May 7, 2024 • 22 mins
We ask for clarity, we say we want clarity, but when clarity tries to come, we also resist it. One of the reasons that clarity seems to elude us is that clarity is incredibly expensive. In today's episode, I’ll talk about what clarity costs us. What would you have to let go of in your life in order to find the clarity you’ve been craving?
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Pick up the pieces of your life, pull them back
together with the word to write all the beauty and
peace and the magic that you'll start too fun when
you write your story.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
You got the.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Words and said, don't you think it's time to let
them out and write them down and cover what it's
all about and write your story. Write you write your story.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Hi, and welcome back to the Write Your Story Podcast.
I'm Ali Fallon, I'm your host, and on today's episode,
I want to talk about why there can be so
much resistance for us around finding clarity inside of our stories.
We say we want clarity. We pay hundreds of dollars,
thousands of dollars to a therapist to get an outsider's
(00:49):
perspective on what's happening in our lives so that we
can get the clarity that we say we're craving. We
say we want to write our story, and as we
write our story, we want to find that one thread
that ties the whole thing together. We want the pathway
through the story. We want clarity, meaning purpose, joy, all
of those things, and yet there can be a ton
(01:10):
of resistance that we bump up against when we sit
down to actually do it. So I want to talk
about why this is and talk about the cost of clarity,
because even though we say we want clarity, clarity is
incredibly expensive. And so today on this episode, I want
to talk about what we lose when we gain clarity.
What we lose when we gain clarity is options. When
(01:33):
you find the thread that guides the reader, that guides
you perfectly through your story from start to finish, that
creates that arc, that has the right amount of tension,
that takes the reader on this wild and exciting ride,
that transforms the hero from the beginning of the story
to the end of the story. When you find that
(01:53):
thread in a story, it can be incredibly satisfying. The
only drawback is, and this is the drawback that gives
us the resistance, is that what we have to sacrifice
in order to stay on that thread are all the
other possible threads inside the story that could have been
all the other events that could have taken place, all
of the other incidences or experiences that could have been
(02:16):
part of the story that don't belong in the story
now or just don't need our attention, because they would
distract from the point of the story. They would distract
from the clarity that we've now found. And I've just
noticed this to be true over and over again in
my life, and I'm noticing it to be true right
now in my life that I ask for clarity, and
then when I get clarity, I realize, oh, clarity is
(02:40):
going to require me to give up things that don't
align with the clarity that I asked for. So here's
just a really quick example. I shared a couple of
weeks ago about my travel experience and how I rewrote
the story from Oh, I always do this, I'm such
a screwup to things always work out for me, even
when I'm at even when I make mistakes, even when
(03:02):
the world around me is chaotic or confusing, things always
just work out for me in the end. I don't
know what it is, but it just always happens that way.
And that was the new clarity that I found in
my story. Well, if the clarity that I find in
my story is things always work out for me, then
what has to be sacrificed is any presumption that I
make that things don't work out for me. So any
(03:24):
events or circumstances that are difficult or challenging, or require
me to fight for my value or my worth, any
moral that I've written of a story that says, you know,
you have to you have to really fight for what
you want in life. You got to work hard and
prove yourself. That has to go. So do you notice
how when I find the clarity inside the story that
(03:44):
I'm looking for, I really have to sacrifice any threat
in the story that doesn't align with that clarity, I
have to let it go. So one of the things
that I've been asking myself in my life lately is
what needs to go in order for me to align
with the clarity that I'm finding. Because I am finding
incredible clarity in my personal story right now. What needs
(04:04):
to go? What doesn't fit with the clarity, what doesn't
align with the clarity. And I'm getting even more clarity
as I ask clearly about what needs to go, what
needs to be let go. So I'm asking myself this
question in my daily writing practice. I'm asking myself the
question when I'm meditating, I'm asking myself the question when
(04:25):
I'm pulling oracle cards, like I talked about with Amanda
Rigo Green on an episode several weeks ago. Just any
time that I get a chance to ask, what do
I need to let go of. That's what I'm asking.
And I'm accumulating a short but really powerful list of
things in my life that have to go. And the
more things that I let go of, the more clarity
rushes in. And it just gave me this epiphany. One
(04:48):
of the big reasons why we have so much resistance
to getting clarity, even though we say we want it,
is because clarity is going to require us to let
go of things that have been serving a purpose in
our lives up until now. So, for example, one of
the things that I keep getting that I'm supposed to
let go of that I'm being asked, I'm being called
really to let go of it. I don't think if
(05:09):
it's so much like a should or supposed to. It's
just like, hey, there's an opportunity for you here if
you should choose it to let go of this. And
one of the things that keeps coming through loud and
clear for me is social media. Now, I don't know
if this let go means forever or if it means
for right now, but regardless, it doesn't really matter because
(05:32):
the fact of the matter is, I'm in a really
interesting time in my life right now. To quote unquote
let go of social media. I keep hearing this message
to come through loud and clear. I say, I want
the clarity. The clarity is coming through. It's like, let
go of social media, which for me means Instagram because
that's where I spend most of my time. So it's like, Okay,
I hear you, loud and clear, let go of social media.
But I have a book coming out tomorrow, and now
(05:55):
it's not really an excellent time for me to let
go of social media. But the question is there for me,
do I trust the clarity when it comes or instead
am I going to choose to hold on to the
thing that is costing me the clarity. I have a choice.
I can choose door A or door B. Door A
is the clarity. Door B is holding on to social media.
(06:18):
And I think a lot of times we're so scared
to let go of the things that we're asked to
let go of when we get clarity that instead of
choosing clarity, we choose holding onto these things because it's
just scary to let them go. And social media is
a great example of that, because you know, I ask
myself the question, if my book comes out tomorrow and
I let go of social media. Now, then, how am
I going to talk about my book? How am I
(06:41):
going to promote the book? How are people going to
find out about it? How am I going to sell it?
How am I going to promote you know, all the
interviews and podcast episodes that I've worked so hard to
record leading up to the book release, and I don't
have the answers to those questions yet. And I don't
need to have the answers to those questions. All I
need is what's right in front of me, which is
the clarity to let go of social media, let go
(07:02):
of Instagram. And again, I don't need to know whether
this is a forever let go or whether it's a
for now let go. Either way, it's a big sacrifice
because I don't see another path in front of me
for how the book is going to sell. How I'm
going to get this in the hands of the people
who I know need to read it. How am I
going to talk about the podcast? How am I going
to talk about the many other things that I have
going on, opportunities that I have for authors to write
(07:25):
a book or whatever. I don't have answers to those questions.
All I have is the option to either choose the
clarity that I asked for, to choose it by letting
go of social media, or to keep hanging on. Something
that's been coming through loud and clear for me is
that I am so attached to being right about things
that here's what that causes for me. It causes me
(07:45):
to when I am talking to a friend and they're
telling me about a set of circumstances in their life,
I'm immediately searching for what's the right way to handle this?
If it were me, how would I do this? And
it also causes me sort of give advice when it's
not my place to give advice, give advice when I'm
not being asked for advice, because my brain is always
(08:07):
just searching for, like, what's the right way to handle this,
what's the right way to do this? And so I
do that with circumstances in my own life. And I
also do it when a friend is being vulnerable and
exposing themselves and showing me something really tender that's happening
in their own life. Immediately my brain jumps in as like, Okay,
what's the right when I handle this? How can I
give them advice? And most of the time in those circumstances,
(08:28):
advice isn't helpful and it's not being asked for. And
so what I keep feeling like I'm being asked to
do is just to say, in those circumstances, it's none
of my business how this is handled. It's none of
my business. And that is a real pivot for me.
It's a real shift from what I'm used to, and
it's requiring me to let go of the sense that
(08:49):
there is a right answer, that I have to figure
out the right answer, that when I figure out the
right answer, that all feel safe and I can help
other people feel safe too. I don't know where exactly
that comes from. It comes from my evangelical upbringing or
someplace different, but either way, I'm being asked very clearly
to let go of the illusion of rightness and to
(09:09):
let people have their own path, let them have their
own way, let them make their own choices, and you know,
live their own lives. I find myself doing this for
people that I don't even know. It's like if I
read a story about something that's going on, my brain
immediately jumps into the mode of fixing, like figuring out
the sort of right way to handle this Wolf. Only
they would have done this and this and this, then
this would have happened. And the fact of the matter is,
(09:30):
I don't know the full story. I don't even know
this person. I don't have a right to have an
opinion about how it should have been handled, and I
don't know the quote unquote right way to handle anything.
Let go of your illusion of rightness, this is what
I'm saying to myself. Let go of your illusion of rightness,
and the clarity that you have been asking for will
flood in. I've been asked to let go of my perfectionism,
(09:55):
which maybe runs right in line with the illusion of rightness.
The perfection is that says if it's not perfect, it's
not worth doing. If I can't do it perfectly, I
shouldn't do it at all. If I'm not perfect, if
I don't look perfect, act perfect, sound perfect, do it perfect,
then I shouldn't share it with the world. You know,
I have a whole story in my head about these
podcast episodes that they need to be really perfect and
(10:16):
polished or they're not really going to mean anything to anyone.
They're not going to be helpful to anyone, and I
just should not do it. If I don't know exactly
what I'm trying to say. If I haven't said it
in the perfect way, then why I release it at all.
And I'm being asked in this time to let go
of that need for things to be perfect, because perfection
is an illusion anyway, And who knows what is meant
(10:39):
to unfold or what is possible, what could unfold when
I allow myself the room to be imperfect, the room
to be messy in the middle, the room to just
try something, just throw some spaghetti against the wall and
see what sticks. So when I let go of my perfectionism,
I get to experience clarity. If I want the clarity,
(11:01):
I have to let go of my perfectionism. I can't
hold onto both at the same time. Now, the problem
is the resistance I bump up against is that perfectionism
is a coping mechanism that I've had for a really
long time that has served me. Now, the problem is
(11:21):
the resistance I bump up against is that perfectionism is
a coping mechanism that I've had for a really long
time that has served me. It has played a massive
role in my life. And so to let go of
perfectionism feels really vulnerable. That might sound silly to some
of you who don't struggle with perfectionism, or maybe you're
listening and you do struggle with that, and so you're like, no,
(11:42):
I totally get it. But for whatever reason, that pattern
in my life, the pattern of like get it perfect,
get it exactly right, don't show anyone until it's perfect.
That pattern has served me. It's served a role in
my life and letting it go. Letting it go sure
would give me clarity, but until I can make peace
(12:02):
with the facts that also, letting go of perfectionism exposes
my vulnerability. Letting go of perfectionism exposes the vulnerability of
the child who used perfectionism as a way to cover
up and to cope. Until I can make peace with that,
I can't really let go of the perfectionism. Until I
say thank you to the perfectionism for serving me for
all this time, I can't really let go of the perfectionism.
(12:24):
And so this is just a simple example, but it's
an example of how we ask for clarity. We say
we want clarity, We sit down to the page to
write so that we can uncover clarity, and yet when
clarity comes to us, it comes at a great cost.
It requires us to let go of some things. That
requires us to let go of whatever is not aligned
with the clarity that we have asked for. Another thing
(12:47):
I'm being asked to let go of is playing small.
I can point back to exactly the set of experiences
in my life, and I don't need to unpack that here,
but exactly the set of experiences that taught me how
to play small as a way to survive. It is
a survival mechanism for me. And there's a part of
my brain that tells me, when you stop playing small,
you're going to die. When you stop playing small, you're
(13:08):
going to be punished. When you stop playing small, you
really open yourself to a lot of pain and suffering.
And so giving up playing small. Although that sounds like, well, yeah,
give that up, you know, don't play small, go be yourself, like,
go be the fullness of yourself in the world. But
there's a part of me that says it's dangerous to
do that. It's dangerous to give up playing small. And
(13:30):
yet this is the cost of clarity. If I say
I want clarity, if I go after clarity in my life,
if I'm looking to know what is my story really
about who am I really? Then I have to give
up my coping mechanism of playing small. I have to
give up this survival tactic that I came up with
a really long time ago. And I'm in a season
of my life where I'm learning how to do these things.
(13:51):
I'm learning how to let go of my illusion of rightness.
I'm learning how to let go of this survival mechanism
of playing small. I'm learning how how to let go
of social media, even though I tell myself a story like,
without social media, how will I ever do any of
the things that I want to do. I don't even
need to know the answer to that question right now.
All I need to know is that I have my clarity.
(14:12):
I'm on my path. In order to stay on the
path of clarity, I have to let go of these
things and just slowly but surely letting them unravel, letting
them fall apart, letting them drop off of me. What
else am I letting go of? I'm letting go of negativity.
You could listen to the episode where I talked about
the trip to Dallas, and you can watch it happening
(14:34):
in real time. I'm letting go of this voice in me.
That's just like, that's never gonna work. Nice try, you
know that doesn't work for real people. That only works
in the movies. That sort of of a mindset and
starting to say to myself, likes it all works out.
Everything all works out in the end, no matter what
I do, no matter what mistakes I make, no matter
how chaotic things get, everything works out for me in
(14:56):
the end. I'm letting go of feeling unworthy. I'm letting
go of acting afraid. I have to let go of
acting afraid. If I don't let go of acting afraid,
then instead I have to let go of the clarity
that I asked for. So if I'm going to stay
on the track of clarity, I have to let go
of acting afraid. I have to let go of my perfectionism.
I have to let go of micromanaging and control over
every little detail of my life and my family's life.
(15:20):
You know, I've got two little kids at home, and
one of my all time favorite survival mechanisms is micromanaging
and control. When I can control the little details of
my day, I feel safe when I am letting go
of those little details like what my children are eating
for lunch. I start to feel anxiety, I start to
(15:41):
feel panic. And yet in order to grab onto the
clarity that I have asked for inside of my story,
I have to let go of those tiny details. I
have to let go of micromanaging other people's choices, other
people's decisions, other people's actions, other people's schedules, even the
little bits of my own schedule that I can't one
hundred percent control. I have to be willing to let
go of those things. And I'm sure whatever it is
(16:04):
for you, it may be a similar list, it may
be a different list. I don't know what your list
looks like, but whatever is on your list, what I
know from experience is that when you ask the question
what do I need to let go of in order
to embrace my clarity, the things that come on to
that list are not going to feel easy to let
go of. Maybe when I say letting go of Instagram,
(16:25):
you think easy done, I've already done that. Well, then
that's not the thing that's getting in the way of
you and your clarity. For you, it's going to be
something different getting in the way of you and your
clarity that when you ask for clarity and you go
out seeking clarity, through writing your story, or through therapy,
or through whatever, that there's going to be something else
standing in the way of you and your clarity. You
(16:45):
say you want your clarity, but then when it comes
time to take it, you realize, Oh, I actually have
to let go of this particular friendship that's really important
to me. This friendship has served a purpose in my
life for a really long time. I actually don't know
who I am without this friendship, and I can't fathom
letting go of it. Maybe for you, you have to
let go of a job or a role that you've played,
(17:09):
Or maybe you have to let go of people pleasing,
of constantly performing and jumping through hoops for someone else
to approve of you. Maybe you have to let go
of an attachment that you had to a way a
certain thing was going to go. I don't know what
it is for you. You might have a totally different
list than I have. But whatever, we set out on
(17:29):
a journey to uncover clarity in our story, in our lives,
the cost of clarity is always going to be all
the things that don't align with our clarity, things that
don't align with what this story is really about. So
ask yourself the question the story that you're living right now?
What is it really about? What is it about? What's
it about underneath the surface of what you thought it
(17:49):
was about the story that I'm living right now. One
thread I could follow is that it's about releasing this book. Well,
it's like, what is it about? Underneath what it's about?
It's not really about really a book, It's about something deeper.
What is the something deeper that it's about? What's the
story that you're living in your life? And what's the
something deeper that story is about? Whatever that is for you,
(18:10):
I don't know, And whatever list of things it brings
up for you that you need to let go of.
I don't know what those things are either, but I
do know from experience that letting go of them is
not going to feel effortless. There is an effortlessness to it.
It is more like a surrender than it is like
a fight. It's an allowing of the unraveling of the
(18:32):
coping mechanisms, the survival techniques, the protection mechanisms that you've
had in place for a really long time, or the
friendships that have nurtured you and fed you and supported you,
and maybe it's time for you to fly on your own,
to come out from underneath of that friendship, and to
know that you are a whole person without that relationship.
(18:52):
Maybe it's something different for you entirely, but whatever it
is that's on the list, there's a certain energy of
surrender that is required to allow those things to fall
away from you, to allow them to unravel, so that
you can have your clarity, so that you can know
exactly what this story is about, and so that you
can follow the track of that story all the way
to the very end, all the way to the resolution,
all the way to where the hero wins the day
(19:14):
and transforms and becomes a different kind of a person.
And who knows, maybe those things that you let go
of get to come back to you in whatever form
you know, maybe especially if they're physical things like a
relationship or you know, Instagram or whatever. There's no morality
to any of those things. It's not like this relationship
(19:35):
is bad and it's toxic, so it has to go,
although maybe the relationship does have toxic elements. Same with Instagram.
It's not like Instagram is bad and it's toxic, so
it has to go. It's just in order to take
your clarity the clarity that you have asked for. This
is what's being asked of you, to surrender these things,
to allow them to unravel, to allow them to fall
(19:55):
away from you. And the cost of clarity is incredibly high,
and yet it worth it. The gain that you get
from clarity is joy, purpose, peace, groundedness, stability, certainty. I
don't mean certainty in sort of a right wrong sort
of a way, but just certainty. Alignment, maybe that's a
(20:16):
better word. Alignment. That is what you gain when you
get your clarity. So you get to make a decision.
There's door A, and that's clarity. There's door B, and
that's all of the protection mechanisms, the coping mechanisms, the
survival tactics that you have been holding onto, the unhealthy
relationship patterns, the people pleasing, the playing small, the acting afraid,
(20:40):
the needing to be right, whatever it is for you
that you've been holding on to. You get to pick
either that or you get to pick your clarity. I
really do hope you'll pick your clarity, because as we
each pick our clarity, we become more powerful. We become
more powerful individually, and we've become more powerful as a group.
(21:01):
And when we become more powerful as a group. We're
able to scale the mountains that we thought we weren't
able to scale. We're able to fight the battles that
we didn't have the strength to fight before. And the
kind of changes that we're hoping to see in the world,
in our culture, in society, and the communities around us
that we've been begging to see, hoping to see, wanting
to see, are all going to come from individuals getting
(21:24):
aligned with their clarity, knowing what their story is really about,
knowing who they really are deep down in their gut
or in the highest version of their selves, Knowing clearly
who they are, embracing that clarity, and letting go of
all of the rest, all of the junk, all of
the bs that doesn't matter, that isn't really who you are.
(21:44):
So I hope you'll take the path of clarity. I
know that I'm doing that right now in my life.
I'm watching changes happen literally in front of my eyes
because I'm embracing my clarity and I'm letting go of
all of the rest. So I hope you'll do the same.
I'm grateful to be in this with you. I know
we're in an altogether. Also, don't forget Write your Story
comes out tomorrow May seventh. It's available now for pre order.
(22:07):
You can still get all your pre order bonuses for
one more day, so don't miss this or order the
book wherever you get books. The book will be to
you in the next couple of days. Go to Write
Yourstory dot com slash book and download eighteen hundred dollars
worth of pre order bonuses. I can't wait to share
this book with you, and I can't wait to hear
about your experience with it. We'll see you next time
on to Write your Story podcast. Until then, I'm Ali
(22:29):
Fallon
Pick up the pieces of your life, pull them back
together with the word to write all the beauty and
peace and the magic that you'll start too fun when
you write your story.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
You got the.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Words and said, don't you think it's time to let
them out and write them down and cover what it's
all about and write your story. Write you write your story.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
Hi, and welcome back to the Write Your Story Podcast.
I'm Ali Fallon, I'm your host, and on today's episode,
I want to talk about why there can be so
much resistance for us around finding clarity inside of our stories.
We say we want clarity. We pay hundreds of dollars,
thousands of dollars to a therapist to get an outsider's
(00:49):
perspective on what's happening in our lives so that we
can get the clarity that we say we're craving. We
say we want to write our story, and as we
write our story, we want to find that one thread
that ties the whole thing together. We want the pathway
through the story. We want clarity, meaning purpose, joy, all
of those things, and yet there can be a ton
(01:10):
of resistance that we bump up against when we sit
down to actually do it. So I want to talk
about why this is and talk about the cost of clarity,
because even though we say we want clarity, clarity is
incredibly expensive. And so today on this episode, I want
to talk about what we lose when we gain clarity.
What we lose when we gain clarity is options. When
(01:33):
you find the thread that guides the reader, that guides
you perfectly through your story from start to finish, that
creates that arc, that has the right amount of tension,
that takes the reader on this wild and exciting ride,
that transforms the hero from the beginning of the story
to the end of the story. When you find that
(01:53):
thread in a story, it can be incredibly satisfying. The
only drawback is, and this is the drawback that gives
us the resistance, is that what we have to sacrifice
in order to stay on that thread are all the
other possible threads inside the story that could have been
all the other events that could have taken place, all
of the other incidences or experiences that could have been
(02:16):
part of the story that don't belong in the story
now or just don't need our attention, because they would
distract from the point of the story. They would distract
from the clarity that we've now found. And I've just
noticed this to be true over and over again in
my life, and I'm noticing it to be true right
now in my life that I ask for clarity, and
then when I get clarity, I realize, oh, clarity is
(02:40):
going to require me to give up things that don't
align with the clarity that I asked for. So here's
just a really quick example. I shared a couple of
weeks ago about my travel experience and how I rewrote
the story from Oh, I always do this, I'm such
a screwup to things always work out for me, even
when I'm at even when I make mistakes, even when
(03:02):
the world around me is chaotic or confusing, things always
just work out for me in the end. I don't
know what it is, but it just always happens that way.
And that was the new clarity that I found in
my story. Well, if the clarity that I find in
my story is things always work out for me, then
what has to be sacrificed is any presumption that I
make that things don't work out for me. So any
(03:24):
events or circumstances that are difficult or challenging, or require
me to fight for my value or my worth, any
moral that I've written of a story that says, you know,
you have to you have to really fight for what
you want in life. You got to work hard and
prove yourself. That has to go. So do you notice
how when I find the clarity inside the story that
(03:44):
I'm looking for, I really have to sacrifice any threat
in the story that doesn't align with that clarity, I
have to let it go. So one of the things
that I've been asking myself in my life lately is
what needs to go in order for me to align
with the clarity that I'm finding. Because I am finding
incredible clarity in my personal story right now. What needs
(04:04):
to go? What doesn't fit with the clarity, what doesn't
align with the clarity. And I'm getting even more clarity
as I ask clearly about what needs to go, what
needs to be let go. So I'm asking myself this
question in my daily writing practice. I'm asking myself the
question when I'm meditating, I'm asking myself the question when
(04:25):
I'm pulling oracle cards, like I talked about with Amanda
Rigo Green on an episode several weeks ago. Just any
time that I get a chance to ask, what do
I need to let go of. That's what I'm asking.
And I'm accumulating a short but really powerful list of
things in my life that have to go. And the
more things that I let go of, the more clarity
rushes in. And it just gave me this epiphany. One
(04:48):
of the big reasons why we have so much resistance
to getting clarity, even though we say we want it,
is because clarity is going to require us to let
go of things that have been serving a purpose in
our lives up until now. So, for example, one of
the things that I keep getting that I'm supposed to
let go of that I'm being asked, I'm being called
really to let go of it. I don't think if
(05:09):
it's so much like a should or supposed to. It's
just like, hey, there's an opportunity for you here if
you should choose it to let go of this. And
one of the things that keeps coming through loud and
clear for me is social media. Now, I don't know
if this let go means forever or if it means
for right now, but regardless, it doesn't really matter because
(05:32):
the fact of the matter is, I'm in a really
interesting time in my life right now. To quote unquote
let go of social media. I keep hearing this message
to come through loud and clear. I say, I want
the clarity. The clarity is coming through. It's like, let
go of social media, which for me means Instagram because
that's where I spend most of my time. So it's like, Okay,
I hear you, loud and clear, let go of social media.
But I have a book coming out tomorrow, and now
(05:55):
it's not really an excellent time for me to let
go of social media. But the question is there for me,
do I trust the clarity when it comes or instead
am I going to choose to hold on to the
thing that is costing me the clarity. I have a choice.
I can choose door A or door B. Door A
is the clarity. Door B is holding on to social media.
(06:18):
And I think a lot of times we're so scared
to let go of the things that we're asked to
let go of when we get clarity that instead of
choosing clarity, we choose holding onto these things because it's
just scary to let them go. And social media is
a great example of that, because you know, I ask
myself the question, if my book comes out tomorrow and
I let go of social media. Now, then, how am
I going to talk about my book? How am I
(06:41):
going to promote the book? How are people going to
find out about it? How am I going to sell it?
How am I going to promote you know, all the
interviews and podcast episodes that I've worked so hard to
record leading up to the book release, and I don't
have the answers to those questions yet. And I don't
need to have the answers to those questions. All I
need is what's right in front of me, which is
the clarity to let go of social media, let go
(07:02):
of Instagram. And again, I don't need to know whether
this is a forever let go or whether it's a
for now let go. Either way, it's a big sacrifice
because I don't see another path in front of me
for how the book is going to sell. How I'm
going to get this in the hands of the people
who I know need to read it. How am I
going to talk about the podcast? How am I going
to talk about the many other things that I have
going on, opportunities that I have for authors to write
(07:25):
a book or whatever. I don't have answers to those questions.
All I have is the option to either choose the
clarity that I asked for, to choose it by letting
go of social media, or to keep hanging on. Something
that's been coming through loud and clear for me is
that I am so attached to being right about things
that here's what that causes for me. It causes me
(07:45):
to when I am talking to a friend and they're
telling me about a set of circumstances in their life,
I'm immediately searching for what's the right way to handle this?
If it were me, how would I do this? And
it also causes me sort of give advice when it's
not my place to give advice, give advice when I'm
not being asked for advice, because my brain is always
(08:07):
just searching for, like, what's the right way to handle this,
what's the right way to do this? And so I
do that with circumstances in my own life. And I
also do it when a friend is being vulnerable and
exposing themselves and showing me something really tender that's happening
in their own life. Immediately my brain jumps in as like, Okay,
what's the right when I handle this? How can I
give them advice? And most of the time in those circumstances,
(08:28):
advice isn't helpful and it's not being asked for. And
so what I keep feeling like I'm being asked to
do is just to say, in those circumstances, it's none
of my business how this is handled. It's none of
my business. And that is a real pivot for me.
It's a real shift from what I'm used to, and
it's requiring me to let go of the sense that
(08:49):
there is a right answer, that I have to figure
out the right answer, that when I figure out the
right answer, that all feel safe and I can help
other people feel safe too. I don't know where exactly
that comes from. It comes from my evangelical upbringing or
someplace different, but either way, I'm being asked very clearly
to let go of the illusion of rightness and to
(09:09):
let people have their own path, let them have their
own way, let them make their own choices, and you know,
live their own lives. I find myself doing this for
people that I don't even know. It's like if I
read a story about something that's going on, my brain
immediately jumps into the mode of fixing, like figuring out
the sort of right way to handle this Wolf. Only
they would have done this and this and this, then
this would have happened. And the fact of the matter is,
(09:30):
I don't know the full story. I don't even know
this person. I don't have a right to have an
opinion about how it should have been handled, and I
don't know the quote unquote right way to handle anything.
Let go of your illusion of rightness, this is what
I'm saying to myself. Let go of your illusion of rightness,
and the clarity that you have been asking for will
flood in. I've been asked to let go of my perfectionism,
(09:55):
which maybe runs right in line with the illusion of rightness.
The perfection is that says if it's not perfect, it's
not worth doing. If I can't do it perfectly, I
shouldn't do it at all. If I'm not perfect, if
I don't look perfect, act perfect, sound perfect, do it perfect,
then I shouldn't share it with the world. You know,
I have a whole story in my head about these
podcast episodes that they need to be really perfect and
(10:16):
polished or they're not really going to mean anything to anyone.
They're not going to be helpful to anyone, and I
just should not do it. If I don't know exactly
what I'm trying to say. If I haven't said it
in the perfect way, then why I release it at all.
And I'm being asked in this time to let go
of that need for things to be perfect, because perfection
is an illusion anyway, And who knows what is meant
(10:39):
to unfold or what is possible, what could unfold when
I allow myself the room to be imperfect, the room
to be messy in the middle, the room to just
try something, just throw some spaghetti against the wall and
see what sticks. So when I let go of my perfectionism,
I get to experience clarity. If I want the clarity,
(11:01):
I have to let go of my perfectionism. I can't
hold onto both at the same time. Now, the problem
is the resistance I bump up against is that perfectionism
is a coping mechanism that I've had for a really
long time that has served me. Now, the problem is
(11:21):
the resistance I bump up against is that perfectionism is
a coping mechanism that I've had for a really long
time that has served me. It has played a massive
role in my life. And so to let go of
perfectionism feels really vulnerable. That might sound silly to some
of you who don't struggle with perfectionism, or maybe you're
listening and you do struggle with that, and so you're like, no,
(11:42):
I totally get it. But for whatever reason, that pattern
in my life, the pattern of like get it perfect,
get it exactly right, don't show anyone until it's perfect.
That pattern has served me. It's served a role in
my life and letting it go. Letting it go sure
would give me clarity, but until I can make peace
(12:02):
with the facts that also, letting go of perfectionism exposes
my vulnerability. Letting go of perfectionism exposes the vulnerability of
the child who used perfectionism as a way to cover
up and to cope. Until I can make peace with that,
I can't really let go of the perfectionism. Until I
say thank you to the perfectionism for serving me for
all this time, I can't really let go of the perfectionism.
(12:24):
And so this is just a simple example, but it's
an example of how we ask for clarity. We say
we want clarity, We sit down to the page to
write so that we can uncover clarity, and yet when
clarity comes to us, it comes at a great cost.
It requires us to let go of some things. That
requires us to let go of whatever is not aligned
with the clarity that we have asked for. Another thing
(12:47):
I'm being asked to let go of is playing small.
I can point back to exactly the set of experiences
in my life, and I don't need to unpack that here,
but exactly the set of experiences that taught me how
to play small as a way to survive. It is
a survival mechanism for me. And there's a part of
my brain that tells me, when you stop playing small,
you're going to die. When you stop playing small, you're
(13:08):
going to be punished. When you stop playing small, you
really open yourself to a lot of pain and suffering.
And so giving up playing small. Although that sounds like, well, yeah,
give that up, you know, don't play small, go be yourself, like,
go be the fullness of yourself in the world. But
there's a part of me that says it's dangerous to
do that. It's dangerous to give up playing small. And
(13:30):
yet this is the cost of clarity. If I say
I want clarity, if I go after clarity in my life,
if I'm looking to know what is my story really
about who am I really? Then I have to give
up my coping mechanism of playing small. I have to
give up this survival tactic that I came up with
a really long time ago. And I'm in a season
of my life where I'm learning how to do these things.
(13:51):
I'm learning how to let go of my illusion of rightness.
I'm learning how to let go of this survival mechanism
of playing small. I'm learning how how to let go
of social media, even though I tell myself a story like,
without social media, how will I ever do any of
the things that I want to do. I don't even
need to know the answer to that question right now.
All I need to know is that I have my clarity.
(14:12):
I'm on my path. In order to stay on the
path of clarity, I have to let go of these
things and just slowly but surely letting them unravel, letting
them fall apart, letting them drop off of me. What
else am I letting go of? I'm letting go of negativity.
You could listen to the episode where I talked about
the trip to Dallas, and you can watch it happening
(14:34):
in real time. I'm letting go of this voice in me.
That's just like, that's never gonna work. Nice try, you
know that doesn't work for real people. That only works
in the movies. That sort of of a mindset and
starting to say to myself, likes it all works out.
Everything all works out in the end, no matter what
I do, no matter what mistakes I make, no matter
how chaotic things get, everything works out for me in
(14:56):
the end. I'm letting go of feeling unworthy. I'm letting
go of acting afraid. I have to let go of
acting afraid. If I don't let go of acting afraid,
then instead I have to let go of the clarity
that I asked for. So if I'm going to stay
on the track of clarity, I have to let go
of acting afraid. I have to let go of my perfectionism.
I have to let go of micromanaging and control over
every little detail of my life and my family's life.
(15:20):
You know, I've got two little kids at home, and
one of my all time favorite survival mechanisms is micromanaging
and control. When I can control the little details of
my day, I feel safe when I am letting go
of those little details like what my children are eating
for lunch. I start to feel anxiety, I start to
(15:41):
feel panic. And yet in order to grab onto the
clarity that I have asked for inside of my story,
I have to let go of those tiny details. I
have to let go of micromanaging other people's choices, other
people's decisions, other people's actions, other people's schedules, even the
little bits of my own schedule that I can't one
hundred percent control. I have to be willing to let
go of those things. And I'm sure whatever it is
(16:04):
for you, it may be a similar list, it may
be a different list. I don't know what your list
looks like, but whatever is on your list, what I
know from experience is that when you ask the question
what do I need to let go of in order
to embrace my clarity, the things that come on to
that list are not going to feel easy to let
go of. Maybe when I say letting go of Instagram,
(16:25):
you think easy done, I've already done that. Well, then
that's not the thing that's getting in the way of
you and your clarity. For you, it's going to be
something different getting in the way of you and your
clarity that when you ask for clarity and you go
out seeking clarity, through writing your story, or through therapy,
or through whatever, that there's going to be something else
standing in the way of you and your clarity. You
(16:45):
say you want your clarity, but then when it comes
time to take it, you realize, Oh, I actually have
to let go of this particular friendship that's really important
to me. This friendship has served a purpose in my
life for a really long time. I actually don't know
who I am without this friendship, and I can't fathom
letting go of it. Maybe for you, you have to
let go of a job or a role that you've played,
(17:09):
Or maybe you have to let go of people pleasing,
of constantly performing and jumping through hoops for someone else
to approve of you. Maybe you have to let go
of an attachment that you had to a way a
certain thing was going to go. I don't know what
it is for you. You might have a totally different
list than I have. But whatever, we set out on
(17:29):
a journey to uncover clarity in our story, in our lives,
the cost of clarity is always going to be all
the things that don't align with our clarity, things that
don't align with what this story is really about. So
ask yourself the question the story that you're living right now?
What is it really about? What is it about? What's
it about underneath the surface of what you thought it
(17:49):
was about the story that I'm living right now. One
thread I could follow is that it's about releasing this book. Well,
it's like, what is it about? Underneath what it's about?
It's not really about really a book, It's about something deeper.
What is the something deeper that it's about? What's the
story that you're living in your life? And what's the
something deeper that story is about? Whatever that is for you,
(18:10):
I don't know, And whatever list of things it brings
up for you that you need to let go of.
I don't know what those things are either, but I
do know from experience that letting go of them is
not going to feel effortless. There is an effortlessness to it.
It is more like a surrender than it is like
a fight. It's an allowing of the unraveling of the
(18:32):
coping mechanisms, the survival techniques, the protection mechanisms that you've
had in place for a really long time, or the
friendships that have nurtured you and fed you and supported you,
and maybe it's time for you to fly on your own,
to come out from underneath of that friendship, and to
know that you are a whole person without that relationship.
(18:52):
Maybe it's something different for you entirely, but whatever it
is that's on the list, there's a certain energy of
surrender that is required to allow those things to fall
away from you, to allow them to unravel, so that
you can have your clarity, so that you can know
exactly what this story is about, and so that you
can follow the track of that story all the way
to the very end, all the way to the resolution,
all the way to where the hero wins the day
(19:14):
and transforms and becomes a different kind of a person.
And who knows, maybe those things that you let go
of get to come back to you in whatever form
you know, maybe especially if they're physical things like a
relationship or you know, Instagram or whatever. There's no morality
to any of those things. It's not like this relationship
(19:35):
is bad and it's toxic, so it has to go,
although maybe the relationship does have toxic elements. Same with Instagram.
It's not like Instagram is bad and it's toxic, so
it has to go. It's just in order to take
your clarity the clarity that you have asked for. This
is what's being asked of you, to surrender these things,
to allow them to unravel, to allow them to fall
(19:55):
away from you. And the cost of clarity is incredibly high,
and yet it worth it. The gain that you get
from clarity is joy, purpose, peace, groundedness, stability, certainty. I
don't mean certainty in sort of a right wrong sort
of a way, but just certainty. Alignment, maybe that's a
(20:16):
better word. Alignment. That is what you gain when you
get your clarity. So you get to make a decision.
There's door A, and that's clarity. There's door B, and
that's all of the protection mechanisms, the coping mechanisms, the
survival tactics that you have been holding onto, the unhealthy
relationship patterns, the people pleasing, the playing small, the acting afraid,
(20:40):
the needing to be right, whatever it is for you
that you've been holding on to. You get to pick
either that or you get to pick your clarity. I
really do hope you'll pick your clarity, because as we
each pick our clarity, we become more powerful. We become
more powerful individually, and we've become more powerful as a group.
(21:01):
And when we become more powerful as a group. We're
able to scale the mountains that we thought we weren't
able to scale. We're able to fight the battles that
we didn't have the strength to fight before. And the
kind of changes that we're hoping to see in the world,
in our culture, in society, and the communities around us
that we've been begging to see, hoping to see, wanting
to see, are all going to come from individuals getting
(21:24):
aligned with their clarity, knowing what their story is really about,
knowing who they really are deep down in their gut
or in the highest version of their selves, Knowing clearly
who they are, embracing that clarity, and letting go of
all of the rest, all of the junk, all of
the bs that doesn't matter, that isn't really who you are.
(21:44):
So I hope you'll take the path of clarity. I
know that I'm doing that right now in my life.
I'm watching changes happen literally in front of my eyes
because I'm embracing my clarity and I'm letting go of
all of the rest. So I hope you'll do the same.
I'm grateful to be in this with you. I know
we're in an altogether. Also, don't forget Write your Story
comes out tomorrow May seventh. It's available now for pre order.
(22:07):
You can still get all your pre order bonuses for
one more day, so don't miss this or order the
book wherever you get books. The book will be to
you in the next couple of days. Go to Write
Yourstory dot com slash book and download eighteen hundred dollars
worth of pre order bonuses. I can't wait to share
this book with you, and I can't wait to hear
about your experience with it. We'll see you next time
on to Write your Story podcast. Until then, I'm Ali
(22:29):
Fallon
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