I don’t know why, but the subject of authenticity gets me all clammy. It feels so big and all-encompassing. Also, there’s the little matter of IT IS SCARY AS HELL. Because authenticity is nothing less than showing up fully yourself, and I can tell you right now that this idea perks up my perfectionist and my shame-monger in equal parts.

My perfectionist says, “Ooh, that’s a tall order, showing up fully myself. That’s an all-the-time, 100% thing, right? I don’t know if I can maintain that kind of standard. Oh man, no way. Don’t even try.”

And meanwhile my shame-monger says, “You can’t do that!!! You can’t show yourself fully! No one will like you if you do that, because let’s face it woman, you’re kind of a mess. Only show the good parts, okay?”

It’s helpful to remind myself that authenticity is a practice, as is everything else, really. That it’s not something anyone can do perfectly, and it’s definitely not something I can do when my shame-monger is in full swing, because when I’m in shame I want to hide anything that I don’t deem lovable, and authenticity is fundamentally about connecting to others and telling the truth.

Okay, but here’s a tricky thing. I’m noticing that “truth” sounds really different when I’m caught up in a shame spiral, than it does when I’m being friendly with myself. In fact, when I’m in shame I really shouldn’t trust anything I’m hearing inside my head. Authenticity is most accessible to me when I am accepting of and loving with myself just as I am in this moment. When I’m in the grip of shame, it’s helpful (and actually is a practice in authenticity) to reach out to others I can trust and share what’s going on rather than hiding. This is a really vulnerable thing to do but when I do reach out and share, others can guide me back to truth, back to internal resources that allow me to climb out of the shame spiral and back into friendliness toward myself.

I have to share authentically that this has been really hard lately, the staying-in-friendliness thing, and I’m reminded that when it’s hard, I owe it to myself to practice even more intensely. I’ve got this Mindfulness Bell app on my iPhone and when I set it to ring every 15 minutes, I have an easier time staying tuned in to how I’m feeling and what I’m telling myself that makes me feel that way, so that I can turn down the volume on shame and turn up the volume on self-compassion.

Another authentic share: I’ve been resisting writing about authenticity at all because it’s easy for me to sound like I’ve got something down pat, and that is so not the case. I’m writing because I said I would, and that lives inside another kind of authenticity, perhaps.

This interview with Brené Brown has been helpful for me in remembering that authenticity is a moment-to-moment practice…it also reminds me how intertwined it is with other qualities of wholehearted living, such as connection, vulnerability, courage. Let me know what it lights up for you.

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I know, I’m a little late to the Word of the Year game, but it’s taken me a few weeks to get my sea legs in this brave new year.  Almost everyone I talk to got their asses kicked by 2013, and more than a few felt like the truck called 2012 that ran them over just hit reverse, changed its name to 2013, and took another run back over top of them.  I for one am ready for some relief!

I run in some gorgeous, powerful circles of women and as we drew closer to New Year’s Eve there was a lot of discussion about what word would be claimed as a touchstone for 2014.  Potent words were claimed and I watched with admiration from the bedroom floor, where I lay still and couldn’t think of any word but one.  I shared it quietly in my innermost circle, not even sure if I had it in me to stick to it for a whole year.  Maybe I needed a word of the month instead.

What I need most this year is some fierce dedication to healing my soul, and so HEAL was the word that kept resonating for me.  But interestingly, as I began to dive down into this word I realized that it doesn’t even mean what I used to think it meant; I used to think healing meant becoming free of what ails you.  I thought it meant becoming perfect again – wow, I really did think that it meant to become perfect.  As if never wounded.  I see now that so inherent in that definition was a huge obstacle: I was caught up in total non-acceptance of myself as-is.  My relationship to healing has been all about not having to be this flawed human being anymore.  Imagine, first, what a letdown that has been!  And second, what a painful rejection of myself.  But I think it’s pretty universal.

I heard in a recent podcast that a Biblical scholar was studying Matthew 5:48, “Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect.”  And he discovered that the word “perfect” had been mis-translated and that the original Aramaic actually translated more accurately as “whole-hearted”.  Be ye therefore whole-hearted.  What a totally different command that is.

The famous shame researcher Brené Brown echoed this in a recent interview for Tami Simon’s Self-Acceptance Project, saying that so many of us think the goal is to become shame-free, but the much more realistic and healthy goal is to become shame-resilient.  Ernest Hemingway put it like this:

The world breaks everyone and afterward many are strong at the broken places.

So this year I want to heal, but even more specifically, I want to become resilient.  Whole-hearted.  Strong at the broken places.  That is the over-arching prayerful intention.  And I’m going to break it down roughly a month at a time, and explore the tools, resources and practices that create a Resilient Heart…get the sand of each practice in between my toes.  I want to understand and integrate each one.  And we’ll see what happens.

Since January 1st I’ve been engaging in a daily practice that I believe will help me immensely – in fact, it already is helping.  It is the practice of developing a loving, compassionate relationship with myself.  In short, to become my own kindest friend.  It is a combination of work I began last year with my self-compassion course, EN{COEUR}AGE, and a process I’ve been studying for a few years called Inner Bonding.  If you are a consistent reader, you’ll probably hear these words a lot as the year goes on, so I want you to know how to access these tools for yourself.  For the remainder of January I’m offering EN{COEUR}AGE as a pay-what-you-can deal, so now is a great time to snatch it up.

For those of you who got on board with my writing about the Feminine, this may seem like a bit of a detour but actually I don’t think it is; it turns out that, I think, the qualities of the Resilient Heart are all qualities of the Feminine.  Interesting!  I have some thoughts about that but want to explore slowly and soulfully.  So stay tuned.  I hope this turns out to be a valuable dialogue on so many levels.  I know I need what I’m about to share, and that’s often been a good indication that others need it, too.  So we’ll see where the year takes us.

Love & Blessings,

Maggie xo

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I was taking an early morning walk in the misty chill, walking and talking on the phone with a dear friend and mentor.  She had asked me to just start where I was.  The tears began to flow, I could feel my breath catch and I remembered to still take the air in.  I placed a hand on my heart, as I’ve been doing now many times a day as I walk through the latest tough emotional time.

I started with the logistics.  ”I’m taking the first carload up today.”  The tears streamed.

Then the allowable feelings.  ”This is going to be a good thing for me.  I have so much support and love there.  I love it there.”

And then the unallowable feelings.  ”And I’m going to miss it here so much that my heart breaks just thinking about it.  I wish it hadn’t gone down like this.”

She gave me that audible sigh that let me know that she knew.

“Oh boy, I wouldn’t have normally acknowledged that last part.  t think I’m feeling all of my feelings for the first time in my life.”

I’ve been a partitioner of feelings ever since I can remember; I’m sure it started before I could talk.  I’m one of the multitudes living in the world of survival, the world of the Wounded One leading the charge of life, and the Wounded One has so much clinging to what must be done in order to survive, that there is no room, no tolerance for the feelings that would muddy the forging ahead.

The only teensy-weensy problem with that is that our Inner Divinity speaks to us through our feelings, through the radio receiver/transmitter we call our bodies.  Our emotions are a vital internal guidance system, and when we start playing with the volume dial we can get off-course from our Soul.  Sometimes so off-course that we wake up one day (if we’re lucky) and wonder what the hell hit our life.

My Wounded One needs to protect and control, and so it speaks in that language.  Control whether or not he loves me.  Protect against the pain of rejection.  Control what she thinks of me.  Protect against failure by never starting.  Protect against disappointment by not caring, not getting invested.  My Wounded One runs from fear by running on fear.  I’m still learning to identify her when she’s speaking to me or acting through me, because for so so long I just thought she was me.

My Inner Divinity, on the other hand, needs me to see her and listen to her, to love her and live for her.  She feels the more pure feelings that my Wounded One can’t stand to indulge: heartbreak, loneliness, helplessness.  She also feels the more pure feelings that my Wounded One protects against, such as joy, love, peace, desire.  (My Wounded One fears these feelings.  I’m still learning why, but it has something to do with letting her guard down which scares her too much.)

For years, not always about everything but too often about the things that really matter, my Wounded One would turn down the volume on the feelings that made it scared.  That allowed me to have a false sense of knowing my path, knowing what I needed, knowing what hurt and what made me feel alive – when in fact I was really only allowing myself to know half of the truth.  Because I didn’t know she was doing that, I just thought it was my truth.  Do you see how that gets problematic?

“What he said really hurt, but I love him and I want to make this work.”

“This job leaves me feeling depleted and soul-dead, but the money’s really good and I’m so glad I have benefits.”

“She never returns my calls and I don’t feel like I can reach out to her when I need support anymore, but we’ve been friends for such a long time and I’d rather keep her in my life than risk finding out what’s wrong.”

“I used to do what I really loved and I wish I hadn’t stopped, but I did and I have to move on and anyway, this life is pretty good now, too.”

When we redact our emotional lives, we live a redacted life.  Our Inner Divinity gets ignored.  We stop taking responsibility for loving Her, for allowing Her to live through us.  We block her from speaking the deeper truth that would allow us to expand.

So I’m feeling all of my feelings for now, and not redacting the internal guidance system known as my emotions.  I’m turning up the volume so I can hear Her, honor Her, and live life closer to the bone, closer to the core of my truth.  What I notice so far is that it is searingly painful in some moments, but by opening the door and being with Her in the pain of heartbreak and helplessness, I can also be with her in the joy, love, desire and peace.  I’m expanding – minutely, millimeters at a time – into possibility.  I notice how the hope pops in that I’ll just be able to stay in the joy-love-desire-peace part, but that’s really not the deal.  I have to be in it for all of it.  And it’s a practice, not a checklist item.  So I’m practicing.  A daily practice of an un-redacted heart, an un-redacted life.

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Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, I contain multitudes.)

~ Walt Whitman, “Song To Myself”

Inspired by her truth…

I want freedom.  I want safety.

I want independence.  I want partnership.

I want to do it myself.  I want to be held.

My head knows the truth for others but my belly knows the truth for me.  I listen to my head too much.

I ride an emotional wave that crests and crashes all the time, and as much as I’m learning to honor this gently, a lot of the time I feel like I just don’t know how to live in the world.

Almost all of the time by now, I love my 40-year-old body.  I love its curves and its stretch, I love beholding what it can do that it couldn’t or didn’t do when it was 20.  But I still cringe at the thought of another seeing me totally naked.  I don’t doubt that that’s a metaphor.

I firmly believe in the Law of Attraction, that I am a powerful creator of my experience, that I can generate myself however I choose to.  Except when I don’t believe any of those things, which is more of the time than I like to admit.  The don’t times are probably when I’m in my head and not in my belly.

Enjoying food and drink with loved ones is one of my very favorite things to do, and I’ve learned how to make the fact that I’m sensitive to grains, dairy, eggs, soy, and refined sugar not a big deal.  Every time I forget to tell someone and they’ve lovingly made me something I can’t eat, I wrestle with whether to eat it anyway or politely decline or take a little bit and push it around the plate.

Because I can see all sides of an issue so easily, I get mired in indecision a lot.  No, I mean a LOT.

Sometimes when I communicate and don’t hear back from people, I get hurt and worry that it was something I did and they’re never coming back.  Except on the days when I don’t and I’m totally fine with it.

Sometimes I have apple slices and almond butter for dinner, with red wine.

I often forget to be grateful.

Singing and embodying other characters on stage with beloved friends is actually when I feel most myself.

I don’t send out holiday cards anymore because I don’t like the environmental impact, but then I get a holiday card in the mail and I feel so loved and it makes my day and I worry that people don’t know how much I love them because I didn’t send any.

I didn’t get my tires changed even though there were definite warning signs of impending doom.  I didn’t get them changed until one blew out going over the Golden Gate Bridge at 11pm.  That might be a metaphor, too.

I have so much fear of running out of money that I make sure I never run out of money, by working for the dough instead of the joy.  But I think that somehow I also make sure that I am always running out of money.  That’s not a metaphor.

I don’t want to work.  I want to live in the ease of my innate genius and allow my gifts to be shared in the service of all.  And make a lot of money and take six weeks of vacation a year.

I work a lot.

This is why I have developed a fierce love affair with my coffeemaker, because it makes me 2/3 caffeinated coffee just the way I like it every morning, and gives me 3 gentle beeps to remind me to smell the coffee and come get some.

This is why I always make sure my favorite coffee mug is washed and ready.

This is why having six different savings accounts makes me feel safe.

This is why I cherish the girlfriends who go deep and see all of me and show me all of them.

This is why I write three pages of longhand morning pages almost every day, to get it all out.

This is why I find “successful” outfits and wear them like uniforms.  Like dresses and sweaters and boots.

This is why I spritz myself with sage smudge spray every night before bed and do energy work lying down to clear my day out of my system so I can sleep.

This is why I’m creating a new savings account called “Tires”.

This is why I leave friends four-minute-long voicemails and send texts that simply say “xoxo”.

This is why I take long walks in cold weather and measure my steps so I can crunch as many leaves as possible.

This is why I sing in the car, in the shower, at the computer, and while on walks.

This is why I say yes to my niece and nephew as often as possible, because saying yes to children’s requests is good medicine.

This is why I love to listen to people’s stories, and witness their truth, and reflect it back to them again and again.

This is why I practice self-compassion and then share my practice.

This is why I place my hand on my heart and take a deep breath, just about every day.

This is why I let the crying come and cleanse me.

This is why I believe love is a verb.

This is why I’m learning to howl.

This is why I pry myself open and share the softest part of me, even when doing so feels so raw that I clutch myself closed again.  I open, I close.  I open, I close.  I open…

This is why I choose to be whole hearted even when I’m broken hearted.

This is why I surrender.

This is why I’m learning to say “I don’t know” more often.

This is why I want to gather and hug and cry and laugh and kiss and clink glasses, often.

This is why my “yes” tattoo is on my stepping-out foot.

This is why I’m choosing to live the pain as wide open as I can, because it’s the only way I can also live the joy and the love wide open.

This is why.

Because I contain multitudes and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Because the cracks are how the light gets in.

Because I want to live an unconditional, unbridled, unfettered yes.

So I live yes, and I expand, and I shrink back, and I live yes again.

This is the only way I know.

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