Say NO when you want to

The importance of asserting what we want is just as important as asserting what we don’t want.  Many times, we live trapped by a personality that doesn’t allow us to act freely: out of fear, not knowing any other way to handle a situation, or because we hide conflicted emotions we don’t understand.  Our personality becomes freer as we better understand our life situations, especially our emotions.

Playing roles

Society enforces several ways of living, and the way we were educated frequently distances us from what we authentically feel.  This makes us take superficial and artificial postures, not allowing us to explore what we really feel and want.  “You should…” “That’s wrong, it’s better to…” “You should be more…” “What you did was wrong…”.  Over time, our personality can become mechanical and our communication with ourselves cold, because we are more focused on looking for acceptance and pleasing others than our authentic satisfaction and free action.

Not being able to truly say what we want, not acting the way we’re most passionate and enthusiastic, is due to the fact that we don’t have enough confidence in ourselves.  We feel insecurity to do or say something, of enforcing ourselves, because what we fear deep down, is rejection and disapproval.  By being accustomed to, and in some ways, educated to live for acceptance by others, keeps us locked into playing roles that over time will only provoke distance from ourselves.  This distance causes and endless number of consequences, among which are despondency to live, a lack of enthusiasm, and loneliness.

When we try to please everyone else except for ourselves, we are weakening not only all of our systems, our energy and strength, but we are also creating all kinds of tensions.  We  anxiously await what others will say or how they will react.  We become defensive if they reject or disapprove of us.  It causes a constant alertness that tenses our muscles, and these tensions accumulate in different parts of the body.  They also degenerate into all kinds of illnesses over time.

Becoming authentic

To continue “acting” and playing certain roles is necessary while we begin to establish reflection and deeper communication with ourselves.  This does not mean being emotionally impulsive and to simply do “the first thing we feel”.  This is about reflecting and asking ourselves why we do certain things, and how we can say no in a pleasant way while learning to say yes to what we want in a sweet and respectful manner.  This is about having more and more strength and certainty, creativity and intelligence, so as to direct ourselves to where we truly feel satisfied.  And if by chance someone doesn’t like you, being able to understand  this and not block our true and authentic actions.  Frequently, choosing what we really want puts us on a difficult and solitary path.  But the compensation of deep satisfaction, of being authentic individuals, is always worth the trouble.

Revised by: Dra. Loredana Lunadei on 01/26/2019

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