Feeling like you can’t express your true self without fear of rejection or misunderstanding? Are you sacrificing your authenticity to fit in or gain acceptance?
What if instead, you could embrace your deep, sensitive soul and shine as your authentic self? It’s possible. And it's easier than you think!
If you're like most sensitive souls, you want to feel understood and accepted for who you truly are.
In today’s episode, I’m going to give you steps to unmask your true nature and step into your authenticity. Whether you've been hiding out of fear or playing small to avoid rejection, you can learn to trust yourself and stand up for your truth.
You have the power to embrace your authenticity and thrive, shining brightly as your unique pixel in the bigger picture of life.
CONNECT WITH MICHELLE:
- Instagram @michelledowker_wellbalance
- Facebook @michelledowkerwellbalance
- Email michelle@michelledowker.com
FREE GUIDEBOOK:
Discover your Leadership Advantage https://michelledowker.thrivecart.com/astrology-guidebook/
WORK WITH MICHELLE:
Leadership Mapping Audit — Decode the design you were born to lead, decide, and live with alignment. https://michelledowker.thrivecart.com/audit/
Clarity Intensive — Pinpoint your next step with clarity, confidence, and direction. https://michelledowker.thrivecart.com/clarity
The Vantage Upgrade — Rewire your Inner Operating System to live as who you've become. https://wellbalance.ca/upgrade
Disclaimer:
This podcast is for informational & inspirational purposes only. Nothing shared is intended as medical, psychological, or personalized advice, and should not be used as a substitute for professional support.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Michelle Dowker (00:00):
Today's episode is one that I pulled out of my
recording vault of episodes thatI've recorded over the last
couple of years as I waspreparing to put together this
podcast.
In today's episode, I speakfrom the heart about expressing
who you are with confidence andnot fearing what other people
(00:20):
are going to think or say aboutyou and who you are.
I provide some very importantperspective shifting analogies
to help you see yourself in adifferent light, especially if
you've had a tendency to maskparts of yourself, play small or
hide parts of you away out offear of judgment, and how to
(00:43):
turn that around for yourself,so that you can express yourself
fully and confidently in whoyou are and in your work, so
that you can contribute to thegreater good of humanity in the
best way that is designed forwho you are.
Today I want to talk about theimportance of expressing the
(01:07):
true, authentic you, standing upfor who you truly are, instead
of hiding yourself, playingsmall or being someone that
you're not.
I know for those of us who aredeep, sensitive souls,
oftentimes we feel misunderstood.
Oftentimes we've felthistorically like we don't fit
in or that maybe we don't feellike we're accepted in certain
(01:32):
groups or within certaincommunities or around certain
people, and because of that,many of us who are deep,
sensitive souls have had atendency to mask ourselves, to
pretend that we're someone thatwe're not, in order to not be
(01:52):
rejected or to be accepted.
We might play small, we mighthide ourselves, keep our voice
suppressed, not express our truethoughts, not be who we really
truly are.
This helped us to survive somechallenging or difficult
(02:13):
situations in our lives.
This was a survival response toplay small, to mask ourselves,
to try to be someone that we'renot, in order to survive or fit
in.
Because our developmental needs, especially before the age of
seven, is to get acceptance andfeel belonging and safety,
(02:33):
especially from the adultsaround us that are raising us.
And if we didn't get that, thenwe are going to adopt these
survival behaviors in order totry to get that in any way we
can, even if it's only for afleeting moment, even if it's
not a true or deep connection ofbelonging or safety.
(02:55):
But it's enough to help us getby.
Survival mechanisms help us toget by, but what helps us to
survive is not what helps us tothrive, and you'll hear me say
this over and over and overagain, because it's that
important to recognize that whathelped you get through these
difficult situations is not thesame behavior, perspective and
(03:20):
paradigm that's going to helpyou thrive and flourish and step
into your fullest potential.
So I want to give you ananalogy today that might be
helpful to help you see theimportance of actually stepping
into your truth and expressingyour true nature, not hide it
away, not mask it, not to try tobe someone else, but to be you.
(03:43):
Think about a television screen,especially the old school
television screens that weremade up of all sorts of little,
tiny pixels, and each pixel putsoff a certain type of light at
a certain color, certainfrequency, and when you take all
those little pixels alltogether, they make up a bigger
(04:06):
picture.
You need to have all of thesepixels lit in order to see the
whole big picture on thetelevision screen clearly.
Now what happens if some ofthose pixels are not lit?
Then what happens is thatyou're going to see these dark
regions of the screen, of thebigger picture.
(04:26):
You're not going to see thefull picture clearly.
And so imagine that each andevery one of us is a pixel, and
if your pixel is not lit becauseyou're hiding, you're masking
and you're being someone elseother than yourself, then that
bigger picture is not going tobe clear.
Your contribution to the biggerpicture of this world is to
(04:50):
shine your pixel and shine itbright, and that's how we're
going to see the whole picture.
And I know this can be.
This can feel intimidating,right, especially if you have
been hiding out of safety yourwhole life.
There's many steps that you cantake to help yourself connect
(05:11):
with your true nature and feelcomfortable expressing your true
nature.
Always start with nervoussystem regulation.
This is always something that Itell people to start with.
It's the foundation of the workthat I do.
It's the starting point so thatyou can build your house on a
strong foundation of awell-regulated nervous system
(05:32):
with a nice wide window oftolerance.
But, of course, don't stopthere.
That's the starting point tocreate the nice strong
foundation so that you can buildyourself.
Upon Going through a journey ofunconditioning from all the
conditioned beliefs that youhave been led to believe, you
(05:52):
needed to follow all theexpectations and the shoulds
from within yourself, but mostlyfrom what has been modeled to
you through the behavior thatyou've been exposed to, through
the values that you've beenexposed to, through the
experiences that you've had,that you put meanings to, that
created the beliefs that youcarry within yourself.
So the experiences that youhave when you have those
(06:14):
experiences, you put meanings tothem and the meanings that
you've put to them leads to abelief, and that belief creates
a perspective.
One of the first steps is touncondition from these beliefs
and the perspectives and themeanings that you put to your
experiences so that you cancreate new meanings, so that you
can see a wider perspective ofwhat else is possible outside of
(06:39):
what you've been told tobelieve About yourself, about
others, about how life operates,about how reality works.
There are always other ways tolook at things, especially
yourself.
When you change the way youlook at things, the things you
look at change, and this isespecially important when it
comes to how you look atyourself and your conditioned
(07:02):
beliefs.
All that conditioning that hasbeen put on you really impacts
how you see yourself.
So it's really important toactually identify all of the
conditioning, because reallyit's kind of like the Wizard of
Oz behind the curtain and youhave been thinking one way about
it and it's been controllingyou and running your life, and
(07:23):
when you see the truth that it'sjust some old, feeble guy
behind a curtain with tricklevers, then you realize the
truth of all this conditioningit's been running your life for
all this time and you realizeit's actually not real and that
can take some time.
That can take some time to havethat actually kind of like
(07:44):
percolate in and understand itnot only from an intellectual or
mind level but actuallyunderstand it from your being
from within yourself.
Right, I see this over and overagain with my clients.
Is there's the one point wherethey're like, yeah, yeah, I get
it.
And then there's this nextpoint, after they've done some
(08:05):
of this shifting work, wherethen they go oh, I get it now.
I know you've told me this halfa dozen times and I thought I
got it, now I get it.
This is the magic of not onlydoing the conscious work, the
top down work, but also doingthe subconscious shifting work
(08:29):
and the bottom up, somatic bodyprocessing work and shifting on
an energetic level, because weare not just physical, we are
energy.
This has been proven.
All of these things shift howyou perceive things, how you see
things, how you think aboutthings and how you interact with
(08:52):
your thoughts, and it changesyour entire inner paradigm.
And it starts withunconditioning from all the
things that you thought were thetruth, and now you're realizing
, oh, that was just like thewizard behind the curtain.
Once you see that, then you canstart to really meet who you are
, identify who that person isunderneath all those layers of
(09:14):
conditioning, really develop anew, up-leveled, compassionate
relationship with that person,get to know who you really are,
what you really want, and as youdo, you start to learn how to
trust yourself and trust yourinner knowing and trust your
voice, especially when you'vebeen told that what you're
(09:36):
saying is not true or you'vebeen gaslit or you've been made
to believe that who you areisn't acceptable.
And I mean this is especiallytrue, for example, for me being
a highly sensitive person.
For most of my life I was ledto believe that my sensitivity
was a flaw, that was wrong, thatI needed to fix and that led me
(09:58):
to not trust myself.
When you're told over and overand over again you're
conditioned to believe who youare and what you're saying and
what you're about is wrong, ofcourse you're not going to trust
yourself.
But it was like the wizardbehind the curtain.
And once you can see that truthand start to accept yourself and
love yourself and havecompassion for yourself, then
(10:19):
you can learn how to trustyourself.
And you can learn what thelanguage is of your inner
guidance system because it has alanguage and you can learn to
translate it and decipher it andhear it.
And then you can start to standup for your truth and start
expressing yourself and yourvoice and your truth and no
longer hide, no longer playsmall and no longer try to be
(10:42):
somebody else in order to gainacceptance or avoid rejection,
because you find that acceptancewithin yourself and when you do
, you realize the truth that ifsomebody is not accepting you
and somebody is rejecting you,it's because they're not meant
for you.
They're all unique.
We all resonate at our ownunique radio station frequencies
(11:04):
.
We play our own music and somemusic stations, some people are
not going to like that style ofmusic.
So if you're classical music,the heavy metal station, people
aren't necessarily going to likewhat you're saying, doing,
playing, and that doesn't makeyou wrong.
It doesn't mean that you'rewrong or that anything is wrong
(11:24):
with you.
It's just that those people arevibing over here and you're
vibing over here and that doesnot mean that you should try to
change yourself to fit in withthe heavy metal music people
over at this station, becausethen you're not going to be in
alignment with your authenticity, they're not going to get to
(11:45):
know the real you and you're notgoing to be happy, you're not
going to be shining your pixelof the big picture and because
of that, everybody is going tomiss out on seeing the true
bigger picture with clarity.
Not only does it benefit you toconnect with yourself and
staying strong for your truthand be authentic for yourself,
(12:08):
but it benefits everybody,everybody, not just you, but it
starts with you.
You need to do this for youfirst, and if you don't, then
everybody misses out.
I hope this is a helpful analogyfor you, a helpful perspective
shift to remind you of theimportance, how important it is
(12:29):
for you to connect with yourself, understand who you are, what
you actually want and stand upfor it.
Stand up for your truth,express your truth, be authentic
and don't hide.
The world needs you now morethan ever to do that.
And if this has been you andyou've been hiding yourself or
(12:49):
trying to be someone else ortrying to change yourself, I
hope this helps you realize andrecognize the importance of
coming home to you.
Take what you need leave therest behind, and I hope this was
helpful.
If this episode resonated withyou and you're looking for some
personalized guidance to helpyou move and expand through
(13:09):
these perspective shifts andinto your fullest version of
yourself in your life and yourwork, you might find my eight
week self discovery intensivePermission to Shine to be
something that you might findinteresting.
In Permission to Shine, I guideyou one on one through a
(13:30):
personalized journey where Ihelp you to give yourself the
fullest permission to expressyour truth unapologetically, and
you're going to learn how torun your business and your work
from a place of inner, authenticalignment, where every aspect
resonates with your values, yourpassions and your deepest
desires and you feel fullyconfident to express your own
(13:54):
inner message unapologetically.
By the end of our eight weekjourney together, you'll
confidently drop the masks, playbig and share your most
powerful gifts with the world.
As a result, you'll experienceexponential growth and impact,
fulfillment and income.
If this sounds like somethingyou're looking for, check out
(14:17):
the details in the show notesand fill out the application
form, and then we can set up adiscussion to see if we're a fit
to work together.
If this sounds like you, I lookforward to hearing from you.
Today's episode is one that I pulled out of my
recording vault of episodes thatI've recorded over the last
couple of years as I waspreparing to put together this
podcast.
In today's episode, I speakfrom the heart about expressing
who you are with confidence andnot fearing what other people
(00:20):
are going to think or say aboutyou and who you are.
I provide some very importantperspective shifting analogies
to help you see yourself in adifferent light, especially if
you've had a tendency to maskparts of yourself, play small or
hide parts of you away out offear of judgment, and how to
(00:43):
turn that around for yourself,so that you can express yourself
fully and confidently in whoyou are and in your work, so
that you can contribute to thegreater good of humanity in the
best way that is designed forwho you are.
Today I want to talk about theimportance of expressing the
(01:07):
true, authentic you, standing upfor who you truly are, instead
of hiding yourself, playingsmall or being someone that
you're not.
I know for those of us who aredeep, sensitive souls,
oftentimes we feel misunderstood.
Oftentimes we've felthistorically like we don't fit
in or that maybe we don't feellike we're accepted in certain
(01:32):
groups or within certaincommunities or around certain
people, and because of that,many of us who are deep,
sensitive souls have had atendency to mask ourselves, to
pretend that we're someone thatwe're not, in order to not be
(01:52):
rejected or to be accepted.
We might play small, we mighthide ourselves, keep our voice
suppressed, not express our truethoughts, not be who we really
truly are.
This helped us to survive somechallenging or difficult
(02:13):
situations in our lives.
This was a survival response toplay small, to mask ourselves,
to try to be someone that we'renot, in order to survive or fit
in.
Because our developmental needs, especially before the age of
seven, is to get acceptance andfeel belonging and safety,
(02:33):
especially from the adultsaround us that are raising us.
And if we didn't get that, thenwe are going to adopt these
survival behaviors in order totry to get that in any way we
can, even if it's only for afleeting moment, even if it's
not a true or deep connection ofbelonging or safety.
(02:55):
But it's enough to help us getby.
Survival mechanisms help us toget by, but what helps us to
survive is not what helps us tothrive, and you'll hear me say
this over and over and overagain, because it's that
important to recognize that whathelped you get through these
difficult situations is not thesame behavior, perspective and
(03:20):
paradigm that's going to helpyou thrive and flourish and step
into your fullest potential.
So I want to give you ananalogy today that might be
helpful to help you see theimportance of actually stepping
into your truth and expressingyour true nature, not hide it
away, not mask it, not to try tobe someone else, but to be you.
(03:43):
Think about a television screen,especially the old school
television screens that weremade up of all sorts of little,
tiny pixels, and each pixel putsoff a certain type of light at
a certain color, certainfrequency, and when you take all
those little pixels alltogether, they make up a bigger
(04:06):
picture.
You need to have all of thesepixels lit in order to see the
whole big picture on thetelevision screen clearly.
Now what happens if some ofthose pixels are not lit?
Then what happens is thatyou're going to see these dark
regions of the screen, of thebigger picture.
(04:26):
You're not going to see thefull picture clearly.
And so imagine that each andevery one of us is a pixel, and
if your pixel is not lit becauseyou're hiding, you're masking
and you're being someone elseother than yourself, then that
bigger picture is not going tobe clear.
Your contribution to the biggerpicture of this world is to
(04:50):
shine your pixel and shine itbright, and that's how we're
going to see the whole picture.
And I know this can be.
This can feel intimidating,right, especially if you have
been hiding out of safety yourwhole life.
There's many steps that you cantake to help yourself connect
(05:11):
with your true nature and feelcomfortable expressing your true
nature.
Always start with nervoussystem regulation.
This is always something that Itell people to start with.
It's the foundation of the workthat I do.
It's the starting point so thatyou can build your house on a
strong foundation of awell-regulated nervous system
(05:32):
with a nice wide window oftolerance.
But, of course, don't stopthere.
That's the starting point tocreate the nice strong
foundation so that you can buildyourself.
Upon Going through a journey ofunconditioning from all the
conditioned beliefs that youhave been led to believe, you
(05:52):
needed to follow all theexpectations and the shoulds
from within yourself, but mostlyfrom what has been modeled to
you through the behavior thatyou've been exposed to, through
the values that you've beenexposed to, through the
experiences that you've had,that you put meanings to, that
created the beliefs that youcarry within yourself.
So the experiences that youhave when you have those
(06:14):
experiences, you put meanings tothem and the meanings that
you've put to them leads to abelief, and that belief creates
a perspective.
One of the first steps is touncondition from these beliefs
and the perspectives and themeanings that you put to your
experiences so that you cancreate new meanings, so that you
can see a wider perspective ofwhat else is possible outside of
(06:39):
what you've been told tobelieve About yourself, about
others, about how life operates,about how reality works.
There are always other ways tolook at things, especially
yourself.
When you change the way youlook at things, the things you
look at change, and this isespecially important when it
comes to how you look atyourself and your conditioned
(07:02):
beliefs.
All that conditioning that hasbeen put on you really impacts
how you see yourself.
So it's really important toactually identify all of the
conditioning, because reallyit's kind of like the Wizard of
Oz behind the curtain and youhave been thinking one way about
it and it's been controllingyou and running your life, and
(07:23):
when you see the truth that it'sjust some old, feeble guy
behind a curtain with tricklevers, then you realize the
truth of all this conditioningit's been running your life for
all this time and you realizeit's actually not real and that
can take some time.
That can take some time to havethat actually kind of like
(07:44):
percolate in and understand itnot only from an intellectual or
mind level but actuallyunderstand it from your being
from within yourself.
Right, I see this over and overagain with my clients.
Is there's the one point wherethey're like, yeah, yeah, I get
it.
And then there's this nextpoint, after they've done some
(08:05):
of this shifting work, wherethen they go oh, I get it now.
I know you've told me this halfa dozen times and I thought I
got it, now I get it.
This is the magic of not onlydoing the conscious work, the
top down work, but also doingthe subconscious shifting work
(08:29):
and the bottom up, somatic bodyprocessing work and shifting on
an energetic level, because weare not just physical, we are
energy.
This has been proven.
All of these things shift howyou perceive things, how you see
things, how you think aboutthings and how you interact with
(08:52):
your thoughts, and it changesyour entire inner paradigm.
And it starts withunconditioning from all the
things that you thought were thetruth, and now you're realizing
, oh, that was just like thewizard behind the curtain.
Once you see that, then you canstart to really meet who you are
, identify who that person isunderneath all those layers of
(09:14):
conditioning, really develop anew, up-leveled, compassionate
relationship with that person,get to know who you really are,
what you really want, and as youdo, you start to learn how to
trust yourself and trust yourinner knowing and trust your
voice, especially when you'vebeen told that what you're
(09:36):
saying is not true or you'vebeen gaslit or you've been made
to believe that who you areisn't acceptable.
And I mean this is especiallytrue, for example, for me being
a highly sensitive person.
For most of my life I was ledto believe that my sensitivity
was a flaw, that was wrong, thatI needed to fix and that led me
(09:58):
to not trust myself.
When you're told over and overand over again you're
conditioned to believe who youare and what you're saying and
what you're about is wrong, ofcourse you're not going to trust
yourself.
But it was like the wizardbehind the curtain.
And once you can see that truthand start to accept yourself and
love yourself and havecompassion for yourself, then
(10:19):
you can learn how to trustyourself.
And you can learn what thelanguage is of your inner
guidance system because it has alanguage and you can learn to
translate it and decipher it andhear it.
And then you can start to standup for your truth and start
expressing yourself and yourvoice and your truth and no
longer hide, no longer playsmall and no longer try to be
(10:42):
somebody else in order to gainacceptance or avoid rejection,
because you find that acceptancewithin yourself and when you do
, you realize the truth that ifsomebody is not accepting you
and somebody is rejecting you,it's because they're not meant
for you.
They're all unique.
We all resonate at our ownunique radio station frequencies
(11:04):
.
We play our own music and somemusic stations, some people are
not going to like that style ofmusic.
So if you're classical music,the heavy metal station, people
aren't necessarily going to likewhat you're saying, doing,
playing, and that doesn't makeyou wrong.
It doesn't mean that you'rewrong or that anything is wrong
(11:24):
with you.
It's just that those people arevibing over here and you're
vibing over here and that doesnot mean that you should try to
change yourself to fit in withthe heavy metal music people
over at this station, becausethen you're not going to be in
alignment with your authenticity, they're not going to get to
(11:45):
know the real you and you're notgoing to be happy, you're not
going to be shining your pixelof the big picture and because
of that, everybody is going tomiss out on seeing the true
bigger picture with clarity.
Not only does it benefit you toconnect with yourself and
staying strong for your truthand be authentic for yourself,
(12:08):
but it benefits everybody,everybody, not just you, but it
starts with you.
You need to do this for youfirst, and if you don't, then
everybody misses out.
I hope this is a helpful analogyfor you, a helpful perspective
shift to remind you of theimportance, how important it is
(12:29):
for you to connect with yourself, understand who you are, what
you actually want and stand upfor it.
Stand up for your truth,express your truth, be authentic
and don't hide.
The world needs you now morethan ever to do that.
And if this has been you andyou've been hiding yourself or
(12:49):
trying to be someone else ortrying to change yourself, I
hope this helps you realize andrecognize the importance of
coming home to you.
Take what you need leave therest behind, and I hope this was
helpful.
If this episode resonated withyou and you're looking for some
personalized guidance to helpyou move and expand through
(13:09):
these perspective shifts andinto your fullest version of
yourself in your life and yourwork, you might find my eight
week self discovery intensivePermission to Shine to be
something that you might findinteresting.
In Permission to Shine, I guideyou one on one through a
(13:30):
personalized journey where Ihelp you to give yourself the
fullest permission to expressyour truth unapologetically, and
you're going to learn how torun your business and your work
from a place of inner, authenticalignment, where every aspect
resonates with your values, yourpassions and your deepest
desires and you feel fullyconfident to express your own
(13:54):
inner message unapologetically.
By the end of our eight weekjourney together, you'll
confidently drop the masks, playbig and share your most
powerful gifts with the world.
As a result, you'll experienceexponential growth and impact,
fulfillment and income.
If this sounds like somethingyou're looking for, check out
(14:17):
the details in the show notesand fill out the application
form, and then we can set up adiscussion to see if we're a fit
to work together.
If this sounds like you, I lookforward to hearing from you.
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