Yesterday I cried

Yesterday I watched a movie. With a sad ending. And I cried. And it felt relieving. Relieving letting go of all built-up tension and sorrow. Like opening a valve to let pressure out. Pressure that does not serve me.

And I stayed with my tears, let myself cry to examine what they were made of. What they carried.

My tears carried my own failures and shortcomings. The sorrows of all the times I have let myself down. Where I have not dared to be my whole self, true to what is really me. To myself and to others.

My tears carried the pain I see in people I meet. The pain of not being able to be true to them selves. The pain of hiding, changing and judging oneself in the belief that “I am not good enough.” Or “I cannot show ‘this’ to others”.

My tears carried the inter-relational pain I see where people are not true to each other. The pain that is born when we don’t talk to, but about each other. The pain when we avoid speaking our hearts and minds to each other, in fear of creating conflict. The pain when we do not seek connection. When we hide in our shells and build our fortresses instead of seeking common ground and create unity.

We are human beings. We are social beings. We are loving, living beings. We are meant to take part in the world, and we feel better when we connect to one another other. When we strive to understand one another. When we let one another be our whole selves, with strengths and skills, faults and flaws.

Both individuals and organizations may flourish if we manage to reach wholeness, as Laloux calls it. Psychological safety as Google puts it. Or communicate with the purpose of creating connection, as Marshall Rosenberg puts it.

The first step on this path is to really connect to yourself. For if we are not in connection with ourselves, how can we possibly strive for connection with others.

Accept this challenge:

Set a timer on your mobile every two hours. Every time it goes off, spend 30 seconds of connecting with yourself. Register your thoughts, emotions and physical sensations.

Name them! Don’t judge them! This will create awareness and connection with you. Awareness and connection that later can be widened to others. Starting to heal. Starting to end the pain that my tears carried!