Speaking Your Truth

OK, I will be the first to admit that, half of the time, I don´t even know what my truth is. I get confused, you see. I like to listen to other people – their opinions, their beliefs, their ways of doing things – and even though, sometimes, these can be completely at odds with my own take on life, I still find myself wondering “hmmm, what if?”

I don´t suppose it´s necessarily a bad thing – being able and willing to see things from someone else´s point of view and taking on board someone else´s opinion. Flexibility is always preferable to a rigid mindset, otherwise we´d never learn or move on. But there comes a point where we have to assimilate all the evidence then ask ourselves what it is we really think of the situation.

It doesn´t matter if you´re dealing with something “minor”, like cancelling the party all your friends were looking forward to because you just don´t feel like it tonight; or if it´s something “big” such as a life-changing experience you´re about to embark on that you know your family and friends won´t understand or approve of. Trying to explain to people the reasons why you have made a particular decision, or chosen a particular path – speaking your truth in other words – is not an easy task.

The first thing that happens is that we start to imagine the responses we will get when we do speak our truth. The criticisms, the ridicule, the anger, the hurt we are sure we will be confronted with. And that leads on to us rehearsing our retaliation – we start to focus on justifying ourselves and being all defensive. We´re more concerned with being “right” than simply explaining how we feel. Unfortunately, the more time and energy we spend in these negative fantasy scenarios, the less connected we become to our truth – to our real motivation for the decisions we´ve made – and the less connected we are to our truth, the less we are able to speak it clearly. What a horrible vicious circle!

The most positive thing we can do – and, in fact, the fairest for everybody involved – is to consciously stop those imaginary confrontations as soon as they start to take over your mind. Breathe deeply and ask your higher self or the Tao to remind you, once again, of your truth. You may find the babble of doubt still continues at the front of your brain for a while, but keep breathing and listen for the quieter, less frantic, gentler voice of truth to whisper its reassurance to you. The more you can tune into this, the clearer your true intentions become and the more likely you will put across your truth, when it comes to the time to speak it, in a calm and confident manner – rather than in a shrill, confrontational, defensive one. Now, that is definitely better for everyone concerned.

At the end of the day, our fear of speaking our truth, or rather, our fear of being misunderstood or criticised, stems from our fundamental need to be approved of at all times. If we can move beyond this, we begin to see that whoever it is we are speaking our truth to, whatever role they are playing in our lives – they have the right to think whatever they want about us and our choices, they have the right to react however they choose. This is not a “to hell with what everybody thinks” type of attitude – this is pure and simple respectful honesty (in sharing your truth with them) and trust (that they´ll deal with it in the best way they can). In other words, you can only speak your truth; you cannot be responsible for other people´s reactions to it.

As much as we´d all like to be all things to all people, to please all the people in our lives all of the time, we have to accept that this is unlikely to be possible. As long as we are not harming another living being on the planet, we are all free to take whatever path we choose, and this is worth us all bearing in mind.

The less judgemental we are ourselves about other people and their decisions, or their truths, the more acceptance we are likely to attract into our own lives.