Telling the Truth

Authenticity and Agency – knowing our truth and exercising choice – are prerequisites for loving and core tasks of being human.

Enjoy this 9 1/2 minute read or let me read it to you via the audio file here.

Some people say life is about learning. Others say it’s service. Some say there’s only the purpose we invent for ourselves. Some say we’re slaves, some that we create our own reality – from our prosperity to our health to our experience of pain. They claim we’re all trapped, complicit in our imprisonment, shying away from the power we have to free ourselves – afraid of the unknown, afraid of how vast we really are.

Some argue our liberation is literal – transforming our homes, workplaces, and communities – and some that it’s more of a metaphysical upgrade towards freedom from attachments and delusions. Whether taken literally or figuratively, we’re fascinated by the story of freedom. It’s a foundational myth of our time – one that may give us hope, but also inspire resentment and shame as we struggle to justify the ways we feel trapped.

Knowing what’s true – and acting in alignment with it – seems to be a vital part of not just what human beings do, but how we survive. And in our current world overflowing with conflicting and constantly shifting truths it can be difficult to get our bearings long enough to create the momentum needed to live authentically and sustain change. Accelerated pressures on personal, relational, and collective levels makes it difficult to attune and ground into who we are, how to relate to others, and how the world works. What was true in my youth, last year, and even yesterday may no longer be so. But that inner longing for some sort of guiding principle and foothold persists, especially as outer turmoil increases. It’s as though the more truth eludes us, the more we need it. We need it to evolve.

I’m struggling in my new relationship to understand what I want. The light and levity is such a welcome relief for my tendency towards rumination and brooding. It lifts me out of rabbit holes and reminds me – as Trickster does – that things aren’t so serious and don’t have to make sense. I feel so much more at home in stillness and caves, seeping into the earth and quietly waiting for some felt revelation. His busyness and enthusiasm can feel ungrounded, intoxicating, even irreverent. Yet I must admit I’m perfectly capable of inventing frivolous distractions on my own – and often do.

These moments of contradiction between what feels sacred and what’s threatening invite us to dig deeper, deeper than we believed possible, for some reconciling force. My relationship is only incompatible if I project my inner contradiction outward. The truth is, it’s easier to have someone or something else to blame than to admit I’m divided against myself. Placing the fault outside myself means I can retain my belief that I’m a soulful, sober person committed to listening deeply and following that guidance. If I fail to live up to that standard, it’s because of the way the world is designed and what I must do to survive. Wisdom is accepting limitations. Struggling to self-actualize within them is art.

I like that story. I happily preach it whenever anyone will listen. But by doing so, I curse all the people – and the parts of me – who behave otherwise. I’m also disempowered – unable to live my truth because of outside forces are stronger than me. And one thing I’ve noticed is that feeling disempowered is at the root of my anxiety, frustration, and discontent. If I’m feeling like a victim, trapped, or thwarted in my efforts I’m starting to ask myself: Where are you giving your power away? I give away my power when I expect a person, institution, or society as a whole to protect me and provide for me. I give it away when I tell stories that aren’t true. Even noble stories about being a soulful, sober person.

The truth about ourselves and the world is far more complex, and that’s why pointing fingers is so problematic, even if we’re blaming ourselves. Telling myself I could have or should have done differently or better is overlooking the fact that some often hidden part of me likely chose to do exactly what it did. The solution isn’t punishment, but illumination. I have a part of me that desecrates, that turns away from what is holy. That breaks my heart. But it also means I can rejoin the human race because I’m no more righteous than anyone else. I have to let go of my idea of being in consistent, sustainable inner alignment. And I have to let go of the fantasy of ever finding or creating a person or place that is.

I believe at some level we all hunger for authenticity in a world that herds us toward conformity, especially the rebellious kind. True authenticity is freedom. It requires that we know our truth and have the courage to express it. But our truth isn’t something we uncover in a lucid dream or psychedelic journey, and then embody for the rest of our lives. Our truth is in constant flux and our hesitation to express it is shaped by complex forces, including fear and competing truths. I may laugh at a joke I find distasteful because I lack the energy for confrontation or to support a socially awkward friend in breaking out of their shell. What matters for my wellbeing and inner alignment is that I’m making a choice instead of being swept along by compulsion or obligation.

I’m often not reconciled with the choices I make, but I’m not convinced that’s always possible. I may resent the presence of my fear, fatigue, and doubt, but ultimately I choose whether to withhold or move forward despite them. I choose whether to honor my needs for creative expression and soulful service on the one hand and security, rest, and play on the other. I choose whether to tell a story that pits them as opposite paradigms locked in stalemate or collaborative entities alchemizing more playful service and relaxed expression.

Truth is often an amalgam of seemingly conflicting elements. That’s why it exists beyond the mind. The mind cannot understand how I can be both pure and profane, cowardly and courageous, selfish and generous, in love and repelled often at exactly the same moment. It needs to evaluate, judge, remediate. It needs to know how things will turn out and make sure they fit its idea of “right”. It needs – essentially – to play God. It doesn’t know how to be with things that simply are and is paralyzed by the notion that messy and obscure might be perfectly okay.

So I do my best in this moment – especially those moments of turmoil – to ask myself “what is true for you?” And then I practice being courageous about admitting what I find – sometimes to others, but more importantly to myself – especially when I don’t like what I hear or it doesn’t make sense: “I feel overwhelmed, can we just sit quietly for a moment?” “That didn’t feel sacred to me and I just need to sob for a minute.” “I’m really tired, but I can listen for five minutes because I care about you.”

Sometimes the decisions I abdicate break my heart. I have a really hard time forgiving myself for acting out of integrity. I tell a story that I’m better than that. But sometimes we’re not paying attention. Sometimes we make a compromise and don’t realize until later that it was a mistake. Sometimes we’re tired and frustrated and take the easy way out. It’s never too late to reconnect with our truth. Now is always the only time to express it. Things flow best when I don’t expect them to be simple or convenient. I don’t expect them to stay still. And I understand that we survive not by clinging to the comforting stories, but by getting out there and seeing what story life wants to tell through us.

If we don’t listen and inquire deeply enough to find a truth in the moment; and if we’re unable to act on it; we’re unable to truly love – to accept and nurture what is. And we miss a core reason we’re here.

Nancy