Ep #217: Developing Intimacy and Trust While Revealing Your True Self

 

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Ep #217: Developing Intimacy and Trust While Revealing Your True Self

Welcome to More Than Mindset, the only podcast that bridges the gap between spirituality and success. Go beyond the mind with clarity and confidence coach, Kim Guillory, and learn how to integrate your passion to serve with your skills and experience to create a business you love. Let’s get started.

Hey there and welcome back to the show. Listen, after I recorded last week’s episode, I started thinking about a few things and I did a few coaching sessions and I decided to make this a part two. So, I’m going to just add on to what I talked about last week, which was the way that we communicate. And what I was thinking about that I wanted to share here today on the show is why aren’t people direct?

So, what I noticed is that they are afraid. They’re afraid to be wrong. They’re afraid to upset whoever they’re talking to. They’re afraid to turn someone off by their directness or their frankness or their opinions. Maybe it’s even their confidence in their beliefs. And so, I thought about this after I recorded and then I did, I think three coach sessions since then and decided that I think this would be a great topic.

When you are not being direct, when you are not being truthful, and we may reach out a little bit and say, when you lie, why do you lie? Why don’t you speak from your knowingness? What is the reason behind that? What are you resisting? What are you afraid of? So, as I did these coaching sessions and we were talking about communication, communicating with other people as well as in business, and the part that they had the hardest time speaking about was their reasoning.

And as we unpacked some of this story, or as I like to say, as we factuated got the truth, got to the core reasons why we do the things that we do, what was beneath there was fear. I’m afraid, like I will miss out on something. I’m afraid I won’t be able to take back what I say. I’m afraid I’ll be misunderstood. I’m afraid they won’t approve. Those are the sorts of things that came out and that got me thinking about our communication and why it’s broken.

Guys, when we move through the world apologetically and cautiously because we’re afraid to insult or disagree with someone, we’re actually resisting our own truth and the value of our opinions and our experience. I don’t know if you’ve thought about that, but what I was saying last week that I got emotional about is I’ve learned how to be direct even when it’s uncomfortable. So much so that when I’m not being honest and I’m not being transparent and I’m not being direct, I’m actually more uncomfortable now.

It’s crazy, right? And this is like making it hard to be in intimate relationship because the protection, the wall, like that barrier that we put up so someone doesn’t see our truth is actually blocking intimacy.

So, think of the word intimacy and then break it down. Int-im-acy I’m looking up the definition. Intimacy is close, familiarity or friendship. Closeness a private, cozy atmosphere.

An intimate remark. So, I think of intimacy as exposure and trust. So, we attain intimacy or closeness with someone else when we allow them to see all of us when we’re not protecting our identity our thoughts and feelings when we’re not afraid to expose whether it be our truth or our contemplation. Sometimes I’m not really claiming a truth. I’m just exploring what I’ve heard or what I’m considering. And I like to share that maybe because I like to hear myself think out loud.

I trust myself when I can hear me say it. I learn so much. I am very open and transparent and direct. Some may say assertive but when I’m in a relationship with someone else and they feel intimidated by that and it could be intimidated by my certainty, by my confidence for just the way that I show up in my energy. That the very fear of that emotional I don’t know. I don’t know the word that I want to use. But let’s just imagine we’re in a conversation and I’m sounding certain and I’m sounding confident and I’m sounding really sure.

And in what I’m talking about. If the person I am speaking to does not feel certain does not feel confident and does not feel sure they may be afraid to expose their thoughts because of the fear of being wrong or being called out or being challenged. Because the energy of certainty and confidence kind of gives us that assumption, right? It makes us feel like that might happen. And as I’m contemplating this all day long, I’ve been really sitting with it and thinking about it.

That unsafety is what we are protecting. So, I want to offer you to consider being honest being open, being truthful, putting it all out there like the example I used earlier, is two things.

Let’s say communication is like a tennis game. One hits the ball and the other one hits it back. So, one has a chance of speaking and the other one has the chance of adding to that maybe questioning it for clarity or maybe changing it completely.

And then it’s back and forth and back and forth. And the more you pause and listen, the deeper your connections and conversations will be. The faster you try to serve the ball and try to get it back over and try to get one up and try to add to the conversation or change it the less it will be because you’re actually not listening. You’re focused and concentrating on what you will say instead of listening to what someone else is saying.

And so, that sometimes severs the intimacy and the connection and the communication and the relationships because you’re not actually paying attention. The game is moving a little too fast and you’re not getting to the deep roots of what’s being said and fully understanding someone else. So, that’s one thing.

The other example I used is imagine we’re playing cards. And so, I’m seeing this poker table and the deck is stacked and there’s layers and layers and layers and layers of exposure, right? So, all of the cards have not been exposed because they’re stacking on top of each other, and they’re face down.

So, in communication would be like a game of fully exposing all of the cards, all of the pieces, all of the parts of you, and even challenging it for yourself, like being curious about what is the next card, what else is in the deck?

I wonder what else I will see and find and expose as we keep questioning. So, for each question, you flip over another card, something new is exposed. You explore it, you have conversation around it, you maybe challenge it, and then you move to the next card.

And this relationship could look like the whole deck being flipped open individually and being able to see all parts of one another. That would be a beautiful relationship of intimacy and transparency and directness and nothing to protect, nothing to hide, not having a fear of being judged or being ridiculed, but just being fully exposed.

Guys, can you even imagine living in a world where you can have those sorts of relationships, that the other person is not going to grab that cord and threaten you with it, threaten to go and show it to the rest of the world, threaten to use it against you later, threaten to emotionally manipulate you?

Because that’s kind of the world we live in right now, right when we are having to protect ourselves and stop our cards from being exposed, stop the other from seeing what’s on the next layer or the next side. And we’re having to protect in order to feel safe. Our relationships might not be as rich. And think about it this way. If someone asks you a question like, well, what do you like? Or what do you want to do? Or what? Do you really?

I don’t know. I’m thinking of my granddaughter that we went out on Sunday, and I was like, what do you want to do? And she was like, I don’t know. What do you want to eat? I don’t know. Do you want to go shopping? I don’t know. I was like, oh my God, this is so painful. Tell me what you do. What? And why are you afraid to tell me? I just kept asking yes and no questions. And when I said, are you hungry? She says, I don’t know. And I said, yeah, actually I am. She’s like, good, because I am too.

I was like, why are you afraid to tell me that you’re hungry or that you want to go and eat something? Most of the time it’s to protect ourselves from feeling called out or put down or ashamed or rejected or told no. So, I want you to think about why wouldn’t you flip all of your cards? Why wouldn’t you expose even your thoughts, your beliefs, your dreams, your desires? Why wouldn’t you expose that to another?

What are you afraid of when someone asks you what do you want or what do you want to do right now? Is it that you truly don’t know? Or is it that you are protecting what you do know because it might not be good enough or it might be wrong, or it might be inappropriate?

That’s it. I just like to give you something else to consider, because we are breaking habits and behaviors that have been formed through indoctrination, through societal conditioning and environmental messaging and religious dogma.

And the moral book like here’s all the morals of what is right or wrong or what’s going to send you to heaven or hell or what’s going to make people like you or dislike you. We’ve been given this big list how to act or how to behave or what to do for other people to like you or to buy from you.

And we kind of don’t know the difference now of what’s ours and what’s just messages from others, what’s habits, what’s behavior. It’s just like a lot of pieces. So, imagine all of those pieces and parts and beliefs flipped up on that card table, fully exposed, without threat. Just getting super curious. I wonder where? I wonder when? I wonder how? I wonder what else? Because where there is resistance, where there is protection, there’s parts of you that are hidden, that are not being considered or being made valid.

And then we take that which we’re doing to ourself and we project it onto the world, and we assume that is what others are doing to us, but it’s actually what we are doing to ourself. We close ourself down. We shut parts of us off because of the fear of being rejected, because of the fear of being judged. What do you think that has created in your life? Are there limitations that have been set because of this?

Are there parts of you that are unsatisfied? Is there something else that you want to explore but you’re protecting or holding yourself back and won’t even have the conversation about it because you have the assumption that someone else will reject it or that someone else will judge it? Don’t you love my brain? It seriously tears apart like all of these layers. It just wants to understand like how can we human better?

What is a human? How do we demystify humanity? Like, how do we unpack the layers of beliefs, the habits that are not even ours? It’s just something we were exposed to, and we made it. Like we put it in our own personal bible. Like that’s what we have to do. If we do this, it means this, right? How much of you, like, when you look at yourself in the mirror, how much of you is being dictated or indoctrinated from someone else?

How many parts of you have been disposed because you believe that it would mean you are unworthy or not valuable or not respected? And so, you just kind of tucked her away and chose to never talk about that again, maybe because of some innocent situation that happened at a young age. And you took on the belief that it was unsafe. It was unsafe to share your dreams, it was unsafe to ask to be treated well. Or like whenever I asked my granddaughter, like, let’s go buy you a birthday present, let’s go shopping, let’s go do something for you.

Have we been taught; have we been shown that that means we’re selfish? What have we made that to be like? What story have we made up in our own heads? And so, we keep the underside of those cards just stacked really tight in this deck, face down. And we hold it really, really tight. We close it, we seal it, we put it in a box. So, I’m going to leave you with a little exercise this week. Find someone that you trust, someone that’s willing to play a game with you that doesn’t think you’re weird and pull out a deck of cards.

And with each card, you can decide ahead of time. The spades, the hearts, the clubs, the diamonds represent something. Let’s say the diamonds represent relationship. And the heart represents desire, something that you dream about in the future. And the guys, I’m just making this up, So, do it your way. And the club represents places that you want to travel to. And the diamonds represents some secret fascination that you’ve always had and were afraid to expose. So, the diamond is like, these are the things that I really keep secret and close to my heart that I might not share with other people I might be cautious about, right? But you just make this up, just put a list, we might actually come up with a game on this.

And when you pull that card, so, if you flip a diamond, then you have to expose something that’s really near and dear to your heart that you wish could materialize in the world or in your life. And when you flip the heart, I don’t remember what I said earlier, but when you flip the heart, it represents something that you really want to. It might be travel or something. Just anything, guys. Just make it up.

I’m actually going to come up with a worksheet on this one and add it to the podcast or come into the More Than Mindset Facebook Group and we’ll actually do a call on it where we can exchange ideas that would be really fun. So, that way you don’t have to go out and find someone to play the game with. Whoever you’re playing the game with will understand. But let’s just say you flip it and it’s talking about something that you really desire in your relationships, and you share that one aspect with the person that you’re playing with. And then when they flip the card over and say it’s a diamond, it’s like one of the fascinations or the dreams that they have been keeping to themselves.

And just see if you can get more comfortable with exposing yourself, especially if you’re in the setting and surrounding of like this is a trusted space where there is no judgment, there’s no conditioning. Everything is allowed. Everything is allowed. And see how that feels. Let me know. I’m going to go put a note somewhere and come up with what each of those represent and I will post it in the More Than Mindset Facebook Group.

If you are not in the Group or you’re not on social media, then you can just respond to the email and tell me if you tried it and what did you experience. The whole goal of this exercise is to begin to reveal more of yourself as you are becoming more of you and allowing the layers of conditioning and indoctrination to be released. And just notice what comes up. Just notice that’s it you don’t have to change the way you are, where you live, what you do.

This is just to expand your own personal consciousness and explore maybe where you thought it was unsafe so, that you can prove to yourself that it is safe. And then therefore, you will be more courageous and more daring about what else you want to experience in this lifetime.

All right, my friends, have an amazing week.

Thanks for listening to this episode of More Than Mindset.