It’s Never Too Late

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I’ve always loved this quote by George Elliot….

“It’s never too late to be what you might have been.”

As a matter of fact, I’ve used this quote in many of my talks and articles, even in my upcoming book, Consider the Possibilities for Your Life.  I use this quote to inspire people to wake up to their inner callings, their deepest nature – to who they truly are.  I use this quote to encourage people that it’s never too late to live their most authentic life.

Not being a literary scholar, imagine my surprise when I learned that the author of my favorite quote, George Eliot, was actually Mary Ann Evans.  Seriously, and I just learned this today. I had not known. Mary Ann Evans used a male pen name both to be taken seriously and also to shield her private life from public scrutiny.

What a difficulty that must have been for her…to be living an inauthentic life in order to be taken seriously and to be emotionally safe.  Sound familiar to anyone…..

I had a client tell me just last week that, even in today’s society, she still finds herself holding back in intellectual conversations, so she doesn’t risk sounding foolish or argumentative.   Even though she is bright and articulate, she learned very young that to be emotionally safe, she needed to be polite…and quiet.  Sound familiar?

How many of us hide our true nature, who we really are, in order to be safe, to feel protected, to be taken seriously?  And, while there may be some obvious reasons for why we hide our true self, there is always a price to pay.  And each and everyone of us know it.  We’ve paid it over and over, many times, in many ways in our lives.

Because…living authentically is no easy business.  At least not in the beginning. (I promise you it gets easier the more you do it.)   Speaking our truth about who we are and who we aren’t, what we value, what we think, what we believe, what we want and what we don’t want requires a great deal of self awareness and courage.

In my upbringing, it was not safe to be sensitive and vulnerable. I’m  sure this was true for many people.  It was very important to be tough.  “Don’t wear your emotions on your sleeves.”  “Don’t let them see you cry.”  My directions were even a bit deeper.  “Don’t cry.”  “Don’t feel.”  So I learned how to appear very tough and unaffected.  I became quite the intellectual.

But the truth about me is that I am deeply sensitive and emotional, and things/people can hurt me very much at times.  Telling this truth not only makes me vulnerable, it also makes me not fit in with the culture of my family.  But it is a truth about who and how I am.   I have learned to embrace it and to stand up for it.  I have learned that safety lies in trusting myself to love and support me.

Also, with great delight, I now find that one of the reasons most people are attracted to me is because they appreciate my willingness to be vulnerable and that I am deeply sensitive and emotional.

While it may be scary at first, there is great emotional freedom that comes with saying, “The truth about me is….”.   Here’s the payoff:   We get to be real.  Our inner world finally begins to match up  with our outer world and we are living authentically.

If you need a shot of courage, remember the beautiful line from The Velveteen Rabbit, when the Skin Horse says,  “Once you are real, you can never be ugly….”

Here are a couple of powerful questions for our on-line community this week:

Ask yourself, what is one piece about myself I have been hiding,denying, resisting so that I could be safe?

What is a truth about myself that I am ready to embrace?

Finish this sentence, “The truth about me is…..”

I recognize that this is intimate work.  Feel free to use our community blog to speak up or you may want to only use your personal journal.  At the very least, stop and take a moment to think about it.  The point is to do the inner work of excavating a piece of yourself that you no longer choose to hide because it keeps you from living your most authentic self.  Speak your truth, if only to your journal, then embrace and celebrate yourself for all of who you are.

So, as Mary Ann Evans (aka George Elliot) says, It’s never to late to be who you are meant to be”.  I also say,

“ It’s never too late to be real.”

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