Life Gets to Be Easy When We Stop Denying Parts of Ourselves
Day 15 (Half way) of morning musings!
Life gets to be easy.
We make it difficult when we deny parts of ourselves. I found myself passionately sharing these words with a client on our call yesterday. It was one of those aha moments when you realise the truth behind the words you're saying. So much of the work I do, and the space I hold, revolves around myself and other women peeling back the layers of conditioning in search of their true centre—letting go of patterns, behaviours, thoughts, and fears that belong to others, and reconnecting with our truth, our knowing, our self-expression.
If someone had asked me years ago what self-expression looked like, I don’t know how easily I would have been able to answer. The idea of self—of me being an individual—was so far removed from what I thought to be true. I knew how to be what others needed me to be, or who I needed to be in order to survive, but my truth? That was unknown.
So much of the dissatisfaction I have experienced in life has come when I have denied parts of myself into existence. When I have denied the words I have been longing to say. When I have denied a boundary out of fear of not being liked. When I have denied buying an item of clothing, fearful that it would draw too much attention to me. The list goes on and on. Denying myself became easier than honouring who I truly am, making it easy to morph into the people or environments I found myself in. I became a chameleon, no longer aware of what I liked but hyper-aware of what others did. I became a master of being who I thought you wanted me to be, and on the outside, it served me well. I was liked, accepted, and even sought after. But on the inside, there was always a roar within me, wanting to be unleashed. A dissatisfaction so deep that I had to continuously force it down.
Until I didn’t.
It started with understanding what I actually liked versus what I was liking to please others. The journey to understanding this took many shapes and forms. Trying new things, checking in, blocking out the noise, and constantly asking myself: is this for me, or am I doing this for another? As the layers of the onion began to peel back, I started to realise that while this dance with self-expression was liberating, I wouldn’t truly be liberated until I started using the one thing I had been ignoring my whole life—the one thing I had spent years learning how to swallow and where I got more comfortable in the silence than in the noise: my voice.
My voice had been the thing I had been denying the most. Trapped inside with so much to say, opinions to share, thoughts to express, and feelings to be acknowledged. My voice was the part of me that was suffocating me, begging to be released, and it was the thing I had been avoiding the most. I had learnt how to compliment, flirt, banter, and charm my way through most situations and crowds, but what I had never done was share what I truly thought. I had saved those thoughts for the hundreds of journals I have written in over the years, but I could no longer hide behind pages. It was no longer enough.
So I started small. Fumbling my way with words. Over-cautiously apologising before I would say what I thought, creating narratives of how I would be received before I even let the words escape my mouth. Most of my conversations would begin with me saying, "I hope you don’t find this offensive," or, "I just want to share what I think, but I don’t want to upset anyone." I was constantly apologising until I realised that these apologies, for sharing parts of myself, were also not doing me any favours. I walked on eggshells with each word until I started to find confidence in my voice. I was never cruel or vicious with my words, and for this, I am proud. The years of analysing my thoughts on paper gave me the advantage of being able to communicate clearly and without conflict. I started to realise that how other people received what I was saying was out of my control and for them to manage. My job was to speak from my heart and to keep my heart open when they responded.
Over time, I stopped being scared to speak and began to enjoy dancing in dialogue. I shared parts of myself with my family that I was afraid to share, and instead of judging me, as the narrative I had created would have me believe, we actually got closer. The walls I had built began to drop, and I no longer feared the words I wanted to speak.
This is just one part of self-expression, and it’s something I still get to work on every day. There are days when I feel the familiar internal gates of my throat shutting down, and I have to fight to keep them open, reminding myself that it is only me who loses when I keep them shut. Then, there are other parts of self-expression that I am still exploring.
When I am living in my self-expression, I tend to compare myself to others less. I don’t feel the need to focus on what others are doing when I am allowing all of me into existence. I feel complete.
The greatest lesson I have found on this journey is knowing that I cannot control the reactions of another and honour my truth at the same time. I have to choose. I either get to choose the comfort of another, or I get to choose my own liberation. And when I choose myself, I am reminded that life gets to be easy. So I choose me.
Today, I am leaving you with these thoughts: what parts of yourself are you denying to please others? How would it feel to honour that part of yourself?
With love,
Millee x
I’ve denied a my creativity for so long. Kudos is given when you were able to be accurate in following instructions and being rewarded for it. I would feel freedom in myself if I were given the opportunity.
I see the roar within you!