To Live With One's Whole Heart ...

“To take life in armfuls, to embrace and accept it, to leap into it with energy and relish, is of course to invite trouble of all the familiar kinds. But the cost of avoiding trouble is a terrible one: it is the cost of having trodden the planet for humanity’s brief allotment of less than a thousand months, without really having lived.”

– A.C. Grayling

Being genuine - or being truly myself, fully present and responsive to others - has been (and is) a long-term and ongoing quest for me. Closely connected to the idea of genuineness are the concepts of being sincere (or sine cera, "without wax," [to make something look pretty and perfect when it's not, as in ancient marble pillars] as a teacher once shared with me) and being whole. The following have really enlarged these ideas for me ...

What does it mean to be truly comfortable as myself? How to be comfortable as myself now and yet motivated to be gradually more and better?

I have been feeling the need to nurture and get to know ME ... and learn to feel, not only what is pleasant and wonderful, but also the uncomfortable and awkward and painful. And learn to thrive on all of it, reaching always for hope and growth. If I can learn to open myself to whatever new experience brings, perhaps I can help light the path for others. I have always loved this quote by Marianne Williamson:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that frightens us most. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and famous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in all of us. And when we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”

I am fearful. Often. To a somewhat crippling extent. But I am coming to feel that fear does not equate to weakness. And I intend to search out and talk to and feel my fear until I can understand it well enough to transform it into experience and joy and growth. I want to be a real and a whole person, and I want others to feel okay about being real and whole and powerful (without being painless) too. Who's with me??

I love this presentation by researcher Brené Brown. Note her explained definition of "courage" and her discussion of the ways in which we (and society) numb what we feel and determine what we will or will not be.



I currently work as a community educator for a local nonprofit agency that provides services to victims of domestic violence. Part of what I've been doing over the past few months is facilitating an educational group about emotions for residents of our emergency shelter. I love doing this - it is incredibly energizing to teach ideas and skills that I feel strongly about, while also trying to encourage and empower the participants to think and make decisions for themselves. It reminds me of what it was like serving as a missionary for my church, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints ... sharing and helping others practice utilizing truths that will make all the difference in their relationships and the many life roads ahead of them. It makes me happy to share things that ring true to so many people!

Jon G. Allen, Ph.D., wrote a book called Coping with Trauma, in which he made a statement to the effect that "healing from trauma requires cultivating emotion, not squelching it." This statement has been one of my driving mottos as I have worked on developing the group. The past three sessions have focused on specific emotions (fear, shame, and grief) and what it means to experience them. What they are like - how they feels physically, the strength of their impact mentally and emotionally, their color and taste and smell. Have you ever thought about that? Ever tried separating an event (involving people or places or things that triggered emotion) from the feeling that engulfed you as a result? What do you do with the feelings? Do you allow yourself to experience them fully or do you try to pretend they are not there? Are they always being compared or are they accepted for what they are?

As it turns out, the world seems to suggest that an awful lot of people are fixated on feeling more, feeling intensely, and being stimulated emotionally. I've been a little overwhelmed by some of the media representations of the struggle to feel that I have recently encountered. See the text of Taylor Swift's "The Way I Loved You," and Eminem and Rihanna's "Love the Way You Lie" for two extremely different examples (be aware that there is some crude language in the lyrics of the second song). We want energy, we want excitement, we want passion and arousal and resolution. But does it come only in such unpredictable and unhealthy circumstances? What has happened to us that causes us at times to look for it in such hurtful and/or dysfunctional settings?

I would love to hear thoughts on how to emphasize and nurture healthy, natural and fulfilling emotional stimulation and integrity. What do you think? Where do natural highs and lows come from? How does emotion play into efforts to be genuine?