Interesting conversations today, about being open and honestly ME. All part of becoming more authentic really. I explained to my friend that writing this blog has felt like a gradual process of giving birth to my SELF, over the last six months. He thought that my voice had changed, that there was a different look in my eyes. I am different now. Entirely.
I’ve watched myself collapsing my different roles and personas into One, or almost One. In some relationships I’m still not quite truly authentic. Less than 100% ME. Is that because I fear how people will react to the real me, or do I think I’m doing them a favour by keeping up the act that they have got to know as me?
Then we got to talking about my writing and whether it would be better to let it all out in the open. “You can’t handle the Truth,” springs to mind.
Throughout my life I’ve had this fascination with confession. A headlong urge to hurl myself out of any closet or hiding place and tell you everything, absolutely and entirely everything about what I have done and what I think. Is that appealing, or off-putting? Perhaps it’s partly what is needed to make yourself a good writer. Who is it that said all writers are just trying to unravel the truth?
But confessions can be burdensome on those who have to hear them. And maybe certain truths can be uncomfortable, or, worse still, dramatically change the way you’ll live your life and interact, from hereon in. Oh heck! Now I sound like a total chicken. Of course the truth will change you. End of story.
There is a power in confessing that can be exhilirating and liberating. I started to think about this in Week 3 of The Artist’s Way, as Cameron began to push us towards uncovering the places where we are still harbouring shame. I began to see my shames, hiding parts of my light, as if they were great dirty cloaks. They had a weight and a smell to them, that made them burdensome to bear, but also keeping me afraid of discarding them entirely, for in the act of disrobing, someone else would see them there and might recoil in disgust.
I’m still not sure the world will be a better place for hearing my Shame Secrets, but I might tell you some of them one day.
