Elizabeth Gilbert's name has been coming up in my life a lot lately. I have known of her fantastic work ever since I read "Eat, Pray, Love" years ago. But I must admit, I haven't followed her on FB, I haven't read her other books, and until recently, she wasn't front & center on my radar...
But lately, everywhere I turn, I hear her name or see something about her. When this kind of thing happens, I tend to take note.
What does Elizabeth Gilbert have to say that I need to understand?
I went to her FB page and the very first post I read felt like not only was she speaking to my soul, but she was saying the words that I have been trying to both learn myself AND convey to my clients.
(I also felt like I wanted to be best friends with her, but that's another story 😉
I am sharing an idea from one of her posts here because I think it profoundly represents the inner struggle that SO MANY of the women I work with get trapped by. (Please go to her FB page to read the rest of this post & maybe everything else she has ever written).
The title of this post was:
I'm Tired Of Being Good - Now All I Want is to be Free
Can you relate?
Have you spent a lifetime (maybe with the exception of your rebellious teen years) TRYING to be GOOD? Trying to prove your worth by pleasing everyone, living up to expectations, and setting incredibly high hoops for yourself to jump through?
Has this quest for "goodness" essentially imprisoned you? Limited your freedom? Kept you hungry, starving maybe, for passion, self-expression, purpose, fun, play?!
Elizabeth challenged all of us "good women" to imagine for a moment what it would be like if we accepted, once and for all, that we already ARE good (what a concept!!) and instead, to imagine what it would be like to be FREE.
How would your life be different? What would you be doing? How would you feel?
She asked,
"What if you believed that your freedom might not only liberate you, but also could make others feel more free? ...What if you refused to make ANY decisions about your life that did not taste like freedom? What if you stopped believing that martyrdom is the path to enlightenment? What if the only thing you needed, in order to be free, was to believe in your own truth, and to trust yourself? What if freedom healed you?"
Deep breath. That is some profound exploration right there, yes?
Most women I know & work with desperately DESIRE freedom, and are, simultaneously, terrified by it.
It reminds me a bit of the movie, Shawshank Redemption (one of my all-time faves). The prisoners can't wait to get free from the walls of the prison, but many of them find themselves right back inside those walls after a short taste of freedom outside.
WHY do we do this??
I believe that, after a lifetime of people-pleasing and siphoning off our own desires & voice, there is a fear that, "If I allow myself to have freedom, I might leave everything & everyone I know. I might become a version of myself that I can't handle. Others won't like if I really express myself. I might end up alone..."
For most women, that is NOT what will happen, because the freedom we are talking about here is really NOT about other people. It's about OWNING & honoring your desires & your choices, moment to moment, day to day.
When you open to the possibility of freedom, you open to an experience of "expanding" your life to include YOU...to include your heart, your needs, your desires, your self-expression, your pleasure, your joy.
When you open to the possibility of freedom, you open to an experience of 'expanding' your life to include YOU... your heart, needs, desire, self-expression, pleasure, and joy.
TWEET THIS
It's a FEELING of expansion, peace, purpose, passion & self-truth. It's like a deep breath of coming HOME to one's SELF.
I am knee-deep in helping women create true freedom for themselves - freedom from their OWN inner "shawshank redemption-like" prisons. Freedom to step outside those self-imposed roles & rules so they can live outside of those walls & INSIDE their full life.
Want to have a taste of this experience? Please reach out to me and let’s explore what’s possible.
