Engaging Authenticity
The north wind doth blow..
And the final workshop this year is upon us.
North is the home of fortitude and mastery. Heart-centred thinking. The Nurturing Generative Adult. The compassionate and insightful Leader, Teacher, Parent, Healer of us. The one of us that is interested in the road to becoming a Sage Elder (even if we never make it.. or come particularly close). The one of us that knows hardship, or, at least, an apprenticing path; the one of us that knows that adversity is required for growth.
One of our great challenges as people, I have found (read: know from painful personal experience), is to navigate the tension between authenticity and social belonging in ways that are generative, and invite meaningful relating. Each of these needs (authenticity & belonging) is fundamental to us humans, and the conflict between them can be powerful at times.
An entry point for soul. And the mystery.
If this conflict is occurring for me intrapersonally (within myself), it is possible that something is occurring, also, for the other. So, then, it might be additionally occurring between us.
There can be much to navigate here. Explored in sufficiently attuned ways over time, a form of trust builds. This invites deeper intimacy (certainly intrapsychic intimacy, but possibly also interpersonal intimacy with the other), which likely leads to deeper experiences of both authenticity and belonging in this connection.
But there is much complexity here, and the terrain is ripe with the potential for hurt, confusion, shame, disappointment, anger and grief. Fallout, pain and harm can be all too common.
Some questions I might be considering as I navigate this complexity include:
Am I embracing the other's wholeness - therefore recognizing any of their challenges as an expression of current conditions, not as who they are fundamentally?
Does my behaviour and languaging effectively communicate what feels most true and honest to me (which may land differently for the other) but is ultimately generative?
Do I want to cultivate more closeness or distance in this connection at this time? Or are there some particular points of connection between us that I would enjoy more closeness around, while others I would prefer more nuance with/distance from?
Is the other currently capable of/interested in what I am seeking? Am I respecting what I sense they want too?
Am I tracking my/their inner protector patterns/behaviours & my/their nervous system states? Do I currently have insight into their needs too? Am I attuned to/responding responsibly to their/my own needs for safety in connection (which is not the same as care-taking or avoiding/abandoning).
Am I navigating differences between us without collapsing into polarization?
Am I considering the larger systems to which we belong as I offer my responses (family systems, group/community dynamics, roles & power dynamics, ecosystems).
Am I aware when/if I am acting on a self-diminishing experience of fear and incompleteness? Do I notice if/when the other might be doing similarly?
Am I conscious of/responding to their/my own places of woundedness with compassion and care (with neither indulgence nor criticism).
Are my ways of communicating not only non-violent, but also generative?
These are just a few potent entry points for reflection. How I engage might radically shift depending on what emerges from my reflections here, and therefore shift my experience of connection. Hopefully, over time, it also grows my ability to cultivate soulful relationships.
Sunday December 1st from 1-4:30 pm, we deepen into the North in the last of the Cultivating Soulful Relationships workshops.
*Based on my understanding/experience of working with Bill Plotkin & Animas Valley Institute's maps of Soul and Wild Mind.