Last night in group we were talking about authenticity. I woke up this morning wondering what it actually is at heart. The obvious rules are be yourself and speak your truth. But rules are often incomplete because they operate at the mind level not the heart level.
At the mind level you’re open and truthful, you know yourself, the trouble is the mind is only your logical thought, what you should do, how you should be. The heart is the centre of emotions and they will always override logic unless you can give them a really strong reason not to.
Emotions can be far stronger than logic – rightly or wrongly – depending on your make up
There’s nothing wrong with being an emotions-first person, but it can be harder than pure logic even though more accurate. Balance is the only true accuracy. Once you know what you truly feel the mind will do an excellent job of communicating that.
We are far stronger and more accurate when the heart and mind are aligned
A truth purely of the mind is only half the story. The tricky part is that your thoughts will be genuine, but the heart may not care; “the heart wants what the heart wants” comes to mind.
Top level authenticity
The starting point of self-authenticity is therefore:
You must know the truth of your heart
To reach that point you must be tuned into your heart. One simple way to begin that process is to sit with your hands on your heart and just breathe deeply into the heart centre. Don’t so much look to feel your heartbeat (although one is handy), as to connect with the emotional energy of the heart. The inner knowing. Don’t be logical about it, just feel. Put your hand there and ask “what do I want?” and allow the answer to come.
For some this is woo-woo and God gave us a brain for a reason, well God gave us a heart and emotions for a reason, so to me listening to both is completely logical. Using both comes under one of my favourite headings:
Might help can’t hurt
You can simply look at it as way of accessing every skill and ability you have as a human, too many of which have been pushed aside by the modern world.
So you have to make a decision?
This is where being authentic can be hard. No matter how much your mind believes that you want something, no matter how sensible the decision, you may find that you constantly back off making it, or do again what you swore you would never do again.
That’s because you’re not aligned – it’s that simple
No matter how much you tell yourself off, call yourself rude names, and despair of your commitment, ability to make a decision, or whatever else comes to mind:
You are not ready to make this decision because your heart doesn’t agree
The obvious sticking point here is that the logical decision may be absolutely correct, whether your heart likes it or otherwise. We cannot ignore logic when it’s right, what we have to do then is to work out how we can action the decision in a way that we feel right about. Maybe in stages, testing every stage, maybe from a different angle from our original approach. But first:
You need to sit with that heart and interrogate it – why won’t it give up?
Ask it and accept the answer.
To be authentic…
… and act authentically you must tell yourself the truth. The good news is that you don’t need to tell anyone else, unless that someone is involved of course. You can do exactly what feels right to you silently, and without external pressure. You answer to no one.
If you ever want to feel truly yourself and find it easier to make decisions based on what’s right for you, then get in contact with your genuine emotions, and get your mind to work out the how of actioning them for you. Almost always there is a good balance between emotions and logic, but ignoring your emotions can cause emotional and mental health issues. Yet we’re taught to think emotions are not important!
Yeah right! Never forget:
Integration prevents procrastination!
Best love
Amorah – Deb
Deb Hawken - Amorah 