finding the confidence and staying connected to your authentic Self

When should you give up trying to do what you want to do?

What is your experience?

Do you ever think that maybe you are trying to do something and are struggling to do it because it's really not authentic to you? Or do you think that you really do authentically want to do what you're trying to do, but you just need to change your thinking around it?

This is a common dilemma to be in. What is your experience around it? When should you give up, so to speak, if something is difficult for you? And when should you keep going and get more help and support so that you will be able to do it?

Can you get the help you need?

Today I am inspired to say to you:

You deserve to get both the inner healing as well as the mindset and the communication skills, so that you can be yourself and express yourself and do what you want.

This sounds obvious, I know, yet it is step #1. However, you must believe not only that you deserve to get this help and find these answers, but that, first of all, they even exist and that secondly, you can find them and then receive them.

Choosing your own way

Here in the United States, it's Thanksgiving, day of giving thanks for what we have been blessed with.

It's hard to be thankful when you feel powerless or victimized by your situation.

The best gift you can give yourself, if you are not feeling very blessed or grateful, is to start owning your experience as your own, as about your own emotional stuff, and not about being a helpless victim of the outside world.

This realization is explained in stark terms by Vickor Frankl, in his book about his time as a prisoner in a Nazi concentration camp during World War II, "Man's Search For Meaning." 

He writes:

"...the mental reactions of the inmates of a concentration camp must seem more to us than the mere expression of certain physical and sociological conditions...in the final analysis it becomes clear that the sort of person the prisoner became was the result of an inner decision, and not the result of camp influences alone..."

"One could make a victory of [their] experiences, turning life into an inner triumph, or one could ignore the challenge and simply vegetate, as did a majority of the prisoners."

Searching the internet, I found this Frankl quote:

"Everything can be taken from a man or a woman but one thing: the last of human freedoms to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way."

Talk is cheap

Talk is cheap. Just being able to say something doesn't mean that you're living it.

That's part of the problem with just focusing only on speaking and presentation skills.

You can learn what to say, you can have the right things to say, so that you sound really good.

But the truth inside of you, if it is not in alignment with what you are saying, it will leak out!! Through your eyes or your body or your words, when you are not careful.

That is why confronting what you are avoiding is so important. And not just trying to be all happy and positive all of the time.

Get real!!!

If being authentic is important to you, then you must learn to function and think about the concrete, physical, visible, external world.

You must not get lost in lofty ideas.

Authenticity does tend to be a lofty idea. An aspirational feeling of desire and goodness. It is a lovely sensation.

But you cannot stop there. The truth is that you must know what authenticity is for you. In a very real way.

What does this mean? It means that you and other people must be able to see, hear, feel, taste or touch elements of what you determine to be your authentic expression.

Otherwise, authenticity is just a bullshit idea. That means nothing but a fluffy, feel-good sensation inside of your mind.

What specifically do you need to say to express your authenticity? What tone of voice will you hear yourself use that will express the emotion and meaning you want to convey? Who will you be speaking to you? What will you see when you look at them? What will you feel your body do? What will the space and environment look like around you?

Trying and experiencing

Sometimes the anticipation of what it will be like to do something feels pretty bad.

And sometimes once you're doing it, it is a totally different (and easier and more pleasant) experience than all of what you imagined.

Being un-attached to what happens or be willing to just experience different things can be helpful, because then you can go and try and see what the color and texture of your experience is without an attachment to the outcome. See how your emotions are. See how your energy is. They maybe way calmer and cooler than all of the wild things you imagined.

It's just for now

It's important to realize that it's only temporary if you are doing things you don't like to do, but things you need to do in order to be responsible and to take care of the things in your life.

The trick, it seems, is knowing that it really is only temporary.

You may doubt that this is a stepping stone to where you want to be. It may feel like what you have to do now is going to last forever.

The key is to know that it's temporary, because you are getting the help and support you need to get to where you really want to be and to doing what you really want to do.

Ask yourself, what do you need so that you can get through and do what you don't like and keep moving towards what you do want? What's missing that you need in order to feel that hope?

Awkward actions

Learning communication skills is great.

Just make sure they are not empty, hollow actions.

Actions need the matching feeling behind them.

Obviously, there is a learning stage where new actions seem awkward and your feelings don't match them yet.

But you get my point. Ultimately, what you say needs to match what your body does and how your energy is. Or else it won't seem genuine. Or feel genuine. It's about getting to the place where all parts of you are aligned, where your new skills flow and feel good to you.

How authentic feelings can equal effectiveness

I was thinking...and I am stating the obvious here.

Yet it's a powerful truth that you can use to guide your actions and to do what you do to take care of yourself. It's that...

If you want to be authentic.

And if being authentic means that: How you act and how you communicate is expressive of how you feel on the inside.

Then it would be very, very important (if authenticity is important to you) that you get what you need, that you do what you need to do, in order to feel better/healthier/happier on the inside!

Because then your authenticity will not only be authentic, but will also help you to more fully express yourself and to be more effective with people and capable in accomplishing what you want.

Inner work, which determines how you think and feel inside, is important.

Finding the right communication skills

There seems to be a way to learn communication skills, to expand what you know how to say and do, and to learn new ways to use your body, energy, and words, while also checking in with yourself. Asking yourself: Does this style of communication or does this approach fit with my own personal value and belief system?

Because the truth is that you may not want to use all approaches to communication that exist and are taught in the world.

Yet you might not want to avoid learning or getting exposed to them just because they are a style that does not come naturally to you.

(Yet also, it may not feel good to get locked into thinking that there is one right way to communicate with people!)

Perhaps this process is about exploring and seeing how you can grow and what tools can help you to expand and strengthen your self-expression and speaking abilities. The job of communication skills is to help you, not block you or box you in. Yet give them some time and space. Play with them. Do it with a light heart. And see what happens!