“And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more
painful than the risk it took to blossom. “
This is one of my favorite quotes and it’s by Anais Nin – a woman who spoke in her authentic voice in a time that was even harder to do so than now.
It takes some courage to live as you truly are and speak with your own authentic voice. For many years, I kept this true voice of mine under wraps. In my professional life, I worked in PR and wrote and spoke on behalf of my clients using their voice. In my personal life, I rarely spoke out about my own beliefs and truths. Being agreeable and being so called nice had a higher priority than being me. This was not my original idea to be this way. Pressure was put on me to keep my mouth shut and tow the line, and I was shamed by society and by family when I didn’t play along. After a while, I didn’t know anymore what was mine and what wasn’t. My own voice was hiding so deep within me that I didn’t really know what it sounded like or what it had to say.
I am now coming into my own, finding my true voice. This has happened later in life, and that’s ok. In fact, considering that I came from many generations of women who didn’t have a voice, it’s a great leap forward that I now do have my own true voice.
It takes some courage to take the risk to blossom as Anais wrote. But it is way more risky to stay tight, enclosed in yourself, living a life that doesn’t feel right. The process of embodying your own true voice starts inside with self talk. I began by admitting to myself who I was, and what I believed. My inner words guide me.
The Buddhist say that we don’t really transform. We realize who we really are. It’s like taking mud off your windshield and suddenly you can see. You have a deep knowing of how powerful, good, beautiful, and awesome beyond belief you really are.
I love us women with experience who are finding our voices now. even if doing so goes against all that your family and society told you to be and how to act and what to say.
I also love this new generation of women who are going for it at a young age and letting their own true authentic voices be heard. For them, there is only one way they can live and that is being themselves. Each woman who finds her voice makes it easier for another woman to do the same.
Miko Lau is one of these vibrant authentic young women. We spoke together as part of her online series Blossoming Into You (Isn’t that a great title!). We talked about using your self talk to give yourself permission to be you. You can sign up for this series for free here:
http://blossomingintoyou.com/MaryseCardin
Miko’s intention with the series is to have women fall unconditionally in love with themselves. Yeah! It’s a 21 day journey with 21 heart-centered women including self-love teachers, women empowerment leaders, bestselling authors, successful women entrepreneurs, international speakers, and tantra gurus. We’ll cover a wide range of beautiful subjects to cultivate a deeply self loving relationship:
How to talk to ourselves with loving kindness and compassion
How to become radiant inside and out
How to awaken our sexual energy (aka our life force) and become sensually alive
How to stop hustling for our worth
How to lift other women up as you lift yourself up
We can all bloom into ourselves. We are like flowers. We don’t transform into something else, but we ascend into a new stage of ourselves. This is what we are here to do.
Thanks for reading!
With love,
Maryse