I’m a recovering people pleaser.
The wild cocktail that is learnt hyper-vigilance, big empath energy, (in the process of being diagnosed) neurodiversity and co-dependence that is my make-up I have lived nearly thirty-nine years putting the needs of others above my own. In the past I’ve called this behavior love, service, hard work, peace keeping; now, I see it for what it is…harmful, minimising, resent making, and untrue. What I am craving more that ever before is to be the kind of person who shows up at full volume; honest, authentic, deep in integrity.
I’m reminded of a party I went to in my late teens, the stereo was an eight-stack CD player and people kept stopping the music to change discs. The music would be loud and then suddenly drop out and people would be caught mid-sentence speaking loudly in the now quiet space. The boy I fancied was talking to a girl we’d never seen before, she was from a different school and wearing a Pizza Hut uniform. One time the music stopped and my crush announced, “So, you know I really like you,” at full volume and the whole party turned, and I was crushed. I think of the moments where I’ve shown up in the fullest expression of myself like that CD Player, sometimes loud and proud and sometimes quickly shut off and silenced because of all of the bullshit we get lampooned with; patriarchy, trauma, white supremacy, the “rules.”
We spend so much time learning how to keep ourselves safe, and then so much time unlearning those strategies the older and more healing we do. It’s like we spend all of this energy accumulating armor, only to have to spend all of this energy to take the armour off. The last few years I’ve been de-armouring. Wandering along whipping off a shoulder plate that actually belongs to my parents, a heavy breast plate that actually belongs to the adolescent body bullshit of being a chubby girl in the nineties, a helmet that’s made from a capitalist view of work and rest. I don’t want the armour anymore, I want to trust the internal, perfectly made guttural system of my intuition. I want to frolic in a light linen frock and bare feet knowing that’s enough. I’m enough. I mean, I might at least carry a cute sword, just in case.
We celebrate strength and resilience without acknowledging that these things mean people are enduring shit. We celebrate selflessness and martyrdom, especially in mothers and carers, without acknowledging this means the erasure of self. We’re constantly encouraged to harden up, be tough, tough it out, but I am realising that it’s all bullshit. I don’t want to harden up, I want to soften down. Culture needs us to toe the line, follow the rules, not interrogate why for maximum control, and we buy it because we’ve been taught to fear anarchy. Add to this our inherent programming as community minded pack animals, which means we feel in our bodies that ostracization will mean certain death, which in the past it did. It’s why our inner critics speak so loudly. It’s all about safety. But, in the unraveling of this I’ve become committed to being and feeling as safe in myself as I possibly can, and in turn making the people around me feel as safe as possible too.
Soft.
Slow.
Gentle.
Trusting that I already know.
We already know.
You already know.
Here’s my soft and gentle commitment to you, pearly ones, a weekly newsletter every Monday. I’ve opened up the subscription options here if you’d like to financially support me and this pearly playground for $6.00 a month. Your support in whatever form it comes is much appreciated. Thank you. If you like a post, share it. If you can spare the dosh, support it. I’m also currently working out a special treat for subscribers, which I’m hoping to have up and running next week.
You’re glorious.
Our affirmation this week: It is safe to trust my intuition. It is safe to show up as the truest, most glorious expression of myself.
Love Claire.
Do the things if you fancy: