Am I Ready to be Myself?

Mark Nepo’s “The Book of Awakening” lives on my nightstand. It contains 366 brief, inspirational, and thought-provoking pieces about the power and necessity of living authentically. I know I’m supposed to read just one piece each day (with one freebie, for when it’s not a leap year), but I find myself devouring at least two or three every morning. Nepo’s entry entitled “Endgame” expresses truths—and a question—that have been churning inside of me. Here’s an excerpt:

I don’t know if it is human nature or the way of life on Earth, but we seldom become all of who we are until forced to do it. Some say that something in us rises to the occasion, that there is, as Hemmingway called it, “a grace under pressure” that comes forth in most of us when challenged. Others say this talk of grace is merely a way to rationalize hard times and painful experience, a way to put a good face on tragedy.

Yet beneath all the talk of tragedy and grace, I have come to believe that we are destined to be opened by the living of our days, and whether we like it or not, whether we choose to participate or not, we will, in time, every one of us, wear the deeper part of who we are as a new skin.

Either by erosion from without or by shedding from within—and often by both—we are forced to live more authentically. And once the crisis that opened us passes, the real choice then becomes: Will we continue such authentic living?

I wonder if you will understand what I mean when I say that I’ve been asking myself whether I am ready to be well again. Of course, I’m ready to be done with the tachycardia, fatigue, brain fog, and headaches. But am I ready to be well and still continue on this path of growth? Am I ready to be well and still choose mindfulness over the hurry and hustle? Am I ready to be well but still be discerning about who and what I allow into my life? If I once again have a body that allows me to power and push and people-please, will I still honor my own needs, boundaries, and truths? In short, am I ready to be well and fully committed to living authentically?

This isn’t an intellectual question, and an intellectual answer won’t suffice. As Rilke once put it, I must live my way into the answer.

Please don’t think that I’m touting ‘readiness’ as some magic-bullet miracle cure. Health isn’t something we must earn, anymore than disability is something we deserve. For me, readiness is simply an intention to hold and a longing to lean into. If or when I fully recover, I want to be ready to keep living from a place of authenticity and vulnerability.

Here’s a lovely byproduct of this intention to be ready: as I live my way into readiness, I live my way into a richer and truer life—whether or not I physically recover. If ten years from now I am still sick, I won’t look back and say “Damn, I wish I hadn’t wasted all that effort on being true to myself. It didn’t even fix my health.” The risk is very real, though, that I could look back and say, “WTF, Lisa, why did you wait around for recovery to start the hard work of being yourself—the messy, vulnerable, life-affirming work of wearing the deeper part of who you are as a new skin?”

I don’t want to sit with the discomfort of that regret one month, one year, or one decade down the line. So, I’m trying to sit instead with the discomfort of turning inside out. I’m trying to lean into the exhilarating unease of exposing buried bits of soul to sun and air. There is a sense in which I have lost parts of myself to this illness, but there is another sense—just as real—in which I am becoming more myself than ever before.

How about you? In what ways are you resisting, allowing, or experiencing the shedding of old selves or the wearing of the deeper parts of yourself as a new skin?

As always, thank you for being here! If this email means something to you, throw it a heart, pass it along to a friend, share on social media, post a comment, send a reply, or buy me a coffee using the button below. I’ll be in touch again next week!