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Henry: Hello, I am Henry Emmons and welcome back to Joy Lab.
Aimee Prasek: And I am Aimee Prasek. So today we're gonna answer this question, what does it really mean to be comfortable in your own skin?
At least that's what we're gonna explore. We're digging into that today as we explore self-alignment, that final piece of self-connection that helps us show up in the world as authentically us. And maybe you already know, we are in our month of Inspiration. That is our Element of Joy and we're in this series of self-connection with those three aspects that we've been digging into.
The first one, self-awareness, second self-acceptance, and then this one, self-alignment. So if you haven't heard any of the other, episodes for this month, I'll link 'em in the show notes. You can stay here for sure, or you can go back.
So [00:01:00] self-alignment is really close, I think, to how we use the word authenticity. Okay. You agree, Henry?
Henry: I do agree. Yeah, it's really interesting to come at it from this angle 'cause it's a little different, but, but
I think it's getting at the same thing. I really like that.
Aimee Prasek: So I'll link our authenticity series in the show notes as well. It'd be nice follow up to this, actually.
So the way we can think of self-alignment is that we are acting in ways that are consistent with our preferences, our internal states, values, expectations, even our intuitions, I would say, and as we're thinking about self-connection, uh, we've, we've practiced self-awareness and self-acceptance so that our behaviors kind of flow from those aspects, supporting self-alignment and then a sense of connection. So I like to think of it, you know, I'm outwardly or behaviorally showing [00:02:00] up as me.
I'm walking my talk. I'm living in ways that I feel are important and consistent with who I am.
Henry: Yeah. You know, I, I am thinking right now of somebody who I knew way back in college days who I think can just be described as being someone who's comfortable in her own skin. And as far as I know, she's always been like that, which in my experience, it's pretty rare for a young person, you know that that age.
It's really kind of rare at any age. Yeah.
So like do you know people like that? Aimee? Does anybody jump out at you?
Aimee Prasek: Um, yeah, but I mean, there's, it, I, it really is kind of this rare gift that you see in people.
Henry: Yeah.
Aimee Prasek: but it does shine through, so, but it is, it, it is not so common.
Henry: When you encounter someone like that, it's striking. I think [00:03:00] maybe because it's so uncommon.
Aimee Prasek: Right.
Henry: So, um, to me that this person and, and others who have that quality, uh, it's that they just seem at ease with who they are. Don't need to be any, anybody else. So even though they still do things like go to work, get into relationships with all of all that that brings, and maybe, you know, of course have their life struggles from time to time, but they just seem to know themselves and feel genuinely comfortable with themselves. So this woman I'm thinking about, and I actually don't know this to be true, but, what I imagine is that she doesn't read self-help books because why would she? She feels fine with herself as she is, but at the same time I imagine that she's still growing. You know, she's grow [00:04:00] growing as a person, but being self aligned like that, especially from an early age, I would imagine that growth just feels more natural, kind of organic, almost, not like it's a project or that there's this search for happiness that so many of us get caught up in. It's just kind of a normal, lifelong process without all of the extra stuff that we add to it.
Aimee Prasek: I'm just thinking back to when I was studying in India for a bit, I was at a, I went to a monastery and I was talking to this Geshe and brilliant person, wonderful conversation. We were talking about authenticity and self-alignment and I had said something to the effect, it feels like you know, you really, you've really nailed it.
You've got authenticity, you, I evolved self-alignment. And he said, well, look at this place. I have to dress this way. My schedule is totally planned in advance. I [00:05:00] get the food delivered to me. He's like, I have none of the sort of drama or variables outside of these walls that so many people deal with.
And not that it, those are things that, you know, make authenticity impossible. But it was just sort of this realization that yeah, you know, that very simple life where everybody is kind of doing the same thing you don't have those pressures of sort of showing up in a certain way necessarily. So you can have that sense of self-alignment, self-connection, authenticity, um, but man does it look different in the real world where, where everybody is not delivered food at the same hour, told to go to bed at the same time, wears the same clothes, which makes me think. So I wanna get into that just a little bit of playing with that word authenticity. I think we can kind of get caught up in that effort of how we show up externally. You know, how we [00:06:00] show up authentically as ourselves in the world and it almost feels like we're working from the outside in. And that external presentation is good. That's fun. There's ways to do that that are expressions of who we are, of course. But if we don't have a good grasp of who we are, we talked about self-awareness already and have self-acceptance of who we are, then, you know, what's the point of trying to dress like ourselves or talk in a certain way, sort of, you know, how we would show up in the world.
So self-alignment and self-connection I think can remind us that really knowing and accepting ourselves, letting that energy flow outward into authenticity, into self-alignment, fuels, that sense of self-connection and inspiration we all crave. And I guess the reason why I was thinking about that monk is it was sort of like, like the external piece of that was taken away, you know?
And so it was [00:07:00] that deep sense of self-alignment and self-connection that, and authenticity that didn't express itself outwardly. We, we kind of have that extra pressure when you, when you don't wear robes, to also do that effort. It just an interesting moment of aha for me.
Henry: Mm-hmm. So I'm liking this sequence that we're following in this series, self-awareness, self-acceptance and self-alignment. And I know that this is drawn from those researchers that you mentioned, a couple episodes ago, but I can't help but notice how similar this is to our shorthand model for how to apply mindfulness in everyday life, which is just listen to the how similar this seems. See, what is, i.e. self-awareness. Accept what is. In other [00:08:00] words,
self-acceptance. And act wisely, which I think is a really nice fit with this concept of self-alignment because it's, it's really about right action that flows from this deep inward sense of who we are and how we choose to be in the world with others.
I just think that's really interesting.
Aimee Prasek: I never noticed that until you said
it
Henry: taken me, it's taken me three, three episodes to notice that too.
Aimee Prasek: God, that's hilarious. Yep.
I love it.
Henry: Yeah. So again, self-awareness, which we talked about a couple episodes ago, is just the beginning.
That alone doesn't get us to where we want to go, which I can tell you from experience. I got tons of self-awareness, but it is not enough to be aware of your internal experience, you have to move on to be able to accept that [00:09:00] experience. So self-acceptance is the next really critical step. And I think if you only did those two things, you know, self-awareness and self-acceptance, you would still come out so far ahead
just by dropping that constant kind of harmful voice of the inner critic.
You know, we can just be a lot happier if we just did that and stop there. But I think this concept we're talking about today of self-alignment, if you really wanna live fully to be fully yourself, I think we've gotta take that next step of self-alignment. The way I see this is it, it has a lot to do with how we act in the world, you know, with the choices that we make based on seeing what we are and accepting what we are. And I think this has to more, this has more to do with who we are becoming because [00:10:00] who we are now, no matter how good we feel about ourselves, we are never finished. You know, we are constantly in this process of becoming.
Aimee Prasek: I love that you're, noting the progression and noting that self-awareness isn't enough just to, self-awareness gets so much attention, right? Oh God. Not self-aware. Not self-aware. But we probably all know people who are super self-aware and really caught up in that negative criticism 'cause it's sort of,
right. We talk about self-awareness to self-evaluation, to self-judgment. Man, you can just cycle in that all day long.
Henry: You can. Self-awareness alone can can be kind of a trap just going in this constant cycle.
Aimee Prasek: Right. Yeah. If you're not gonna put self-acceptance on the, on the other side of that, you might as well put yourself, your head in the sand, I think. Right. It'd probably be... well, that's a whole nother conversation. It might, it might be, it might be better for you. I don't know. I mean, I'm not gonna say that that would be better than [00:11:00] self-acceptance, but yeah, self-awareness is certainly not enough.
I, I think it's also important to note, maybe it's back to my, um, monk story there, um, is that self-alignment might be way easier for some folks. I think it's important to call out when we're talking about self-connection because self-connection in some ways is a community activity.
So let me get in that just a bit more.
Henry: Say more about that.
Aimee Prasek: So nobody can take away your self-awareness. Yes, I believe that, but the world can make it really hard to practice self-acceptance and the world can make it dangerous to practice self-alignment, which can make it really hard to feel self connected. For example, if you're told you're not worthy or welcome just the way you are, then it's really hard to behave in the ways that are consistent with who you are clearly.
Yep. And I think we've all experienced that. Not feeling welcome to show up as who you are. You may have heard it [00:12:00] growing up from a close adult who only demonstrated love if you met some standard, they had for you. Conditional acceptance like we got into last episode rather than unconditional acceptance. Or at a job where you're more of an introvert and the expectation is that everyone is an extreme extrovert. Or you may be hearing it loud and clear or in whispers when you just walk down the street, you might be getting clear messages that you don't belong, but that is not true. You do belong. Just as much as any other clump of cells around you.
You belong.
And so, those feelings of not belonging are certainly real to feel that way. But it's not that you don't belong. I think it's that we are a disconnected community full of a lot of folks who have a low self-connection, because as the evidence is so clear [00:13:00] on when we have strong self-awareness and self-acceptance, then our sense of belonging expands. Yes. And we are far more likely to accept others just as they are too. So it can be helpful to realize when environments might have made or are making our self-connection more difficult. And at the same time, self-connection is a skill and power that nobody can take away from you.
They might make it harder, but your self-connection is always there for you. And that's because it really is this inner experience that we're talking about, and in the case of self-alignment, it will express itself out. And so if we're having to moderate ourselves in some ways to stay safe or cope, I really think that we still can feel self-connection. We still can practice self-connection, even if we're having to moderate to stay safe like that is not gonna disconnect [00:14:00] us.
Um, okay, so the next question, how do we practice self-alignment? Whether we feel like it's more easy for us or hard for us, I think there are some really key strategies we can take, that are accessible for all of us to tap into more of this, sense of self-alignment, this sense of self-connection.
So part of it is letting that self-awareness and self-acceptance take some shape to name it, to see how it might come out of us. So one way to do this is to take your many selves lists that you created a few episodes ago. I'll link to that episode in the show notes. If you haven't done it yet, take that list and look it over and see which item from any of the categories that you identified. So creative, experiential, or attitudinal. See which item pops for you. Which of those items when you read it just sparks something in you. It doesn't matter what the item is. It doesn't have to be [00:15:00] some big thing like saving the oceans. It might be making and giving truffles or playing pickleball with your friends, whatever, whichever one pops for you the most, you're going to get artsy with it.
So you'll create a tattoo design for that item. This is coming from, um, cognitive behavioral therapy values clarification work. So if some of you practitioners are like, oh, this sounds interesting. The tattoo thing, I don't know where that came from. I like to draw doodle. So we're gonna take it into this tattoo realm.
Uh, so you'll create a tattoo design for that item that really popped for you. So think about and draw the colors, shapes, images, words, numbers, whatever that illustrate that value for you, that item. And you only have so much skin, so you wanna make it fairly concise. And it- does not have to be pretty or something that you actually put on your skin.
This [00:16:00] is not something next episode that you take to the tattoo and piercing shop down the road and
Henry: Oh, big sighs of relief.
Aimee Prasek: No worries, Henry. Henry is gonna come next week a massive face tattoo with like a tree of life. Um, so yeah, no pressure here. Have fun with it. I'm real bad at drawing too. I like to doodle, but I'm bad at it.
Or at least if somebody assessed it, I don't think I would get quality marks for art. But it does not matter. This is not about whether it's quote good or not. So just draw redraw again until you have a tattoo design that speaks to this value of yours. And if someone approached you, and asked, "Ooh, that's such an interesting tattoo. Tell me about it." You would be excited to point to pieces of it and describe what each symbolized and why it means so much to you. And then just hold onto that tattoo design for next episode. 'cause we'll play with it some more and hopefully it can [00:17:00] also be a little, um, source of inspiration for you. So design your tattoo.
That's a practice for today. I, it's surprisingly helpful for identifying, clarifying values and working in this self-alignment. I, I'm telling you folks, it sounds kind of silly, but it really is helpful.
Henry: Cool.
Aimee Prasek: Yeah.
Henry: I, I wanna read the opening lines of a poem that I was just struck by when I first saw it. This is some years ago, but I think it's relevant to what we're talking about. So here are the opening lines. "Now I become myself. It's taken time, many years, and places I have been dissolved and shaken, worn other people's faces." You could say maybe worn other people's tattoos.
Aimee Prasek: Hmm.
Henry: So that was written by a poet named [00:18:00] May Sarton, who I'd not heard of until I encountered this poem. She wrote this when she was 81 years old. Think of writing poetry like that at age 81. I just find it such a beautiful and honest reckoning of one's life and, and just kind of telling us what we intuitively know. Self-alignment does not come easily for a lot of us.
So Parker Palmer, who actually learned about this poem from, he put it this way in this little gem of a book that I've mentioned before. The book is called Let Your Life Speak, and here's what Parker wrote.
"What a long time it can take to become the person one has always been. How often in the process we mask ourselves in faces that are not our own." So [00:19:00] he is pointing out that this connection to true self is a frequent casualty of childhood. You kind of alluded to this earlier, Aimee, and, and one of the core tasks of aging, no matter how old we are, one of the core tasks of kind of growing into ourselves is to reclaim the birthright gifts of true self. So that might factor into your drawing and kind of your creative way of articulating who you are and what's important to you. So here's another quote from, from that same book, " We are disabused of original giftedness in the first half of our lives. Then if we are awake, aware, and able to admit our loss, we spend the second half trying to recover and reclaim the gift we once possessed." I think that just rings true. [00:20:00] And I think if, you know, if we really do take the time to try to uncover something, some part of ourselves, some quality or skill or passion, very often, not always, but very often, it'll go back to childhood and it'll have gone dormant for one of the reasons we've talked about. So really, who among us has not worn other people's faces, right? Living out the expectations of a parent, a teacher, a friend. We are trying so hard, so much of the time to be someone we are not. And who has not felt that their identity is shaken.
Aimee Prasek: Hmm.
Henry: We're unsure of who we really are, how to move forward, retain a sense of self. So when you take your reflective time in whatever way you like to do that, think about your own [00:21:00] life for a moment, the the arc of your life, and be gentle with yourself
Aimee Prasek: Hmm.
Henry: And maybe ask yourself this question, when did I begin to forsake myself? And what was it that prompted me to do so? And also what can I do now to reclaim the parts of myself that I wasn't able to hold onto, even if I knew that they were true for me?
Aimee Prasek: Hmm. When did you begin to forsake yourself and what prompted you to do so? That is such a powerful question. And there's a value in there too, right? There's like something really rich in there that, that prompted us to behave in a certain way, to protect ourselves, to protect somebody else. Like there's something really good in there, I think too.
I think what also, what's really powerful about this [00:22:00] work and what you, Henry and May Sarton and Parker Palmer highlight is that
what we're really doing here with self-alignment, self-connection, authenticity is not about fixing or building or even evolving ourselves. Yeah. It it like not in the sense of acquiring something we aren't yet, or, or getting something we don't yet have. It's about reclaiming ourselves, reconnecting ourselves.
Henry: Mm-hmm.
Aimee Prasek: So I, I hope this episode has maybe sparked a little inspiration to dig into some of those questions, to, to do some doodling, see what, what arises from your self-awareness, from your self-acceptance, and kind of what that shows, for, for maybe a, a wise action.
A way of being in the world that aligns with those two things, that self-awareness, that self-acceptance. Before we close, I, I do wanna share a bit [00:23:00] more wisdom from someone else who I think modeled self-alignment. Mahatma Gandhi. Here's what he said. "Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony."
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