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Finding the words to express your authenticity


How many times have you felt, when expressing things that mean the most to you, that words simply do not convey your meaning as truly as you would want them to? In attempting to find our authenticity and act from this it it can be difficult to express yourself clearly. The description of your choices and beliefs can evade even yourself due to the confusion language choices create. The social undertones or etymology of language choices you make, as well as the current social trends around these words and phrases can leave you feeling confused and misunderstood by others. Our ability to authentically communicate our truth can be further impacted by peoples experiences as well as views held by generations or particular social groupings.
As I continue to grapple to finding my authentic voice my experience has been redefined in the following ways by those around me, self help books, podcasts, social media or the enormity of the world wide web. Some of the things we are told within this myriad of our modern mental diet are:
You are stuck and so depressed, you should talk to someone.
You don't have the 'right' mindset and aren't manifesting your future.
You are not aligned with your inner being.
Everyone feels like this to some extent, that is normal.
You are searching for something that doesn't exist.
You are overthinking and making yourself unhappy.
You should ‘give less fucks.’
You expect too much.
Having a family is hard work, everyone feels like this - it is part of life.
You should work on your self worth and develop a self care routine.
You should learn to be patient and sit with it.
You should be kinder to yourself.
You are awakening.
Stop trying so hard, stop resisting and go with the flow.
I found this external noise very distracting as many of the phrases either didn't mean anything to me or did not resonate with me. It overcomplicated the simple fact that I needed to stop chasing, grasping and taking on board more voices and simply make room to hear and feel my own voice in my own words that meant something to me.
Expression is the key to unlocking our needs, wants and everything in between. Without this, clarity on choosing our next steps is significantly impaired. There are many viewpoints from which we would acknowledge this necessity for communication with our authentic self.
For example, perhaps you believe in the early traditions of Hinduism and chakras in which the fifth chakra is located in the throat and when blocked inhibits a person from speaking their truth as well as hear and be heard. Perhaps the idea of Limiting Self Beliefs resonates with you and you understand that your expressions of self are moulded by past experiences and are the views of others rather than ourselves, rooted in our conscious and subconscious mind. Maybe Trauma Informed approaches have taught you that, due to the pathways ingrained in your brain, your responses are not true reflections of your thoughts and feelings but instead a safety mechanism set in motion automatically by the stress response. Or you may simply adhere to the well known phrase - follow your gut - meaning, allow your intuition or instincts to be your guide.
Whatever our understanding, our expression concerning life changes and connecting to our authentic voice can be inhibited by many things. Feelings of self worth, upbringing, gender stereotypes, the culture you are embedded within or subcultures are a non exhaustive list of the things we may feel silence our true voice. However, as I explained, the barrier I have continually faced is the language available to me to describe my individual human experience.
Other layers of complexity added to the vast array of language we can use to describe our feelings, sensations, realisations and wants are the social connotations that are then applied to this language, which can once again inhibit our expression of changes and our confidence in them.
I found this particularly difficult when searching for help and guidance at a point where I wanted to make radical changes to my life to find happiness. Finding advice when using search engines provided more distractions and confusion, and discussing my thoughts with friends even more so as many had their own definitions of the language I used. This sometimes led to my realisations being put into boxes best understood by the masses, or characterised wrongly. This in turn affected my confidence in these inner revelations and led me to focus on academic understanding rather than feelings that were naturally occurring within me.
Here are some of the definitions I encountered when trying to find understanding regarding who I truly am and how to move forward with my life and be happy.
Life crisis
This term is a phenomena originally coined by Elliott Jaques in 1965 and is described by everyone's lighthearted friend Wikipedia as;
A psychological crisis brought about by a person's growing age, inevitable mortality and possibly lack of accomplishments in life.
The term has negative connotations, unsurprisingly as crisis itself means ‘a time of intense difficulty or danger’. It is often depicted in our society in film and narrative as desperate periods in a person's life, whereby they feel radical change is necessary for them to pursue their happiness. The bias added to these depictions is often that this crisis is something to be feared, a nonsensical approach peppered with delusion and unstable self confidence. This adult fable outlines clearly that seeking change in order to pursue contentment is both risky and foolhardy, likely leading to a negative outcome and regret. This form of social oppression aids to keep the status quo and ensures that we stay the course, chalking up our feelings of unhappiness to either our own failings, greed, or one of life's inevitabilities.
When searching for answers it seemed that the internet and those close to me felt that this was an adequate term to describe my feeling of depression and the need to pursue a more authentic life which would require big changes. As you can imagine, this negative connotation allowed fear to influence and hinder my self exploration.
Enlightenment
This term tends to be viewed by many as aligning ourselves with a spiritual understanding, and earns you a badge as someone who feels there is more than what can be seen or ‘hippy magic.' When I finally joined the world of Instagram as part of a personal challenge, it seemed that enlightenment was yet another societal goal to be obtained and there was a race to do so as so many influencers seem to claim to be enlightened. This, tied in with the notion of enlightenment being the highest spiritual state that can be achieved by Buddhist and Hindu beliefs, adds another layer of pressure to achieve and be seen to do so in order to succeed at reaching a true connection with oneself and the universe.
For me, I craved all elements of the meaning of this word. To be enlightened with understanding of the world around me, the spiritual world, the psychological or biological world, who I truly was and why I had reached the point that I had.
Healing crisis
I came across this term when exploring for answers as to why after two months of seeing an improvement in my mental health, it very suddenly dipped again and brought me back to dark intrusive thoughts. On reflection, I can see that it was natural for my body to do this as recovery is not linear. However, at the time I was grasping for explanation, help and validation that this was not a failure but indeed a part of some fated journey.
A Healing Crisis is viewed in a spiritual capacity as part of a path towards awakening. It is described as a ‘temporary worsening of symptoms that arises as we go through the healing process’. This brought me great comfort but also allowed me to indulge in more thoughts regarding where I was on this path to awakening and when I would reach this point. I wondered what I could do to force things forward and move out of the deeply uncomfortable space I found myself in. In retrospect this was deeply unhelpful and distracted me from focusing on what my authentic voice was saying or my body was showing me. I needed to go easy on myself, rest and recognise I was unwell instead of pushing harder and tying myself in knots.
I could go on to list many other incredibly unhelpful conversations, phrasing or concepts that I allowed in during this time in my desperation for clarity and wellness. However the realisation I came to about the obstacles words created for me is far more helpful to share.
You know yourself better than anyone. Your voice is without doubt, the most important.
It can be hard to trust in this when you are ill, overwhelmed and feeling like a failure. However, much like our worth, this is always true and never changes. Our feelings about it or around it may change, but it is a fact that we are our own best friend, confidant, mother, father, partner and person. The only person that we will walk through the whole of our lives with, knowing each and every intimate detail of our lives, is ourselves.
It is therefore essential to provide yourself with the space to hear your own voice, other voices are a distraction and often drown out your own. This can be tricky at first and will require you to trust yourself, take time to be free from obligation and thought. However, it will come and once it does that voice will become clearer, louder and more familiar to you so that in time you will need to spend less time and energy to hear it as your intuition will become a welcome part of your everyday human experience.
I understand that feeling of searching in vain for answers when you are in pain. When you are lost, you listen to it all. You listen in the hopes that someone will be able to tell you where your happiness is so that you can find it and hold it close. However, listening and comprehending is exhausting so ensure that your energies are firstly placed within the efforts to make sense of and embrace your own thoughts, feelings and language to describe your experience. Without this, your next steps will remain a mystery and you will only ever see the paths of others and progress they make along it from a distance rather than revealing your own and confidently taking those first few steps.
Our own voices are unique to us, our experience and knowing of our own experience. Trying to fit this into belief systems, align with popular understanding or modify our words for those around us simply erode our own understanding of ourselves. This understanding of ourselves, our self compassion for our voice and ability to hear it are without doubt fundamental to anchoring ourselves to our authenticity and contentment. Shut out the noise, whatever that may be for you, and listen to the person that knows you best.

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