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Brene Brown on authenticity:
Authenticity is a daily practice.
Choosing authenticity means: cultivating the courage to be emotionally honest, to set boundaries, and to allow ourselves to be vulnerable; exercising the compassion that comes from knowing that we are all made of strength and struggle and connected to each other through a loving and resilient human spirit; nurturing the connection and sense of belonging that can only happen when we let go of what we are supposed to be and embrace who we are.
Authenticity demands wholehearted living and loving – even when it’s hard, even when we’re wrestling with the shame and fear of not being good enough, and especially when the joy is so intense that we’re afraid to let ourselves feel it.
Mindfully practicing authenticity during our most soul-searching struggles is how we invite grace, joy, and gratitude into our lives.
University ruined my ability to read books. Before university I could plow through any book in a week, maybe two at the most. Now it takes me months. Maybe its because I try to read too many different things concurrently, rather than waiting till I finish one to begin another. Maybe its because my brain is still fried from all that info they pumped into it at school. Who knows.
A whopping five months ago I began reading The Boy in the Moon, in which Ian Brown reflects on his relationship with his severely disabled son, Walker. As I ponder my relationships with the core members at L’arche and my role as discover of their gifts, I reflect on these words.
“What is he trying to show me? All I really want to know is what goes on inside his off-shaped head, in his jumped-up heart. But every time I ask, he somehow persuades me to look into my own” (3).
“This constant questioning, filtered through Walker – does he mean what he’s doing, or not? – was also a model, a frame on which to hang the human world, a way of living” (39).
“The light her children threw on her life, and the darkness that hovered around them and their future, went hand in hand. One was not possible without the existence of the other. The most difficult part to accept was how complex life was, how bleak and at the same time how rich. [Her daughter's] mere existence was a form of remonstration, a reminder to look deeper, or at least to be alert. Who’s to say they’re not happier in their world than I am in mine? And here I am feeling sorry for them because I’m trying to judge them by the standards of the world they aren’t part of.” (144).
“The disabled are a challenge to everyone’s established sense of order: they frighten us, if not with their faces, then with their obvious need. They call us to be more than we ever thought we would have to be” (150).
“Genetic tests are a way to eliminate the imperfect, and all the pain and agony that comes with that imperfection. I am relieved there was no such test [when Walker was born], that I didn’t have to face the ethical dilemma it may soon present. Because Walker is proof of what the imperfect and the fragile have to offer; a reminder that there are many ways to be human; a concentrator of joy; an insistent nudge to pay attention to every passing mote of daily life that otherwise slips by uncounted. A test avoids all that, for better or for worse. But if there were a more adequate system of caring for the disabled, if we were less frightened of them, if the prospect of looking after a disabled child did not threaten to destroy the lives of those doing the caring – if we had such alternatives, would we need a test at all?” (180).
“Walker’s [group] home is run by an organization that offers assisted living at a thoroughly professional level. But how does one make a professional operation a home as well – a place full of compassion where people are forgiven endlessly? Walker had a home where he was taken care of, but was it also a family? Would the place he was cared for feel like his home, occupied by a group of friends and measured by the collective inner life created by its residents?” (186).
Quoting Jean Vanier, “We begin in fragility, we grow up, we are fragile and strong at the same time, and then we go into the process of weakening. So the whole question of the human process is how to integrate strength and weakness. You become human by accepting your own vulnerability. We’re in a society where we have to know what to do all the time. But if we move instead from the place of our weakness, what happens? We say to people, I need your help. And then we create community” (208).
You are me and I am you.
It is obvious that we are inter-are.
You cultivate the flower in yourself
…so that I will be beautiful.
I transform the garbage in myself
so that you do not have to suffer.
I support you, you support me.
I am here to bring you peace,
you are here to bring me joy.
- Thich Naht Hahn
I recently unpacked my bags at Rachel and Brandon’s place in Hamilton. I’m not entirely sure all the reasons why I’m here. I mean, I am pursuing an opportunity with L’arche and starting to volunteer at a few places, but for the most part right now, I’m just trying to get to know our neighbours. I’ve said hello to a few people who I think are unaccustomed to engaging in conversation with strangers and received some odd looks for it.
There are a few local guys who hang out in our back alley on warmer days. They are really great guys to chat with when they are sober and I’m getting better at learning how to respond when they’re not. Having a friend like Mogey (Rachel and Brandon’s new dog) makes it a lot easier to start conversations with strangers and reminds me to get outside for a walk at least once a day. Mogey likes these walks through the back alleys. There is usually someone who will offer a friendly pat on the head, and he eagerly sniffs out scraps of food and garbage before any of us even notice its there.
From the outside, my life these days might not look like it has much of an immediate, obvious sense of meaning, but I’m grateful for the chances I have to take things a day at a time, to observe and reflect, and to invest in conversations with people I meet along the way.
I’ve been brewing over the importance of meaning for a few months now. The following was part of an email my former philosophy professor and good friend, Jeremy Wiebe, sent my way back in November. He wrote,
Meaning in life is very important at a deep level; not just intellectual exercises where one tries to discern meaning, but LIVED, EXISTENTIAL meaning that you can feel, that fills your imagination, your hopes and dreams, and your disappointments. Where is this Golden Mean, between hellish unrest and unrealistic striving AND complacency? Only God knows. But I want to celebrate and accept my earthliness, that I am limited, that I get tired and cranky… but am also capable of stumbling towards love, acceptance and kindness.
I’ve written four different drafts of this post, trying to unpack the mystery of how we cultivate meaning in our lives. I feel like every attempt results in nothing but words. In a postmodern society, where the basis of social norms, language, even truth, are constantly being challenged by theories of relativity and social construction, it becomes so hard to find any lasting sense of meaning, of purpose.
I know what it feels like to lack purpose. To feel like everything I am striving for amounts to nothing. To feel hellish unrest driven by anger and despair at all the world’s (and my own) brokenness. And to feel like there isn’t anything real, substantial or true to hold on to in the face of this brokenness.
The only thought I keep coming back to is hope. If we are so bogged down by complacency, so familiar with routine that we can walk through our days with our eyes closed, meaning and purpose become pretty elusive. If all we can see around us is drudgery and endless unsolvable problems, it is as if we are pushing a rock up a hill but never able to reach the top.
But if, by some miracle, hope fills our imagination and enables us to see the possibility of stumbling upon something beautiful, even in littered and abandoned back alleys, our purpose becomes more clear. This potential leads us forward, despite our shortcomings, our failings, our disappointments. We stumble forward with the hope of finding something deeply meaningful and I think if we are willing to search it out, it will always be there to be found.
I can’t remember where I picked these up from, they’ve been hanging around on scraps of paper in my room, waiting for something to be said of them or done with them. For now, I will share them here.
I am not so sure of myself and do not claim to have all the answers. In fact, I often wonder quite openly about these “answers,” and about the habit of always having them ready. The best I can do is to look for some of the questions. – Thomas Merton
To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty, but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness… And if we do act, in however small a way, we don’t have to wait for some grand utopian future. The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory. – Howard Zinn
I have become fascinated with reading the acceptance speeches of Nobel Laureates. In the same talk by Walter mentioned in my post on The Good Life Part II, Walter quotes from Martin Luther King Jr’s acceptance speech. As I read through King’s words, and hold the image in my mind of Nelson Mandela dancing in the documentary Amandla!, I find my heart filled with hope for Daw Aung San Suu Kyi and the people of Burma. And for the men, women and children of Sudan. The oft quoted words of Gandhi ring in my ears and resonate within my chest, “when I despair, I remember that all through history the ways of truth and love have always won. There have been tyrants, and murderers, and for a time they can seem invincible, but in the end they always fall. Think of it – always.”
Consider these words from King’s speech, delivered in 1964, while many African Americans were still facing severe persecution at the hands of racism and oppression:
Nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral question of our time – the need for man to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to violence and oppression. Civilization and violence are antithetical concepts. Negroes of the United States, following the people of India, have demonstrated that nonviolence is not sterile passivity, but a powerful moral force which makes for social transformation. Sooner or later all the people of the world will have to discover a way to live together in peace, and thereby transform this pending cosmic elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. If this is to be achieved, man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.
I refuse to accept the cynical notion that nation after nation must spiral down a militaristic stairway into the hell of thermonuclear destruction. I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right temporarily defeated is stronger than evil triumphant. I believe that even amid today’s mortar bursts and whining bullets, there is still hope for a brighter tomorrow. I believe that wounded justice, lying prostrate on the blood-flowing streets of our nations, can be lifted from this dust of shame to reign supreme among the children of men. I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality and freedom for their spirits. I believe that what self-centered men have torn down men other-centered can build up. I still believe that one day mankind will bow before the altars of God and be crowned triumphant over war and bloodshed, and nonviolent redemptive good will proclaim the rule of the land. “And the lion and the lamb shall lie down together and every man shall sit under his own vine and fig tree and none shall be afraid.”
So I ask you, can the power of love conquer the love of power?
I plan on posting my thoughts on this question very soon.
Here’s a link to the full speech if you’re interested (the same website has a whole host of speeches worth perusing).
And here’s the clip of Nelson Mandela dancing from the documentary Amandla!:
“if there ever were a tester movie, this is the tester movie, there has never been more of a tester movie than this tester movie. this is not a chester movie, this is not a bester movie. this is a tester movie. oh yeah.”
***this might not make sense to you if you do not know margaret sider personally (or her extreme obsession with photobooth).
