Being Brave to Speak Your Truth

How do you find the words to speak your truth? How do you show up whole to others?
In this episode Christina discusses the importance of having a clear intention and saying "yes" to life in order to show up authentically and bravely. She also emphasizes the importance of celebrating one's growth and being accountable to one's own divine spark.

Christina suggests deconstructing past beliefs and opinions that have been passed down to them and aligning to their divine to find the courage to show up as their true selves. To work through this she offers her process on releasing guilt and shamed pass on to others which can be downloaded over at www.spirituallyawareliving.com/guidetoguilt
In this episode Christina covers:

• How to Speak as Yourself
• How to Say Yes to Life (but not to everything)
• How to know your intention
• How to release what isn't yours so you can find your own belief
• How to Align to Your Divine

Christina Fletcher is a Spiritual Awareness coach, energy worker, author, speaker and host of the podcast Showing Up Whole.
She specialises in practical spirituality and integrating inner work with outer living.
Through mindset, spiritual connection, intuitive guidance, manifestation, and mindfulness techniques Christina helps her clients overcome overwhelm and shame to find a place of flow, ease, and deep heart-centered connection.
Christina has been a spiritual life and parent coach for 7 years and trained in Therapeutic Touch 8 years ago. She has also studied Homeopathy,  Quantum Healing, NLP as well as majored in Religious Studies at the University of Manitoba in Canada.
For more information please visit her website www.spirituallyawareliving.com
Or Follow her on her social media accounts:
Facebook
Instagram
or
Linkedin

Christina Fletcher is a Spiritual Alignment coach, energy worker, author, speaker and host of the podcast Showing Up Whole.
She specialises in practical spirituality and integrating inner work with outer living, so you can get self development off of the hobby shelf and integrated as a powerful fuel to your life.

Through mindset, spiritual connection, intuitive guidance, manifestation, and mindfulness techniques Christina helps her clients overcome overwhelm and shame to find a place of flow, ease, and deep heart-centered connection.
Christina has been a spiritual alignment coach, healer and spiritually aware parent coach for 7 years and trained in Therapeutic Touch 8 years ago. She is also a meditation teacher and speaker.
For more information please visit her website www.spirituallyawareliving.com

Want to uncover where you need the most energy alignment?
Take her new Energy Alignment Quiz to identify which of your energetic worlds (mind, body, heart or spirit) needs aligning the most!

Or Follow her on her social media accounts:
Facebook
Instagram
or
Linkedin...

Transcript

00:18 - 

Hi, and welcome back to showing up whole,  the place where we discuss balance in mind, body, heart and spirit in every aspect of our lives. And today I want to talk about the showing up, of showing up whole. I want to talk about bravery, finding the courage to be yourself and show up is who you really are. 

Hi and welcome back. I was asked a fascinating question over this last week. I sat and talked to this woman and she said, how do you find your voice, how do you speak authentically as who you are?

00:56 - r

She said she'd listen to this podcast and she knew that I basically just kind of spilled it all out and it always makes me ponder when someone asks me a direct question like that. It makes me sit back and really review my pro. Processes and what that means for me. I found myself, taking a moment to reply to her question as we sat and chatted. And what came to the 1st thing that came to my mind was, well, I'm a trained actress. Studied theater for years and um, within that there's a lot of improvisation and it seems like an in a rather uh, indirect response in talking about authenticity and showing up as your true self, to start talking about how you were trained as an actor to portray other people.

01:53 - 

But the truth is that within improv, within improvisation, there are a couple of basic rules, and those rules, seem to work well in life, in showing up as yourself and speaking your truth. And it was interesting because as a little side note, I just was watching. The series Staged with David Tenant a few weeks back and they were talking about the laws of improv, and it kind of brought this all to the surface. So it all basically worked together. The rules that I learned in theater and in improvisation are basically this have a clear intention, meaning know what you're going in to say and always say yes.

02:39 - 

They always say yes is a fascinating thing when you are working with spirituality because the thing is that you allow the flow of spirit of the universe to flow through you. So rather than hesitating when you get an intuitive nudge to take a conversation down one route, you have a basic understanding of a trust, a trust to listen to that nudge and follow through with it and basically say yes to the universe. So I guess you would see that if, if you're looking at with improvisation, that you're working with the other person, the other actor.

03:18 -

That you are always in that state of saying yes with them. Instead, you allow yourself to be in a state of yes with the universe. However, the clarity of intention starts to really the prominent role in that the intention to show up, the intention to have a general idea of the direction you're heading. For instance, sitting here tonight, I'm, I'm sitting here in the evening. I decided to click record for my weekly podcast and you know, it's I set the intention of what am I talking about?

03:54 - 

Talking about bravery, I'm talking about showing up, I'm talking about being authentic. The bravery to show up is who you really are. That's my intention. That's my goal. I didn't come in here and just click record with basically this thing of, well, I know I talk about spirituality and self care and showing up whole, but I don't know what's gonna pop out of my mouth. No, I set myself some basic parameters. However, when you are Showing Up in the World That Takes a Different Color.

04:26 - 

And what I mean by that is it falls more into the place of your practice beforehand. When I start my day, it starts with the meditation and plugging into the universe. That is where I set my parameters, that's where I set my intention. It begins with the opening up to the universe and saying, Okay, we're doing this day, and that's how I set my parameters for my day, rather than just setting up my intentions for the podcast where I just kind of spill it all out. It's really important to have a clear intention of who you are and who you want to be as you show up whole within yourself and within your day.

05:10 - 

And then it's important to actually use that improvisational tool of saying, yes, a little bit like, you know, actually let's le, let's just poke around that a little tiny bit. Why is it important to say? Yes, and, and I want to make sure that we're not talking about things that go against your heart, things that go against your intuitive pull. That's not what we're talking about when we say or say yes, we're saying that. The alternative to that sense of saying yes, philosophy means that you can easily close yourself off to opportunities or certain conversations or certain, exploration.

05:56 - 

You might walk into a situation and, and you're open. It's an openness, that's what I mean when I say saying yes, it's an openness for the possibility. If you start to sense that the possibilities or opportunities are making you feel less than yourself, that's when you do pull out a massive no, it's not saying yes to everything so that whatever opportunity that comes your way can easily litter across your own personal yard. No, it's not that, instead, it's welcoming. The person at the gate walking across your own yard and checking out the opportunity for the engagement, if you know what I mean.

06:40 - 

Important to welcome life. It's important to say yes to life. You'll find that when you say yes to life, and then reserve the right to say no if it starts to feel unaligned to who you want to be when you say yes to life and you at the same time set the intention of the direction you want to go, you enter into a cosmic dance, this beautiful cosmic play where you are showing up authentically and at the same time you are being shown who you really are through the eyes of something greater.

07:19 - 

What I mean by that is this also you have to leave the room for your own growth. We are all growing and learning and expanding, and sometimes You can know yourself authentically, know who you really are. If you've done the work, and dived into your own heart, you know yourself. And yet that can often merge into, to a construct of who you perceive yourself as. And that is actually not about authenticity, that's acting past versions of yourself. So it's important to engage in that dance of having again the bravery of exploring the new horizon.

08:05 - 

I feel like I'm sounding really poetic today, but it's not. And I think actually that is part of my own expansion, because again, we're all expanding, we're all growing. And within that it's important to remember that you have to keep learning who you are. In other words, often we get this concept of well, we need to show up authentically, we need to show up as who we want to be or who we are, and therefore then we Devise this character outline of who that person is. And in all honesty, that's not showing up whole in the ultimate bravery, because we have to allow the new, we have to allow the pushing of the edges, the pushing of the new.

09:00 - 

Boundary of saying wait a 2nd. Actually I've grown and I expanded and now I need to relearn who I am. I think actually, whereas, you know, I, there's, there's the general. Growth pattern Right where you 1st start off with the spiritual work, you start off with getting to know yourself, you, you lean into suddenly that you aren't who you've been told you are. That's, that's the early steps of spiritual development. And it's so exciting to break free of the construct of who you're told you are when you all of a sudden realize that you're more That you're, you're more than your name and your roles and the positions you sit in your family, and you're more than the thoughts you think and you're more than the, jobs you hold.

10:06 - 

It's not about how you show up in this lifetime. Is. Sitting with within the who you've been in all lifetimes, and you understand that this is part of something so much greater. Understanding that, saying yes to that, allowing that, being able to set the intention of going, actually I'm going to lean into my mourns. And then saying yes to what comes up and saying yes to allowing the constructs that you've been offered to shift and feel less important. That is the 1st really brave step.

10:55 - 

That's hard. And I'm not gonna say that, that if you're still going through that and you're listening to that and you're like, yeah, I know I'm kind of wrestling that went to the ground. Christina Then I want you to say that, that in itself is bravery. That is the profound step of showing up whole, that is showing up in deep authenticity. And I. I actually want to just add a little tiny subtext in this, that sometimes when you're looking at spirituality and people are talking about different levels of consciousness or levels of the journey.

11:32 - 

These levels are not, they're not stacked on top of each other in the sense of, of graduation. This is a school. It's rather I, I, I think it's important to see it as a spiral, a spiral of growth and there's no measurement of better than the other. In this spiral, you know, the outer edge is just as important as the deep dive inner center. I think it's important in all spiritual work to not have any sense of a hierarchy. Yes, you are developing your consciousness, but whether you're at the beginning of that spiral then or if you're in the middle, there's, you're still on the spiral.

12:16 - 

And is that level of awareness to the spiral, that actually is what counts. And I'm going to tell you. A little bit of a secret. You can be on the middle of the spiral one day and then all of a sudden you find yourself needing to go back to the outer of the spiral just to reestablish some things. Because things change and things move and things transform. Everything's happening at once. So you might find yourself at that outer edge, just entering in. And that intention. There's a lott of neural pathways.

12:53 - 

You're going to have to transform in that. There's a lot of past programming. You're going to have to transform in that. There's a lot of different Inner voices that are gonna chatter. The negative chatter could be really strong of saying no, not many people are doing this. This kind of looks a little weird. If you are on that, then if you surpassed that, then congratulations. It is something to truly celebrate, an honor to. Acknowledge the shift within yourself, and to go for mourns, Celebrate your moreness, and claim your moreness.

13:40 - 

I like that actually your moreness. Celebrating your moreness is actually. One of the tools that really support bravery, I think, because suddenly becomes a non negotiable. When you know yourself for the divine spark of life that you are, or you even just have that glimmer of that, then suddenly that's what you are accountable to. That's what you become accountable to. It's not suddenly the concern about what other people think start to fade away because you've said yes and set the intention to be accountable to your moreness within that suddenly you, you shift Your perspective in what's important Um, you know, a little while ago I was talking to a dear friend of mine and oh, actually, I was talking to Hannah who was on the podcast last week and um, we were talking about the path of a priestess and we were talking about how a priestess serves the divine.

15:06 - The people that she is supporting or they are supporting, just like a healer serves the divine and allows the divine to flow through as energy to the people that they support. If you see it as supporting the people who are in front of you, then you easily start self generating energy. Therefore then can easily get drained out. When you see it as allowing the Divine to flow through you, that energy is everlasting it keeps flowing, and you are in service to that Divine, that Divine Light, you allow it to become the priority.

16:01 - 

And I say that, because when you, 1st, dive into the bravery of claiming yourself. Then suddenly, that's where the parameter shifts. It shifts to your priority being your connection to your divinity, to your anything, from your to your God, to your angels, to your spirit guides, to your ancestors, to your goddess, to all that isness to the universe, to source whatever you see that is, when all of a sudden that. Relationship becomes stronger than what people think of you. Then suddenly you find that courage takes on a new meaning.

16:51 - 

You can't not listen. It's interesting because in my, you know, I'm writing down my notes of, I'm looking at my notes that I wrote down before, you know, as I set my intention of coming into this conversation, you know it, I said how to be able to look in the mirror and I think that's an important thing to give yourself. As a parameter, I've always made it a promise to myself that whatever decisions I made and whatever I aligned to, I would always be able to look myself in the mirror and say that I had done my best, that I was doing my best to align to my greatest self, that I wasn't letting myself down.

17:36 - 

And have I always kept that promise? Probably not. No, I don't think any human ever keeps that promise all the time. But it is a good parameter to have that when you do look in the mirror, ask yourself whether you can look yourself in the eye and actually see yourself, and hold yourself in that state of accountability of saying, Yes, I am seeing me really me, my highest me llo, that is who I amm, and I amm honouring the light within myself. Supports your bravery because if all of a sudden you can't look yourself in the eye, you know, it's like the old thing, like, you know, when, when you had, you know, when your kids were, were kind of, you know, being doing something sneaky and they couldn't look you in the eye.

18:26 - 

Can you look yourself in the eye or are you letting yourself down? It, it's an interesting thing to play around with. Knowing yourself and committing to yourself and following through with that level of accountability leads to the bravery to show up as yourself, even in a crowd. Because you can. You're not. Held accountable by the masses. Suddenly it becomes a question of Who am I in the eyes of my own divinity, and in the eyes of my source, Energy? And how do I shine the brightest within that.

19:16 - 

It takes a little bit if, if you're not at that point yet. And I wanna kind of just lean into this a little bit because the thing is that again. One of the layers of that labyrinth, that spiral as you move through it, is to make sure that you have your own inner voice in your heart and mind. Let's face it, the amount of layers that can be piled on top of you, through life experience that you've picked up. There's a lot of things that you can pick up along your trail. We pick up other people's opinions, we pick up what, other people's words, other people's thoughts about us, we pick up other people's thoughts about what we actually believe.

20:07 - 

We can become nervous and um, insecure around what we actual the truth we want to speak. And so if even the idea of showing up in the world with a certain level of your um moreness. Makes you feel a little nervous. Then it's important to poke around that and actually explore why that is. You know, I remember, I've gone through that a number of times throughout my life, even over the last ten years, you know, 1st when it was like, oh, exploring the term healer. And I remember that took ages. I dear friend of mine who was coaching me as well, at the same time we were talking and she just kept leaning and she's like, you have to call yourself a healer, that's what you are, and the word would just get choked up in my mouth.

21:01 - 

It would just feel so strange to claim that part of my life. It took a while of actually de um deconstructing where I had gotten beliefs around the term healer, the same thing with which You know, when I, I don't often call myself a witch, but I know that what I do is I, I practice as a witch. I don't call myself a witch simply. I don't know why I don't call myself much. Because really in so many ways that would be what sums a lot of what I do up. I guesss I just have too many labels that could give myself.

21:45 - 

I just go by mystic, I do. I can associate myself as a witch, I can, I can easily align to that. But it's interesting when I 1st started using that term either loosely or lightly, to align myself, I again choke up in my throat, my throat shaker would have a field day. And again that was because of past concepts, past beliefs, what other people would think, what other people would associate with. My own inner witch wound was definitely screaming at me and that took a while to also. Muddle through.

22:28 - 

And it's interesting as we talk about this because really I think the reason why I don't use which now is simply because it didn't fit in with my moreness. I go with the mourns of it all. It now the which part of me is a small section of what I practice, whereas before it felt like too big of term for what I was practicing. If that makes sense, move through terms, move through concepts, move through beliefs. But sometimes you have to wrestle them down to the ground a little bit and find out why you're not using them.

23:04 - 

And you often will find that it is based on things that were done in the past, that things that you were told, that things that society passed down to you, the things that you don't want to be seen as, the things that you opinions or things that made you feel guilty, or things that made you feel ashamed or dirty or off based on what other people impose upon you for that. And if there's anything that helps you be brave, it's making sure that you know yourself, that you are accountable to yourself.

23:35 - 

So therefore, then in that accountability of yourself, you find that you have no other choice but to stand up for yourself and stand into yourself. But it does take deconstructing the various gilts and shames and beliefs said have passed down to you. And by the way, if, if you're wondering the best route to take of how to actually deconstruct that. I actually have a process that I piece that I put together. It's a Pdf and there's a little video that goes through the process really. It doesn't actually take the deep diving and long processes that so often is assigned to this.

24:20 - 

And it's not deep shadow work, this is. It's amazing how when you quickly acknowledge the beliefs that aren't yours, they lose power. So you can actually just download that over at my website Spiritually, where Living. Com or the link is just in the comments below, but it really is important as you dive into claiming yourself and claiming your own bravery, and showing up in wholeness to look at what has been passed on to you, which dims your light, because if there is anything that actually does hold you back It's that because it doesn't even just stop you from speaking your truth, it actually stops you from knowing your truth.

25:09 - 

It actually stops you from being able to hear your truth because all you hear is the opinions or guilt or shame from other people or from society itself. I encourage you to do a deep dive into what's been passed on to you, so then you can decipher and distinguish the difference between your voice and other people's. Truly the key step to that. What I was saying about saying yes to these opportunities, you wanna do it from authentically as yourself. And that takes knowing yourself on that deep level and at the same time tooo also setting those intentions when you want to set the intentions that are based on your heart, voice, your inner callings, not what other people have passed on to you.

25:58 - 

Because truly, like I said, having. 1st Initial steps of diving into this work. It does stand in knowing yourself and really leaning into that intention of stepping away from what's been and what you've been told about yourself and instead into your mourns. It's important to decide and learn who you are and then I gotta tell you, give it a little cycle of that spiral and you'll be learning yourself all over again. So even if you feel like you've done that work, then allow it to re emerge when it's time and review.

26:45 - 

You know, I go through the process that I just mentioned, every once in a while I pull it back up and go, okay, wait. Is anything of what I'm looking at or seeing, the, the glasses that I'm wearing, that the eyes that I'm seeing through? Is there anything that doesn't belong to me anymore? Is there anything that I don't want to. Anymore. Your core values shift, your beliefs shift, things grow and expand, and it's important to keep in touch with the newness of your Moreness. There you go.

27:24 - 

How's that for a phrase that should be on a T shirt? It's important to keep your expansion and growth at the forefront of it all. You know my new tagline for my website is aligned to your Divine. And that's what a lot of this comes into. You align to your divine releasing and letting go of the opinions and s chattering of society and the world around you and past versions of yourself, and instead you align to who you are now and your best parts of you. You align to your expansion. And when you do that, suddenly you start to say yes, more to that divinity and that divine.

28:15 - 

And suddenly you say, you know what universe? Let's just play and let's just go for it and we'll just do it and we'll just show up whole and will show up at all of this mourns and we will just, I will open my mouth and, and I'm gonna just trust that what is needed to be said will flow out of that mouth. There is always The thing that when you listen to your heart and when you align to divine, you align to love. And that's an important thing to remember because a lot of people will say, oh, open your mouth and let things flow out, What if you hurt someone, What if you say something mean, What if you say this was a if you are doing the work and if you are starting your day connecting to your divine, when you are laying out and setting the intention of saying yes to the divine and setting the intention of who you are and being your best self, then you are learning to love.

29:14 - 

And within that, it's important to remember that it's very rarely going to lead you astray. The loving choice is the kind choice So therefore, it's important to trust that flow of that, to trust your own connection to your spiritual source and to allow it to carry you and, well, that may be the ending of a conversation about. Bravery and courage. It's also important to remember that if you are aligning to your divine, you aren't alone. We never really are alone anyway because divine's always got your back.

29:56 - 

But when you're aligning and acknowledging it, then you truly, truly aren't alone and you are standing with the greatest support as you show up as yourself loved