seem not to be up to the task- that’s when there’s room for grace to come in. It’s in those moments when there’s space for learning to happen. Because if you already know the answers and are on the top of the world, what do you need to learn?
What would happen if you started to look at where you are right now—-the positive and the negative parts?
What if you started to look at your weaknesses with compassion and love?
This week I would like you to just play with noticing how you respond when you feel that gap, that friction in your life, that thing that isn’t feeling good, that part of your health that isn’t where you want it to be, that skill that you’d love to learn but you feel like you’re too bad at it now to even really give it a try.
Invite in the gaps in your knowledge and in your capacity. Then, see what kind of grace and growth could emerge from that empty, painful, or uncomfortable place.
This openness to your flaws and gaps and incapacity is the way to open the door for your soul to come through.
Growth isn’t always easy or comfortable, but it’s always, always, worth it.
