Getting Lighter

Getting Lighter, Not Heavier, Along the Way.

It may make you look and feel more youthful and healthy, but the real rewards are a better feeling, fuller life.

“He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.”

― Friedrich Nietzsche

Last night, while on the phone with my cousin, I shared my theory as to why she and I are perceived as being significantly younger than we actually are. While I value eating whole and colorful foods, drinking plenty of water, exercising, walking, and stretching daily, I believe that my commitment to becoming more lighthearted as I age has the most significant impact on maintaining youthful energy and appearance. I see the same commitment to grow and become more whole in my cousin, to a profound degree.

Taking things seriously, stress, and resentment are heavy and have biological impacts as much as they do emotional and mental. While I in no way value getting “lighter” as I go for any aesthetic reason, how we feel will eventually show up in our health, hence the saying “stress is the biggest killer.”

Why do I strive to get lighter, not heavier, as I go?

I do it for one reason: I know that this life is temporary, and I feel deep in my bones the love, joy, greatness, and potentiality, contributing from the highest expression of ourselves, which is possible.

In sum, I am in awe that we are alive and in this world. Like comets, never to be seen again, I don’t want to miss it, while ephemerally here.

To be clear, there has been a drive within me toward this for as long as I can remember, as if I came in this way. I would secretly be moved to tears as a child, feeling a sense of awe and “greatness” in being alive. At night, I would vividly dream about being this “bright and shiny self,” where it didn't matter what that looked like, but rather how it felt.

I later discovered that I am in a tiny minority of the population that is as “macro-thinking” (big-picture seeing) and critically thinking as my mind is wired. I can not help but think and be compelled in this way, and it’s futile for me to try to be otherwise — it’s cycling through my mind, noticing patterns and deeper understandings, at all times and throughout the day.

Being extra aware of the end made me involuntarily vigilant about being alive. BUT,the distance between who I was and where I wanted to be was cataclysmically vast.

By high school, I was devastatingly insecure and shame-riddled, later jokingly calling myself "The Hunchback of Notre Dame” because my spine was so perpetually curved. I wanted to hide. I had a massive, private vision for what I wanted in life: love, family, community, authenticity, abundance, adventure, beauty, and creating impact in the world; however, I lacked the self-worth and value, as well as the confidence and self-esteem, to put those ideas into action.

I felt isolated, alone, unseen, and unloved. I always had small pockets of friends, but I remember genuinely wondering if anyone would come to my funeral or care if I died (not to be mistaken with being suicidal; I would find myself in dark tunnels in my life- as we all have, but I have thankfully always been able to see the light at the end of them).

I had to painstakingly become someone who showed up in the way I wanted to be more than I wanted anything, without knowing what I was doing. Still, it has always felt as if an invisible thread is pulling me. I wanted to love fully and to live, but I grew up in an environment characterized by reactivity, volatility, and low self-worth. As a naturally sensitive and porous person, I had to incrementally break down everything I had absorbed and reestablish it with a more conscious way of thinking and living.

I observed everyone and everything. I paid close attention to the qualities in others that I admired, from those I encountered to those I observed in thousands of videos and interviews. I read countless books. I am never more excited than when I am moved or when some new information sparks greater realization in me. I studied with passion and intent.

I still do.

Again, I HAD TO FIGURE IT OUT AS I WENT. I had a fantastic mentor in my early 20s who was instrumental in helping me learn emotional awareness, emotional processing, taking responsibility for my life and emotions (letting others take responsibility for theirs), and noticing how much I needed to figure out being more lighthearted rather than so intensely serious, controlling, and perfectionistic (hello, ego, my friend).

The first and most important step was learning about compassion—and how to cultivate it further.

It was a matter of survival; if I did not learn to have compassion for myself, then there was no hope of being okay, much less thriving in the way I wanted with every cell of my being. The beauty I have since learned is that, however much compassion we have for ourselves is directly proportional to how much we have for others. It is a mirror.

Searching for a way out of the prisons of deep insecurity, reactivity, and judgment that kept me from who I longed to be and how I longed to live, I came across a book that taught me the phrase, “Everyone is doing the best they can based on their own level of awareness.”

I was in high school, and I remember focusing more on that book than any of my classes. I had never seen compassion and had no concept of awareness, so I had much to learn. However, by the end of the book, I had gained a glimmer of understanding and a whole new direction to move in. It was the beginning of a long and intricate story, where I became more empathetic, honest, and lighthearted as I marched on.

See, I felt deeply that who I was growing up was not ok nor lovable, so I learned to hide and lie, as a point of survival. I am not alone in this; likely, all children learn this to varying degrees —to perform and hide in adulthood, where they learned they would not be relatively “loved” and accepted in childhood.

It’s cyclical, societal, and a factor of deep survival mechanisms rather than anyone’s fault.

But my life, now, is my responsibility.

My version of this may have been a bit extreme, but if I valued healthy and intimate relationships and an honest and fulfilling life, then rigorous respect, compassion, and integrity would need to be understood and integrated over time.

I’ve seen one TED Talker describe people who are considered truly likable as having three traits in common: Empathy, Authenticity, and Enthusiasm.

You want to know why empathy is on that list? It’s because we all long to feel accepted and seen, rather than judged and unseen; when people are truly empathetic, we feel seen and accepted in their presence. For wherever we hide, we can feel that we can be more of who we really are with them.

I believe that we are not truly free if we are not empathetic when faced with anything. To me, that’s the whole game.

Depending on where you are, that may be a significant concept, but it is worth discovering, in your own time.

I can sum up the process of becoming lighter along the way with one sentence: -“Bringing everything home.”

However, its results are evident in how empathetic and honest I am in any situation - aka, how liberated.

While many have been driven on a path of career and family (and while I certainly value and want those things), I have been yanked against my will down a path of growth and trying to see, understand, and integrate.

Should I want to love and live in the way I value most, there is no other way.

Concerned with being different, I used to feel like I needed to make apologies for this, to hide further, but I love how unique every person is and how we are not all here to live the same life; instead, we are here to create our own unique design within a greater tapestry.

Being so taken this way has made me lighter, more joyful, and more at ease. While never perfect and forever learning, I have intimacy in friendships, and I have forgiveness and understanding in relationships that have had challenges. I can be vulnerable and honest when it is hard, and I can have perspective and laughter when everything in me wants to give in to reactivity and negativity. I can sit in heavy emotions and hard times with grace and know that they will pass. I can sit with others as they navigate the depths of difficult emotions, without judgment and with perspective. I can see our limitations and know that we are so much more — the love, joy, and longing that lie underneath. I can see that everything interconnects and intersects.

I dream of contributing to the fullest extent possible in my life, and there is no doubt that being on this path is part of that.

I believe I am and will be the kind of partner, mother, friend, daughter, sister, and community member I dream of being, and that when I inevitably stumble in those areas, I will listen, take consideration, and show up better for them and for myself as a result. As long as I live, I will never stop trying.

I want to see the people and the world, our temporary wonder, rather than maintaining the barriers and projections that prevent me from seeing. I want to leave this world even the tiniest bit more loving and joyful than it was before, and I see that as a daily, momentary way of showing up — with the plumber, the client, the child — rather than some grand gesture, achievement, or social recognition.

Our true lightness of being and impact shine through in every person we touch, every risk we take at being seen, and every moment we come alive.

It is accessible to all, available at any moment, and can be started over and over again.

I sum up integrity as “how we do anything is how we do everything,” and when we do the unusual—becoming lighter (not heavier) along the way—it positively impacts our health, relationships, work, and relationship with ourselves and the world around us. Look to nature, to laughter and playfulness, to those who are free. These are just as much a part of you as anything else.

If there is any part of you that is like me, aware that this ride will end and can perceive its vast potential and infinite value, then I dare you to set out to become lighter, too —in whatever you are doing, wherever you find yourself, and for as long as you live.

I’m right here with you.