Being Authentic Isn’t For Wimps

I wrote a guest blog post last week for a colleague and friend of mine that required me to dive deep into who I am at my core.  Then, I promptly had a minor freak-out because it dove deep into who I am at my core. The fear started to rise up, bubble up into my head.  What’s going to happen when my friends read this? What’s going to happen if my dad reads this? What kind of blowback will I get when I blow the top off of some serious trama?

But that trama made me.

It made me into a more compassionate foster mom and mom.

It made me into a more driven person.

It made me into the kind of person that loves treating others but knows she has to center herself first.

Working through that trauma made me into a person I even like to hang out with.

But it is so much easier being my authentic self with people I don’t know

People that haven’t judged me yet.  People that don’t have preconceived notions of who I am, what I think, or what I stand for.

Living, truly living one’s authentic self means that we live boldly, bravely, unabashedly, ourselves at all times, never diminishing ourselves for other’s benefit.

How many times a day are you less than what the universe made you just to make other people ‘comfortable’?

Now, I do not diminish the need to be ‘less’ for safety and survival reasons.  There are many reasons one might want or need to code-switch into a more diminutive version of yourself- but that’s not what I’m talking about.

I’m talking about the times we change our speech, our tone, our dress, our joie de vivre to “fit in” to look, sound, act “professional” or “worthy” or “appropriate”.

The problem with that is exactly what we see when we scroll through 99% of Facebook, Instagram, (insert social media of choice here).  Everything blends together.  Everything is the same- until it’s not, and THAT’S when we pay attention!

 Our brains notice the things that stick out

Our brains notice the things that stick out, the things that are loud, colorful, darest I say it… authentic in the same ol’, same ol’ beige world.

So stick out, wear the loud lipstick- or don’t, wear the clothes you love, say the things you want to say the way you want to say them, do all your photos in moody noir, or don’t because that’s all you baby, and no one can copy that.

You are your secret sauce.  Secret sauce isn’t supposed to be easy to make, share, or duplicate.

Accept no imitations or limitations.

Accept nothing less for yourself, of yourself and your business will get noticed.

Live in grace my friends,