TRUTH...How honest are you?

How many more days are we all going to go on like this? Hurting in one way or another. Honesty, is what I want to talk about. Hard, uncompromising truths. Life is hard, that’s what everyone is led to believe from the first day you are born. God is ruling our lives? Our parents? Bosses? Institutions? FEAR. Fear is the one and only thing ruling our lives if we are in any kind of discomfort, and let’s be real here – everybody is in discomfort. Whether they will own up to it or not. I’m not saying that there should be no discomfort, that is impossible and discomfort helps us to grow and gives us the motivation to make changes – sometimes. But this chronic level of discomfort is absurd, grotesque, painful, sad, and unnecessary. I know this resonates with you. Because we are surrounded and infiltrated with strong, unfair and unrealistic expectations. Everywhere – in the media, schools, workplace, families, personal relationships, food, money. How often do you PRETEND on a daily basis?

PRETEND. We pretend to be something we are not at work, because we have been taught about “Good customer service” and “the customer is always right”. We wear clothes we don’t like, say things we don’t mean, smile smiles that aren’t real, stay in rooms longer than feels natural, wake up earlier than our bodies want to. Do you know how much of your precious energy gets stolen by this kind of daily routine? And that’s just your work aspect. Why? Why would you do all these things you don’t really want to do, in the one life you have been given, to experience this earth and the beauty and joys it could offer if we found a way to enjoy it fully. Why? FEAR. Fear of what would happen if you didn’t do these things. Fear of being “different” of being judged, of not being able to keep up with the lifestyle that modern western society deems the norm now. What would happen if you stopped? What would happen if you were honest? I don’t like wearing this shirt. I don’t want to be here for 8 hours a day, it numbs me. I don’t want to have that false conversation every day and smile that smile I don’t mean, because it drains me from the inside out. Well it’s downright terrifying isn’t it? The thought of actually being HONEST!? God forbid. It’s just not something we feel we are ALLOWED to do right? Haven’t we all been taught, in one way or another that you just turn up, when you are supposed to, nod and agree. And if you really want to be ”successful” make them believe you mean it. Go above and beyond, for that meaningless money making scheme that does not light a fire in you. Give them all your energy so you can be “employee of the month” and have that false sense of reward, security and the pat on the back. They give just enough encouragement and have you competing against each other to hit made up money targets. Do they even believe in what they are telling you? Probably not. No wonder many of us hurt our bodies with too much food and alcohol. I know I do. When you get home from a full day of FALSE. You are doing it and so is everybody else, except nobody says it. Everyone thinks it. But we push it back down day after day and then numb ourselves with coffee, movies, alcohol, food, drugs. Feeling that discomfort that you PRETEND isn’t there. That “there has to be more than this”. “How long can I keep doing this” “One day I will go travelling, make a change”.

You may be thinking that this is all a little depressing. Well it is. But It’s only depressing if it’s true. It wouldn’t make you feel down if you didn’t know these honest words to be true. Now I feel here it is important to say, that I am a big fan of using mindfulness as a tool to make your life beautiful, I know positive thinking and mind over matter helps you overcome all sorts and I also know that the law of attraction means you create your experience with your thoughts. But there is countless writings on these things and I will delve into them at a later date. Many of us have the same questions buzzing around in our heads often, when we don’t shut them out and put our heads down and just get on with it – not really loving ourselves at all, not really honouring what we truly want out of this life, how we would truly like to spend our precious days. We may not even feel we have the right to want such things. Everybody else is unhappy too right? So who are we to want better for ourselves? Who taught you that though? When you were younger did you ever hear something along the lines of “Sometimes in life you have to do things you don’t want to do” or “Everybody else has to do it, you are no different”? Have you ever imagined you took really ill so you didn’t have to go to work? Ever imagined falling down and hurting your leg so there was a reason to stop the washing machine, the cycle, the round and round, without having to be honest? Be real, many have had those thoughts. Is that ok? I mean with you, truly, in your heart – is this ok with you?

There’s a lot of “there’s always someone who has it worse off than you” and “positive thinking, no negativity” and ”there are starving children in Africa” – none of that is untrue. Those statements are generally probably true in most of your situations if you are here in England. So those thoughts keep you stuck? They make you believe you don’t have the fundamental right to be happy, because some people are sadder than you. Is that right? Is that logical? Now, of course you should appreciate what you have and be grateful for it. Absolutely. But are you being grateful for the things you actually want? Or the things that you’ve been taught you should want? Yes, let’s be grateful we don’t have to starve, that we have shelter from the weather, that we don’t currently live under the rule of a cruel dictator. But do we have to continue the lives of dishonesty and pretending many of us endure, to be grateful for those things? Or do we feel we have to continue the lives we have built based on our conditioning to keep up with the new phones, nice cars, good clothes, status, busy social lives. Do those things light a fire in your soul? Do they make you feel fulfilled and warm and fuzzy? Or would the being honest, not pretending any more, and being kind and loving to yourself and your truths feel better? Some people may be doing all of the pretending, pushing down their true feelings and enduring what they don’t really want for a whole host of other reasons. Just to pay the bills, stuck in relationships because they don’t know how to have the self esteem to really love themselves, physical pain that they don’t know how to get out of.

I don’t have all the answers that’s for sure. I’m just asking, is it all worth it? Who are we truly doing it for? Could we do it differently and be HONEST?

It’s not easy. If it was easy everybody would be doing it. The reason it’s not easy, is because by being honest and true to yourself, often you will have to go against the grain. You will have to do what many are too afraid to do, and people may not like it. So this is where the FEAR comes in. If I am real, people won’t like me. If I say no, I have to trust in my own decisions- which is hard if that decision means doing the opposite of what everyone else seems to be doing. Will I be lonely? Will I be isolated? Will people understand me? Will people be angry at me, for saying then things they aren’t brave enough to? Can I cope with choosing freedom over security? So yes – its damn scary. Which is why we go around and around and stay stuck because somehow that feels safer. But are you ready to sign up for staying where you have been in your head for as long as you can remember? Are you really ready to allow that for yourself?

Thanks for reading. Put your hand on your heart, take a breath and ask yourself.