BEING ONESELF

While “Being enough” and “Being oneself” are similar states of beingness, they’re not the same. Brené Brown might consider them cousins of sorts. In any case, these notions, these phrases, the messages + feelings + experiences that are ignited and connoted by words, are now elemental parts of my State of Being-ness. They’re infused in, melded with, my life now, one that is being lived fully as Participant AND Witness. Aspirational concepts became present realities. Never before experienced. It‘s no longer how I WANT to be. This is how, and who, I am – being-wise, and feeling-wise. Well, at least “wise” more often than not, I believe (this human-in-progress thing can often be a challenge!), and, surely more than ever before. Some aspects still feel like a brand new wardrobe, it can take a little time to get ease in and get comfortable. 

In Mexico, I’ve had several encounters with people who’ve come to know me during this extraordinary, and greatly unexpected, time in my life. People who don’t (yet) have any real knowledge of and/or perspective on my context-narrative-history. When I share that I’m absolutely living and feeling in the most joyous place inside EVER in my life (at the same time moving through personal realities that cause me deep sadness), AND that whatever version of me is showing-up now is by far the best version of me (yet), It’s interesting to witness their reactions when they learn that this 69.0, inside-out version of me is a very new, and first time, thing. 

I relish the opportunity to share about my circuitous, sometimes bumpy, and deeply rewarding journey on the Roads Less Traveled, the one that got me (t)here to arrive at the closest thing that I have ever known to “wholeness.” The path to feel that I am, fully, “being myself.” A self that was set into motion, as for all of us, long ago. And for some of us, it’s been quite a trip to find that place of “home.” Of Self. Of Being Oneself.

I’ve long considered myself a Seeker. Being in this new place has been, of course, a process and it’s surely a reflection of small evolutions, shifts and “allowings” inside. They catalyze and transform – they manifest – what happens on the outside. As Hank Wasiak and Kathy Cramer noted in their shape-shifting book, “CHANGE THE WAY YOU SEE EVERYTHING,” small shifts can have seismic effects. For me, it’s not about changing what I’m DOING, it’s the (sometimes) slow revealing results of MANY YEARS of work to (try and) reframe and UNlearn and reprogram messages and beliefs that I had taken on, looking at life through the lens I did. We all have our own. Those filters that can have us feeling like “this is just the way it is.” As if we can’t do something, anything, about it. “People can’t change” is a common notion. Often held by people who would rather not have their narrative cracked open, unwilling to take the Road Less Traveled for themselves. No judgment from me, it’s understandable that is happens, because there are so many societal influences keeping people in conformity, to not question, to not shake-up the status quo. The ”known,” even if it ain’t giving us joy, is often what we choose, versus the unknown. If I am now given a choice between the two, if the known isn’t fueling my purpose and being, if it FEELS out of alignment, I’m pretty much always going for the unknown. The uncharted. 

When I was married, I created the word, “ensmall,” I’m quite sure you get the notion, the energy, that it conveys. It’s what so many of us do, I surely have, and tolerate, in ways that damage ourselves, our soul, our love for self, in order to make other people comfortable, or not make others uncomfortable, or to appease others at the expense of our own truth, or whatever our drivers may be. I close my eyes and I can see and hear what all those folks were saying who assumed and/or judged, or implored me to stay married, for their own reasons and agendas. As well as others who vilified me for doing what clearly needed to be done (and not just for me, for everyone involved). No one knows what goes on in anyone’s being, any more than we know what goes on in anyone else’s bedrooms, no matter how it looks on the surface. 

For me, Being Oneself means that I am embracing all the parts of myself – light and dark, prideful and shameful, the aspects of self I love and the ones I don’t so much, in a way that integrates my Personal Alchemy. My AlcheME. It means to NOT be THINKING about how to be (as I did for most of my life) as I walked into a room, a situation, a meeting…already thinking about what to say, how to show-up, how I wanted to be seen, etc.. To not be carrying around the old story, the sense of not-enoughness (among others). You get the picture. Being Oneself means showing up with my fullness, all of me, with presence, mindfulness, as much as possible. Oh yes, Kindness too, it’s so underrated. Because we’re human, all these elements aren’t always available to us, we can’t always access them. And that’s inherent in this journey. I am still “wet clay,” a work-in-progress, at least as much as ever. I’ve got way more work to do in this ongoing unfolding. I couldn’t have gotten to this place without rolling in the mud and the shit. Willing to fall down as often as it happened, so that I could pick myself up again to, as Richard Rohr says, Fall Upward. I’m moving through life in a way that is full of Magic and Flow…

It’s important for me to be reminded that, if I had followed what others wanted (as I had done my whole life), I never would have gotten to this place of experiencing and feeling extraordinary joy, purpose, meaning, integration. As well as all the rest. I’d love to talk to you, if you want to explore your own path. I am just a mirror, I ain’t no guru.