Today more than ever it seems like we’re struggling with this idea of truth. We’re being bombarded with talk about real news, fake news, and it begs the question, what is truth?
Truth is fact, truth is honesty, and in personal life, truth is the willingness to put what you say and believe on the line.
Are you motivated to be more truthful with your loved ones?
Here are 4 reasons why it’s time for you to speak your truth.
1. Take Your Power
As women it can be hard to stand in your power. Many of us were trained to be gentle peacekeepers. And oftentimes when women do stand up, they’re branded as “bitches.”
Of course there’s another way – to bring the heart of compassion into what we say. Think about your chakras. The chakra of power is in your belly, as you move up, the next one is at your heart center, and then your 5th chakra is your throat.
The goal is to speak your truth – moving that idea or power up from the belly – through the heart and out the throat.
There’s a world of difference between someone communicating from this space as opposed to bypassing the heart and speaking truth from a place of power.
Think about people you’ve heard talk – politicians, motivational speakers, reporters. When you listen to those voices, what do you hear? Clarity and compassion or harsh aggressive, bombastic truth?
2. Be in Integrity
When we are true to ourselves, we are in integrity.
What is integrity?
One definition, according to the American Heritage Dictionary is, “the quality or condition of being whole.”
I think about integrity as alignment. I want my actions and my words to align with my thoughts and beliefs as much as I am able to do that.
So when we choke back words or don’t speak authentically, we fall out of integrity.
How can you say the words that need to be said today?
3. Forgive
Speaking your truth allows you to forgive and I believe that forgiveness is one of our primary functions on earth.
Forgiveness is an act of release – both for you and the “other.”
When we speak to someone about what we really think, how we genuinely feel, we are opening a door through which true conversation, healing and love can occur.
This is the power of forgiveness.
4. Help Others
Are you one of those people who has the ability to see exactly what’s happening? As if you can cut through to the core of something and genuinely understand an issue?
Whether it’s a business challenge or a personal one, you sense which way to go or how it should be navigated – for the right outcome.
But then, you don’t say anything.
Maybe you stay quiet because you feel like it isn’t your place to share. Or perhaps you think it’s presumptive to offer your opinion. Maybe you don’t want to hurt someone else’s feelings.
But here’s the thing, by not speaking up, you are denying that person your authentic voice, your clarity, your insight.
Think back to when a friend spoke truth to you. Maybe in the moment it wasn’t fun or you didn’t like it, but did it help? Did those words prompt action from you?
I remember the first time I got advice like this as a young adult. I was living in Hong Kong and had finally quit a job I really hated. In all honesty, I just wanted to run away from everything – the city, my failed existence, even myself.
One day I was picnicking with my best friend. We’d traveled to an outlying island and hiked up a canyon following a trickle of a waterfall. From there, we could see across the harbor to Hong Kong island with its towering skyscrapers. She turned to me and said; “What are you going to do now?”
I replied, “I don’t know, anything, as long as it isn’t here.”
Then she asked; “Where are you going to go?”
And I answered, “anywhere as long as it isn’t here.”
She looked me straight in the eye and said, “you have to make your happiness here.”
Immediately I wanted to tell her to f**k off but I also knew she was absolutely right.
What did I do?
I did what she suggested. I stayed, made peace with the city and my life, and grew up.
I still remember her honest words nearly thirty years later, that’s the impact they had. What if she’d been afraid to speak? It would have been a huge disservice to me.
Hard conversations are hard but they're also important.
Whether they are with loved ones or colleagues, speak your truth. Say what you feel, what you need and what you see. All of us need feedback even when we don’t want to hear it. But that feedback when given with love, kindness and compassion can be invaluable and life changing.