Behind the stories our egos paint….

Last night I passed out and then abruptly woke up ‘out of nowhere’ I’m tempted to write but have since decided that it wasn’t out of nowhere at all.

I woke up and felt exhausted.

It was almost like my subconscious mind couldn’t handle all that was going on in ‘dream land’, it was being bombarded by all of the locked-in emotion and choking on the stuck energy.

It was getting slammed with hard truths that my conscious mind refuses to accept and fucking sprinting from my deepest fears and the truth about what I fear most.

In simpler terms, I was exhausted from facing all the stuff I consciously don’t face; I’m too scared to face.

You see, our dreams are basically a window into the unconscious mind.

They allow our subconscious mind to communicate with our conscious mind.

Dreams tell us what we really know about something, what we really feel. They point us toward what we need to do to become our truest selves.

They send messages upon messages all in an attempt to guide us home.

Dreams are the directions home; and if we listen to them and follow them,

they will guide us back to who we were before the world got its hands on us,

they will guide us back to who we were before our egos painted us pictures and told us stories that we believed,

They will guide us back to who we were always meant to be,

to who we are, authentically.

The problem is, this is much MUCH more difficult than it sounds.

Following these ‘directions’ often entails doing a lot of inner work.

Listening to our dreams and actually facing what it is they’re trying to tell us, what they are telling us requires strength beyond measure.

It requires us to face the things we consciously do not face because doing so is too hard.

It requires us to get uncomfortable.

It requires us to unravel the stories that our ego tells us to keep us safe and to see them for what they are, ‘stories’.

It requires us to put in work; real, raw, deep, messy, hard, uncomfortable work. And that work is often painful and can feel unbearable at times because it forces us to see the truth that we couldn’t bear, the truth that we hid from by believing our ego stories.

And thus, whenever an opportunity presents itself to us to in essence “follow these directions” and put in the necessary inner work needed to guide us ‘home’, we often scream, and cry and yell or disengage completely because our egos don’t want to let go of the narratives they’ve created to protect us. Believing their stories has been what’s kept us safe.

Facing the truth and letting these stories go is often terrifying.

It feels like we’re under attack. And that is when most people run and hide.

They cling to their ego stories and neglect to heal.

They refuse to face the truth.

They refuse to stare their deepest fears in the eyes, they want too but they can’t.

They’re too scared and without proper guidance, most don’t have the tools to do anything other than run.

Sadly, the real magic happens when we don’t run.

It happens when we sit with those uncomfortable feelings.

It happens when we embrace the terrifying unknowns of vulnerability and allow those seemingly unbearable feelings to arise within us.

It happens when we allow ourselves to feel those feelings.

The real magic happens when we don’t run but actually sit with our feelings allowing ourselves to feel every ounce of them as they move through our bodies.

You see, when we’re brave enough to acknowledge how we’re REALLY feeling and actually sit with and feel those uncomfortable feelings, only then can we release them. Until the feeling is felt, it will remain stuck inside you.

At first, it’s intense. Without the ego story, we feel bare and vulnerable and we enter a swamp of repressed emotions that have been festering inside our minds, affecting aspects of our lives and relationships.

But if given the correct tools via therapy or a coach/ mentor; after a few minutes, our bodies just…take over—and do the work for us.

And we began to feel.

We feel it all.

All of the locked-in emotion,

The stuck energy, and once we feel it we can FINALLY release it which is why transformation work is so vital. In order to heal, reclaim our power, and show up as our authentic selves, we must acknowledge that there's something wrong. We must face those feelings that we’ve repressed because somewhere along the way we were taught they were unacceptable to feel or that feeling them made us weak.

Because once we do, we can begin to come back to ourselves and show up as that bomb ass confident human we were always meant to be.

Problematically, we cannot acknowledge, sit with, feel, and release feelings that we do not even know we have…

And therein lies the core problem.

Due to the stigma surrounding mental health, toxic masculinity, and the negative connotations that society has attached to feeling our feelings, many of us do not acknowledge our feelings, those damn egos of ours are SO good at protecting us…….

So what happens is instead of accepting our feelings as they present themselves, we grow conditioned to hide them, not express them, or override them with something else.

Problematically, because emotions are energy, and energy cannot be created nor destroyed…

those emotions get STUCK in the body;

They live there, fester, and wreak havoc on our physical and mental health.

they yearn to be released so no matter how hard we try to repress them, they find ways to show up; seeping through the cracks of our lives, manifesting in ugly ways or as physical disease in the body.

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And thus, taking note of not just our dreams but also how we feel and our energy levels is also how our subconscious communicates with our conscious. If we feel unwell or like something is off; that is often a major sign that something is off. That is the subconscious mind telling the conscious mind that we are not aligned; and thus that is our bodies way of telling us, we are out of alignment with our true authentic selves.

So, where in the world am I even going with all of this?

Well,

I was on Instagram the morning following the night where i abruptly woke up out of my sleep and the first post I saw was a quote, a relatable one at that.

Am I surprised? No. Of course, not. Why? Because

the world around us is a reflection of the world inside of us.

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My Instagram feed? A reflection of my subconscious mind;

and the quote that appeared on my feed proves it:

It read:

“There is something uniquely beautiful about a person that grows from his or her struggles and uses the lessons from their experiences to spread wisdom.

It doesn’t matter what you’ve done or how far you fell.

Be the example that shows others that they can overcome that mountain, too.”

I read it, related to it, and went to post it to my story as I often do. Originally I intended to add my own commentary to it in just a few words but my few words turned into a paragraph and then two paragraphs and I thought, welp, I should probably turn this into a longer post because clearly I have a thing or two to say.

Clearly, I thought right.

Here’s what I began to write on the post when I was thinking it was just going to be a story post.

“for most of us, our egos prevent us from being this type of person. The job of the ego is to protect us & thus our ego convinces us to tell people that we didn’t fall from a mountain. We say it was more like a hill and we didn’t fall, we tripped but got right back up... and we tell both ourselves and the world at large that we’re totally fine.

We paint this narrative as means to protect ourselves and it works. We protect ourselves from our deepest fears & vulnerabilities. (which isn’t surprising seeing as our egos are phenomenal storytellers and painters)

But you see, the ego has a way of hiding things from ourselves to keep us safe. Again, Its job is to protect us from our greatest fears and especially from seeing the truth of who we are (meaning when we paint these narratives our egos are doing EXACTLY what they’re supposed to do).

The problem is, we believe our egos and the stories they tell.

We believe that we didn’t just catapult down an incredibly high mountain (although we totally did and that shit was so painful).

We believe that we didn’t get hurt on the way down. (although we are internally covered in bruises and cuts).

We believe that we tripped on a hill and it was ‘nothing’ and thus WE BELIEVE that were totally fine.

The problem is we’re not totally fine.

And by existing as “totally fine” we dont let ourselves feel.

We let our emotions remain stuck inside of us, repressed.

We allow them to weigh us down.

We think we're doing ourselves a favor by not acknowledging emotions that “make us weak.”

But we’re not.

Were repressing emotions and presenting as “happy” and “fine” so we can be like everyone else….

But the thing is everyone else isn’t “happy” and “fine” either, their egos protect them just as yours protects you….

They’re just presenting that way so they too can feel safe, so they too can fit in, and feel “normal” and thus in light of Mental Health Awareness Month being upon us, I figured i’d let everyone know that mental health is a human experience. If you battle with your mental health, you’re not alone

and not only are you not alone, but

you are normal.

It is normal to suffer from mental health struggles.

Symptoms and circumstances of mental health concerns come in nearly unlimited variation. But they are, above all, a normal part of being alive.

And thus,

We must care for not only our bodies, but also for our emotions and thoughts. We must stop convincing ourselves that battling mental illness makes us different and weird.

We must stop hiding from the world. And more importantly, we must stop hiding from ourselves. Our emotions are always valid. They all deserve to be acknowledged and felt, yes even the ones you’d rather not acknowledge. By presenting as “perfectly fine” all we are doing is ostracizing ourselves-- we are making ourselves feel more alone. Worse, we are hurting ourselves. We are convincing ourselves that we are fine and then bullying ourselves when were hit with the reality that we’re not fine, and responding by telling ourselves that we should be fine and belittling ourselves and calling ourselves weak for not being fine and before we know it we are legitimately trapped in our own bodies, our own minds. And we must stop. It is up to us to stop. So let’s;

Let’s stop hiding behind filters, surface level texts, cute-clothes, and well-applied makeup.

Let’s stop hiding behind sarcasm, anger, and fear.

Let’s be authentic and honest and real and raw about what we're going through.

Let’s talk about how we are actually feeling, what we are actually going through.

Let’s talk about our anxiety and the things that scare us most just as much as we talk about our successes, hopes and dreams.

Let’s talk about our darkest moments and our most isolating experiences

Let’s talk about how hard it is to open up to someone about being sad for no reason.

Let’s talk about how hard it is to explain to your friends and family that you have this really heavy feeling in your chest for no reason.

Let’s talk about how hard it is to understand why you’re having trouble breathing & why your chest feels heavy & tight.

Let’s talk about how hard it is to understand why you can’t get out of bed and why you feel like you can burst into tears at any given second.

Let’s talk about how hard it is to understand your own self and how scary it is to feel like the whole world is falling on your shoulders and you have no idea why.

Let’s have the conversations we’re not having. m

Let’s talk about why we don’t talk.

Let’s be real and raw and open and honest and vulnerable and let’s actually talk.

Let’s put an end to the dialogue surrounding materialistic things and talk about the things that actually matter, the uncomfortable, messy, scary, R A W things,

the things that need to be talked about,

the things that will save lives.

Let’s get comfortable with being uncomfortable.

Let’s get out of shallow waters and swim deep with one another.

Please

I’m begging you,

L e t s

T a l k.

Join the conversation. Share your stories. Open up. Get deep.

We don’t need any more fake perfection and artificial happiness.

we need to feel like someone else out there understands us. And most of all, we need to feel like we are not alone in this.

Because none of us are alone. Not me, and not you...❥