What it takes to be free.
“I can’t believe the way he acts sometimes,” my client said incredulously.
We were discussing her fiancè and how she often finds herself either embarrassed or angered by how he acts in public.
“What exactly does he do that upsets you?”, I asked.
“There are specific things but when I think about it, what bothers me most is that he doesn’t seem to care what people think of him. If he gets aggressive when we're playing games with friends or shares his true thoughts on a particular topic, he’s completely unbothered by how people take it,” she said.
“And why is this a problem?,” I questioned.
“Because ALL I care about is what people think of me...and him. All I want is for people to like me and think I’m the best and there he is, doing whatever he wants without giving a shit what people think. He’s not playing by the rules!”
“And how are these societal rules working for you? Why are you so attached to upholding them?”, I posed.
Photo by Kirstina V
My client was silent for a long while. She took a deep breath and slowly said, “The rules aren’t working for me. I feel boxed in, caged and worried about being disliked or saying the wrong thing.”
She continued, “I’m realizing I’ve connected safety and love to upholding the rules of how a woman should be. I’ve been telling myself that if I’m just kind, understanding and sweet all the time then people will like me. And in being liked, then I feel safe and love...but only for a little while. It's exhausting to always be hustling for safety and love.”
I was quiet for a minute, allowing the truth of her words to settle between us. “What does it cost you to uphold the rules of how a woman should be?”, I gently asked.
“It costs me MY FREEDOM!”, she blurted out. “In fact”, she continued, “I think I get pissed at my fiancè because he’s free and I’m not. I want to be free...like him!”
“We live in an oppressive, white-supremacist, fat-phobic, heteronormative, patriarchal culture that has very strict rules on how people are to behave.”
Women in particular are to be doting, loving, put-together, kind, thin and always working to make things easier for others. We are to be constantly selfless, gracious, and understanding all while maintaining a perfectly healthy and able body that fits into size 6 jeans.
These oppressive narratives are stories that were embedded within us without our knowledge and permission. They were implanted without our consent and yet we spend our entire lives upholding and defending them as if they were our own.
Dominant culture narratives offer no room for difference or freedom or self-expression which is why so many of us are killing ourselves trying to uphold the rules while simultaneously dying to break free.
Taking exquisite care of ourselves demands that we unhook from dominant culture’s (and often our friends/family’s) definition of how we are supposed to be. Exquisite care simultaneously invites us to get close to who we are, at our essence, so that we can truly live life on our own terms.
Why is it so important to reconnect with your essence? Because your essence cannot be tamed by patriarchy, white-supremacy, diet culture or any other oppressive system. Your essence is the freest, wildest, truest thing about you, the thing that will always lead you home...if only you let it.
If you too are yearning for more freedom, here are some questions to ask yourself:
In what ways do you succumb to dominant culture’s idea of how you’re “supposed to be”? How does this make you feel?
What do you need to believe to be free?
What oppressive narratives do you need to let go of to be free?
What actions would you take if you were free?
What might you say if you were free?
What would freedom feel like in your body?
Lastly what is ONE thing you can do today to offer yourself a dose of much needed freedom?
All my love and may today be a FREE one.
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This conversation is between myself and an incredible woman named Ani, who shares how she learned how to be authentic, practice self-compassion, and take up space without guilt or shame through my 6-month group coaching program, Homecoming. Ani is a model for how to excavate internalized misogyny and live authentically without fear of others’ opinions. The conversation originally took place on my podcast, The Path Home.