Christmas Reflection #2

In my Christmas Reflection yesterday, I shared with you some inspiring quotes from women who inspire, words that I will take with me into 2006 and words I hope will guide my living in that year.

At the core of these inspiring words, at least to me, is the message of 'speaking one's truth'. This, speaking my truth, has been an important lesson for me this year, so much so that I wrote an article on the topic.

Another so-called celebrity and for me 'strong woman', Iyanla Vanzant, taught me this lesson through her writings. It is a lesson that was reinforced for me during this year that is ending - a way of living that I have tried to keep in step with.

In my professional and my private lives, I have come to learn that the failure to tell the truth or to give voice to one's own truth is to murder your spirit. For many years I have done that - killed my own soul - just to make sure that I was accepted by society and by people who I so dearly wanted to like me.

What I have learnt is that when I fail to speak my truth, I also fail to acknowledge my reality. The end result is that I am less liked, first and foremost by myself and then others.

I know that some people in my life are uncomfortable with my speaking the truth, telling the story of pain and struggles that I have lived and endured. To these people I have said, hopefully not in a crude way, "to bad, to sad."

I must speak the truth to live and become all that I can be - this I know is true.

Emily Dickinson it was who said, "Truth is such a rare thing, it is [delightful] to tell it." That is what I am experiencing and continue to experience since I have started telling the truth - delight and moments of sheer joy - as I see the freedom speaking my truth gives to the person hearing it.

Will you speak your truth in 2006? Will you step up to life's microphone and give voice to the real you this New Year?

I dare you!

Blessings,

Claudette