October 16, 2009
Baylan on Showing Up in the World
Here’s one of my stories about showing up in life:
Janet Attwood stood on one side, and Marci Schimoff stood on my other side. Two powerful women who know what it takes to fully be in the world as who you truly are. Janet was creating her Masters interview series, while simultaneously developing a workshop with Chris Attwood that was designed to help create the life of your dreams. (Janet and Chris already had written “The Passion Test” together.) Marci had just finished her Chicken Soup book and was writing her own about being Happy. Dan Kuschell was popping in and out of the room before it was his turn to present.
It was an October morning, and this workshop was starting out as more than I could ever have imagined. I’m usually the one who sits in the back half of the room, buried in note-taking, trying to keep a low profile, chronicling more than participating. Janet had chosen me to be one of three participants in this particular exercise.
I think we had just written about what we wanted to have in our lives – how we felt about our world when it was as we dreamed. I looked around. The cameras and audio recorders were running, and the room was full of people who were open and expectant. There I was at the front of the room, and Janet asked us to SING what we’d written. Sing!?! Me?? The other two were incredible, singing with full voice and confidence. Then there was me.
I stood in front all alone, and just shook. My body was rooted to the ground, and my entire brain had scrambled. I looked at all those faces so soft and ready to hear whatever came out of my mouth. And nothing.
Tears started to roll down my cheeks. For the first time in my life, I was terrified. Janet waited, and I felt her encouraging me to rise, to meet myself, to … something. But I was just a puddle of tears. The confident Baylan was nowhere to be found, feeling naked in front of these loving strangers.
Tell them about my dreams? Share my inner thoughts about how my life could be? Tell the world who I am? There would be no hiding.
What felt like several minutes passed. No sound came out. I needed help.
Janet walked to me and tried, gently reminding me of what I was there for, trying to help me get back on track. I barely registered her words. My legs were getting weak, and I could barely feel my hands. I was paralyzed.
Then she asked the others to wait a minute while she took me aside. The cameras and recordings paused. She turned me away from those gathered. “Can I share a secret with you?” she asked before whispering something to me. “Ah!” I thought. I can do THAT.
“Would you like me to stand with you?” she asked. A glimmer of hope shone in my brain, and another thought came to me. “Yes, please — and can Marci stand on my other side?” She looked a bit surprised, and Marci quickly came to my side. “Of course!” she smiled.
Take a few breaths, I told myself. Breathe. (That’s what I always tell others – now it was my turn to remind myself.) And on the out-breath, I started to sing. Quietly, almost shyly, I heard the words come out. I felt their meaning as I painted my picture, and my voice grew stronger. My song started to fill the front rows, and then the rest of the room with my dream life. I looked out and saw eyes shining back at me. It felt like my heart had broken open and I had wings. I was received.
Thinking of that moment today, I still feel chills run up my spine. Sometimes I think of it when talking with someone at the precipice of trusting that it’s okay to show up in the world, to share your gifts. Sometimes I remember it to be reminded that it’s okay to show up in a new way, to go into a different area, to explore the world and how I choose to be a part of it.
Breathe your world into existence. With conscious thought and intention, create your world as you wish.
Oh, the crap will come up. This stuff is seldom easy. So keep your bigger picture in mind. “Hold fast to dreams,” Langston Hughes said. Because the world will test your resolve. Your world will, in its own way, ask you, “Are you sure you want this new thing? We really like it the way it is.”
And if you keep your dream uppermost in your mind to guide your steps, your world will recalibrate to meet the new, emerging you. In the process, ways that you have not been true to yourself will come up.
Did I really want a big house on a big lot? No, I wanted a home where I could gather with friends.
Did I really have to be so anal-retentive about the details and blast my team about the smallest slip? No, I wanted to trust that they would take as much care about our creation as I did, and forgot that I too am imperfect. And I wanted to be a good communicator and leader.
Not.
So I had to forgive myself for doing those things, and resolve to be clearer in my creating as I stepped forward. I knew I would stumble as I walked along, yet I had decided that I would walk nonetheless.
I had to remember to ask myself the most important question, “What did I learn about myself?” And to follow that up with “How do I want to show up and serve?”
Standing in front of that room, afraid to show up as the imperfect me, I did not realize the courage I had to muster just to make a sound, and to string those sounds together to make a song. In those moments of paralysis, I did not know how many other people were as afraid as me, yet crying inside to break the chains and run free.
What did Janet share with me? She told me that it wasn’t about me. Not really. It was about what I could do for them.
It really was a moment when I was living Marianne Williamson’s words that Nelson Madela spoke out to the world as he officially took the presidential reins following the abolition of apartheid. They begin with “Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.” In that moment, I was living the last two sentences:
“And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”
So go on out there and shine your light. Breathe. We’re all waiting to experience what only you can bring to the world.
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