Your authentic self, and true freedom, derives from within, detached from external answers or validation
—
The time has come to realize that I am no longer unequipped. The time has come to embrace the power I possess.
No longer do I need to look outside of myself for answers that are so clearly found within. Consciously softening myself and allowing my soul to speak. The idea that I NEED anyone is false. The ability to see my friends’ and family’s perspective can be helpful as an empath, but not a beneficial part of my healing and growth. It only confuses things for me.
Sometimes I wonder why there is a feeling like something is missing from my life. I guess it’s because parts of me kind of shut down. Not in a dysfunctional way, but in a social way. Things that used to excite me no longer do; people with whom I have had many a laugh were no longer a funny release for me.
I feel like I have been hard to reach, but I think that has been for my own good. I no longer feel a connection to it or them.
At this point in my life, I don’t want to risk another minute doing the same old thing or having the same old mindless conversations.
Then there are moments where I feel like I am taking things way too seriously. Like I need to lighten up. But where do I draw the line? I don’t want to slip back into old patterns of outdated thoughts, behaviors or actions. I don’t want to undo the tremendous inner work that I am so proud of.
It’s huge that I no longer need outside validation. I never thought I’d say that, but it’s true. Needing outside validation is one of those things that I felt was ingrained in me since I was a young girl. “Do this so you can have that.” UGH what a twisted mentality. At this stage in my life, ‘people pleasing’ is the least of my worries. I feel proud to say that because for so long that seemed like all that mattered. Isolation is necessary when you need to level up.
It’s about time that I embrace my DIVINE BEINGNESS and stop acting so small. The fact that now when I look in the mirror and wholeheartedly love who I see looking back at me is monumental. I didn’t really care much for her years ago. It took my deepest fears and deeply rooted subconscious thoughts and behaviors in 2011 to come crashing down on me sending me on a downward spiral that forced me to get real. Realer than real. I had come face to face with another failed relationship and the realization that the majority of my friendships were never really mine to keep, they were only visitors passing through, each sent to teach me lessons, and also coming face to face with that little girl who grew up feeling inadequate and ridiculed. Suddenly everything became the mirrors of what I had been running from for so long.
Honestly I was so relieved when it all came crashing down. I didn’t have the strength to fight back or deal with it any longer.
I don’t know why it took me so long to realize that. Maybe I was just comfortable and didn’t want to rock the boat.
Looking back, I realize all of it had been staring me in the face. Reflecting back on that young girl desperately seeking outside validation, because I was never taught how to love myself.
Self-love wasn’t an example in my house.
Criticism and disapproval seemed to be at the forefront of my adolescence. I know my parents loved me and did the best they could from their level of consciousness. I love them very much and will always be eternally grateful to them. That said, I think I was angry at my judgmental and verbally abusive father and disappointed that my mother’s love for herself wasn’t as strong as it should have been for her to choose a better husband and father for her child.
My father did provide a great material life for me, but I think it was his general apathy that triggered parts of my inadequate and abandoned abyss and possibly my overall feelings of being sheltered by both my parents. Also, I always felt my parents never saw me for me. They would always try to override any decision I made, saying they knew what was better for me than I did.
Maybe that was true when I was a child, but not when I was an adolescent and young adult. Every time I thought I had a grip on figuring myself out, their disapproval would threaten any ‘material’ plans I had. I’d succumb to their ridicule because I wanted to be popular in school and being popular meant having all the shiny possessions my parents provided. I was so blinded by it, a result of the culture I was raised in. It never occurred to me that I was trading pieces of my soul for it.
I thought that dismal time would never end.
It never occurred to me that the purpose of all that pain was my soul finally crying out, saying ENOUGH! I was finally unravelling out of my pit of despair. I complained the entire time until one day, I felt reborn. I can’t explain it, it just occurred to me one day. My divine beingness was once again speaking to and through me. Somehow I had shut her voice out and carried on with my reckless abandonment of myself because it felt better to numb the pain instead of allowing the pain to catapult me into major growth.
Why I chose to self-sabotage my healing I will never fully understand. Of course, the signs were everywhere and once I was ready to see them, I understood them. I guess I was so adamant about holding onto guilt, shame and anger — it just blinded me. Now however, I have come to accept myself as both a mess and a masterpiece simultaneously.
I kind of like the idea that if I don’t like something I can just start over.
This is something I remind myself of daily because it can be quite challenging to unlearn everything I was taught. Everything I once held as personal law no longer applies to me. I have a new perspective on who I am and what I want. A renewed sense of confidence that was hiding deep down was finally ready to emerge.
It’s definitely been an emotional crash course these last six years. I am seeing why things happened the way they did. Once I stopped trying to shop it away, drink it away, smoke it away and most certainly recklessly date it away. The path revealed itself to me. I bravely faced it without any vices.
It’s almost like I was lifted out of my body and my soul was shielded by the universe. I don’t remember all the darkness and pain I survived, yet I know very clearly that I did. I know it was traumatic, yet all I see when I remember back is my darkness transmuted into light.
Like a phoenix rising from the ashes, I have been reborn into a warrior.
I used to laugh at statements like this, but I guess it takes going through some shit to realize some shit. I don’t have to do anything I don’t want to do. If it doesn’t resonate with me, I withdraw from it. Protecting my energy is priority number one. Misery can only affect me if I am not consciously aware of my energetic surroundings.
I love experiencing things with this new perspective. Making a conscious effort to be fully present has given me the opportunity to see what’s going on around me in a new light. I feel like things are easier the more I surrender to God/Universe. It is a little scary, but I am learning every day to embrace the uncertainty and not only love it but trust that my life is being divinely guided. I transmuted all that pain into my greatest assets: Inner peace and love.
You may also enjoy reading How to Find Your Ikigai and Live a Life of Happiness & Purpose by Emily Gibson