Should you do it your way but feel alone, or do it their way and risk losing yourself?
How to walk your own path while feeling connected, supported and like you belong.
Two months ago, I asked a room full of 60 strangers if they’d ever wished someone could come into their life and tell them exactly what to do.
Every single person raised their hand, including me.
Because darn, this life can be confusing sometimes. Swirly. Up and down and sideways.
Not to mention a societal context where so many of our reference points are up in the air, our ethics are being challenged daily, traditional structures feel wobbly and our rugged individualism has made us “freer” than ever, and also more lonely, disconnected and lost.
So… many of us turn to role models. Or what we might call: mentors. We seek people who will inspire us, encourage us, support us, show us what’s possible.
And mentors are dope!!! I wouldn’t be here today without the many guides I’ve met along the way: from teachers and coaches to friends, strangers, partners, babies and flowers.
But what I’ve found in my personal experience, in the research and through the many people I’ve supported over the past seven years (who often want to work with me because they want me to give them answers… which spoiler: I don’t have): mentors only truly help us when they don’t give us a map, but instead inspire us to create our own.
Yes, you’ve heard it. They don’t offer a clear, straight line to follow, but rather encourage you to discover your own wiggly path.
And while they may reassure us, the inconvenient truth is that if we are brave enough to commit to it, no mentor can take away the deep discomfort of forging our own road.
“If the path before you is clear, you’re probably on someone else’s.” Joseph Campbell
Read that quote twice. And once more, please. Yes, there we go. Feel the weight?
Wait, but that’s so scary Silba!!! I want a plan!!! I’ve always had a plan!!!
Yes, love, I know. And there’s nothing wrong with you for being scared, it just means you’re human. Consider this:
Recent behavioural research (thank you Nick Chater) shows that most of our so called ‘irrational’ behaviours can be brought down to one urge: to be consistent with our own stories. WE WANT TO MAKE SENSE TO OURSELVES AND OTHERS.
And so we prefer being consistent with our stories / plans / tales of ourselves, rather than to what’s true to us (even when it costs us time, energy, money, joy!).
For example, you may stay in a career, relationship or location because it’s what ‘makes sense’, while ignoring the quiet voice inside that knows something else is possible… Why? Because we’re social creatures, wired for connection and literally dependent (no matter what hyper-individualism tells us) on each other for survival.
We know that we are more likely to be accepted (usually) if people can put us in a box. And so we safeguard the box. Because…
It’s not a mindset issue, it’s a biological one: because being accepted by our social group is how we stay alive.
But there’s more.
There’s this fascinating research on creatives and innovators (and by that, I invite you to consider anybody who’s doing things differently: so yes, you) that shows they / you / we live with a constant inner tension.
On one hand: our individual need to create, express and follow our own path (honouring our uniqueness). On the other: our biological need to fit in, belong, be part of something bigger (often requiring us to perform sameness).
It seems we must choose: free but lonely, or safe but caged. Sound familiar?
We all carry the cellular memory of witches, inventors, geniuses, activists who were punished for going against the grain just a little too much… with judgment, ostracisation and sometimes death.
It makes sense then, that those who choose to follow their wild may try to do so far away from the world that shaped them. Or that many of us forgo our ‘crazy’ and difference, for the sake of fitting in and being less expressed, but ‘safe.’
Here’s the deal:
Is it really safety if we have to hide parts of ourselves to belong?
Can we ever be truly satisfied walking a path that isn’t ours, or walking it alone?
Do we really have to choose between our truth and being part of something bigger?
The research says: no.
As a creative (again: anyone doing things a little differently), there is a way to honour both our need for uniqueness and our need to belong.
And that is: by participating in communities of creators, innovators, change-makers, dreamers, who are as bonkers as you and who are united around the shared value of pushing the edges of what is possible, and finding better ways to be.
Humans committed to honouring their difference. And to creating spaces where our wild, messy, strange is not only accepted, but seen, encouraged and celebrated!
And this might be people you don’t know yet. Or, it might be a new way of relating with those you already know. Because so many of us are just waiting for the permission to be ourselves.
So yes, mentors are dope. And can be of great help if they support us in feeling inspired, while also strengthening our own inner guidance.
And, more than anything: we need each other.
Real, raw, honest. Non-hierarchical, unpaid human connections where we can reconcile our need for uniqueness and our need to belong.
Where we can remember how to be fully ourselves. And learn to feel in our bones it is safe to do so.
Painter Matisse said:
“Creativity takes courage.”
And I’ll add:
Walking your own path takes courage.
Showing yourself without the polish takes courage.
Living boldly while staying in relationship with others takes courage.
And when you dare to be yourself, you become not only more free, expressed, connected and alive (sounds great, right?), you also become a living permission slip for others who are secretly longing to do the same.
So keep being brave. Keep being silly. Keep being yourself.
Do it for you. And do it for us all.
But whatever you do, don’t do it alone.
It will be faster, funner and more sustainable together.
With love & sass,
Silba
“True belonging doesn’t require us to change who we are. It requires us to be who we are.” Brené Brown
Questions to Reflect On:
Where in your life are you still waiting for someone to hand you a map?
What parts of you have you been hiding or downplaying to fit in?
When was a time you knew without a shadow of a doubt what the next right step was? What did it feel like?
What would it feel like to show up as your “weird ass self” wherever you are?
Who are the mentors who’ve helped you listen to yourself more deeply?
What small act of courage could you take to show those around you one more flavour of you?
If this stirred something in you…
The courage to walk your own wiggly path while being in relationship with people who not only accept you, but celebrate you in your rawness and quirks: Fully Seen might be the next step.
We begin again next Wednesday October 8th. Two more seats. All info right here.