Episode 144 -Are You Willing to Be Disliked? - The Way of Integrity - Part 3
Join us for the final installment of our series on The Way of Integrity by Martha Beck. Delve into the repercussions of going against the grain, strategies for handling pushback from others amid personal transformation, and the profound rewards of living authentically. This episode empowers you to courageously embrace your true self, shedding what no longer serves and embracing unparalleled joy and inner peace.
Topics
Importance of living in truth
Consequences of living in integrity
Embracing freedom and truth
Setting firm boundaries and pursuing one's truth
The power of external criticism
Links
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Resources for this episode:
📕 The Way of Integrity book
Transcript
[AUTO-GENERATED]
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:00:06]:
Welcome to the Self Growth Nerds podcast. I'm your host, Marie, a courage coach, creative soul, and adventure seeker. Since thru hiking the Pacific Crest Trail in 2019. I'm on a mission to help you embrace your most confident self so you can achieve your dreams too. If you're eager for deep conversations, big questions, and meaningful connections, join me on the quest to discovering how we can create a more magical and memorable life. Hello, nerds. How are you? I'm really good. This is the last part of the 3 part series about the Way of Integrity, one of my favorite books by the author, Martha Beck.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:00:52]:
If you haven't listened to the last 2 episodes, go listen because today's gonna make a lot more sense. But just as a reminder, in the 1st episode, we talked about how to know if you're out of alignment. In the 2nd episode, we discussed the, process to find and question the cultural beliefs that keep you trapped. And today, we're gonna talk about how to live in your truth and how to the to respond to the consequences that come with this change in your way of life. Because, yes, it's not all daisies and roses. Otherwise, Everyone would do it. No. It comes with challenges, and we're gonna talk about these.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:01:38]:
Okay. So the first order of business when you have decided to pursue the way of integrity is to stop lying, both with your words and your actions. You stop saying things you don't mean. You stop doing things you don't really wanna do. The problem with that is that you will for sure break the rules of a culture that matters to you, and you have to decide that it's worth it. To show you that it's worth it, let's do a little exercise. I want you to think about a person or a situation right now in your life with whom or in which you cannot be your real self. You got it? You brought it to your mind? Okay.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:02:27]:
Now when you're with this person or when you're in this situation, How do you feel physically? Describe it. For me, the sensations are a tight throat and uneasy breathing. And then ask yourself how you feel emotionally. To me, the words that come to mind are heaviness, anxiety, and uneasiness. Then the next step of the exercise is to imagine that you've drunk a potion that makes you completely immune to other people's opinions, and everyone else has drunk the same potion. So imagine yourself with the same person you thought about or in the same situation, but being comfortable to just speak your truth and to be your real self and being received by them in a very open, compassionate way. Take a moment to tune into what that would look like and what that would feel like. Remember, you you're under the spell of a potion where you don't care about what anyone else thinks, and they are also super loving and Have no negative thoughts or feeling whatsoever about your way of being.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:03:59]:
How would you feel physically? For me, the breathing has started feeling good again. I'm breathing well, and I have a sense of lightness and presence. How would you feel emotionally? The words that come to mind for me are Compassion and flow. Now imagine you could be with those sensations all the time. The more time you spend feeling good, the less you want to feel bad. It sounds silly, but let me give you a a concrete example. After going on a 6 month thru hike and feeling pure alignment for all these weeks. Getting back into line, getting putting myself back into a box felt nearly impossible.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:05:02]:
Freedom seems scary at first, but the more often you taste it, the more willing you're likely to be to ruffle some feathers and to go against the current. In the book, Martha writes, quote, when you move forward into your longing for truth, you will feel yourself gaining momentum. When you try to reverse back into the situation where you don't feel free, everything will fight you. Another analogy is moving into integrity is like petting a cat from front to back While moving away from your truth to please your culture feels like petting the same cat back to front. The more you imagine freedom and let yourself feel it, the stronger your yearning to stay in truth becomes. Think about this the sensations you experienced when I asked you to imagine someone or situation in which you cannot be your real self. This sensation is your prison, and you can be free from it if you stop lying, if you start committing to the truth. You will experience Some chaotic life changes.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:06:18]:
Yes. But you will become stronger, healthier, and so much more peaceful. Being able to shift between the feelings of misalignment and the feelings of freedom is going to help you strengthen Your commitment to integrity no matter how scary it is. Now let's talk about 2 of the consequences that make it scary and how you can respond to them. The first one is grief. Transformation doesn't happen overnight. It is a long process, and you cannot just jump too quickly into a new identity. That's not how our brains work.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:07:05]:
We must give ourselves time to adjust. One of my clients is a big people pleaser. She was conditioned to Put everyone else's needs before her own, and that's how she learned to receive love. Now she is learning to stand up for herself, to put herself first, to own her desires, but it's hard. It's what the life coach Brooke Castillo calls the river of misery. You're going against the current of your conditioning. If it feels familiar for you to please everyone because you've done it for decades, It's going to feel uncomfortable to stop doing so. Part of this process is what neuroscientists and cultural anthropologist Mario Martinez, calls mourning the known misery.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:08:07]:
I love that term. You're grieving who you used to be, the life you used to have. You are going to miss your go to coping mechanisms. You're going to miss the feeling of fitting in with the other people who feel miserable, who don't set boundaries, who don't stand up for themselves. It's kind of like getting rid of an old T shirt that you really love, but it's full of holes. There are friends that I just don't connect with anymore who still want to connect with me, but I'm not the me that they used to know. And that that's just sad, but I'm not going to force something that's not true anymore. And you know what else is sad? What I miss is being able to say what my job is to people on dating apps without being afraid that I'm gonna be met with judgment.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:09:05]:
When I told people I was a graphic designer, no one really cared. When I say I'm a life coach, it comes with some biases, and some people react negatively. That's okay. That tells me about them. It's it's a a filter of sorts, but, you know, sometimes I miss the comfort of being socially approved of. But because you miss something that you should go back. Just like an ex, you can miss an ex and feel sad, but that doesn't mean you made the wrong decision. The grief will eventually get better, And all you can do in the meantime is sit in it and have compassion for yourself.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:09:50]:
But you will eventually be free from it and have access to so much more joy than you ever did. The other consequence of following the way of integrity is what Martha's old therapist used to call change back attacks. It's people being annoyed with you because you're challenging their cultural compliance. I'm gonna give you a bunch of examples. Since I started exploring the world of ethical nonmonogamy, I've made friends with people who are polyamorous or are in open relationships, And they say that they've lost friend because of that, because their way of living threatens some of their monogamous friends. Let's say you're in a monogamous relationship with your partner. You're unhappy. You wish you could have more experiences outside your relationship or with your partner, but it's not a possibility, then you might start feeling resentment towards someone else who goes on adventures with their partner, who has that kind of relationship that you don't seem able to create.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:11:17]:
The resentment might turn into judgments, saying things like, oh, it's never gonna work. 1 of them is gonna meet someone else, and it's just gonna break up the relationship. I'm so much better off doing what I'm doing, judgment as a way to protect yourself. It might also turn into not wanting to spend time with them because you struggle to relate. Because whenever you look at them and their freedom. It reminds you of what you wish you had and makes you feel angry. I remember Glennon Doyle in her book Untamed. She said that when she started feeling happy and telling people about it, She started receiving so much more hate.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:12:03]:
People love someone who's miserable so much more because it's relatable. If you're not pursuing your truth, you might have a hard time dealing with people who are. I'm gonna give you, another example. When I started setting firm boundaries, I remember I was a freelancer, and, you know, clients sometimes would Times would ask ask me to do extra work on a project that goes outside the, initial scope that we had agreed upon, An old me would have said, oh, sure. No worries. Let me do it because I wanted to be nice. But eventually, I I started saying things like, oh, no problem. What's your budget? Because, of course, I wanna do the extra work, but I'm not gonna do it for free.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:12:50]:
Now the other person, on the other end might be totally fine with it if they know how to set their own boundaries. But if they don't, they might just think she's rude. Who the who does she think she is? That that's not nice, that would just tell me that they don't allow themselves that kind of behavior. In other words, the way you are following your truth is highlighting what they are repressing. Otherwise, they wouldn't mind that much. Culture relies on everyone agreeing. It relies on consensus. And when someone doesn't agree, the whole order is threatened.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:13:37]:
An example of that is a friend of mine who has studied children development talks a lot online about how screen time for kids is dangerous. It's really bad for them, and she has a lot of sound arguments to explain her reasoning, and yet she receives a lot of pushback from parents who want to keep feeling okay about putting their kids in front of a screen a lot of the time. They would prefer that she remains quiet even if she has important things to say so that they can keep doing what they've been doing because it's easier and more comfortable than making the effort of finding alternatives. My friend is sharing the information that she has learned in her research, and she's challenging the status quo. Just like nonmonogamous people demonstrate that the the social consensus to be monogamous is arbitrary. It's not the one and only way. And we're we're not saying here's the new truth. We're just saying, here's my truth.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:14:48]:
This also makes me think about trans people fighting for their rights. Some people make a big fuss even though the percentage of trans folks in the population is below 0%. It's like 0 point something percent. It's crazy. They think it well, if they break the rules of our society, then Everyone can break the rules too, and it's going to be chaos. We must stop them. What's super insidious is that people will be angry, yes, but they might Also make you feel that it's not too late to apologize for who you think you are and just come back into line. We will still love you if you if you say you're sorry and you do as we as we as we want you to, like like a a partner in a toxic relationship.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:15:37]:
Just say you're sorry, and it'll be okay even though they're the one who who did some something bad. Martha writes, quote, your loved ones may shame and blame you for disobeying the cultural rules of your relationship. They may try to manipulate you with displays of neediness, anger, or straight up aggression. If you're in in an oppressive system, you could get arrested or physically threatened. When someone embarks on integrity and refuses to look back. Culture pulls out its whole arsenal of control strategies to make them drop their stupid obsession with integrity and go back to acting normal, end quote. She experienced that when she left Mormonism and spoke out about what was going on in her community. Many people were pissed.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:16:33]:
Some people wanted her to, quote, repent and return to the fold. In that time, she spent a lot out of time curled up in a ball listening to her inner people pleaser telling her she had made a big mistake because that is likely to be one of our initial reactions to just wanna run back into the cave of comfort. Either fight, you know, fight, flight, freeze, fawn, you might wanna respond with an attack in return. You might wanna just say, Oh, never mind. I never meant it. You might wanna run away. You might wanna you know, sometimes I've wanted to move to a different country They imagine I could be my real self there without any pushback, but that might not be the best solution. The solution that Martha suggests in the book is to practice treating yourself the way you wish others would treat you.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:17:35]:
Now that might come into one ear and out the other. I'm gonna give you examples so you better understand what I mean. When I came back from the Pacific Crest Trail, I knew I wanted to start a business online, And, one of the first things that I did is create an online course to help people prepare mentally for long distance hiking. I received some hate because of that when I was promoting the course. Some people told me, Well, I would do that for free. How dare you charge money? You are evil. Now what I wanted to hear instead of that is, great on you that you're trying something new, and I'm sure it's going to help the right people. The reason why the haters' words would get to me so much is That part of me believed what they said, and what I needed to do in that moment is reinforce my belief in what I wish they would tell me.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:18:44]:
So reinforce the belief that it was very courageous of me to try something in you, and that I was going to be able to help the right people with that project because you already Have the voices of culture in your mind. We all do. And, yes, people might be hard on you when you do something that's out of the ordinary, but chances are you are the number 1 person being hard on yourself, and that's where we have the most power. That's where the biggest shift can happen. You must do what we talked about in the last episode, which is spot the judgmental thoughts within your self and question them. Free yourself from them. You have the power to do that. If someone attacks you and they say, I hate your blue hair, but you don't have blue hair, you just laugh in their face and think, okay.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:19:42]:
Well, something's wrong with them clearly. It wouldn't affect you. An attack only affects you when part of you still believes what the other person is saying. Martha says it beautifully. She writes, quote, when someone bothers us, it's because that person believes things about us that are not true, But shards of those same beliefs are still inside our own self-concept hanging out in our blind spots, end quote. Get this. The person whose attack upsets us the most is showing us what we have to work on and how to free ourselves. Let me give you a personal example.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:20:28]:
When I think about speaking publicly about my nonmonogamy. I feel like you guys, if it's just We're intimate. This this doesn't feel public to me even though there's a a 1000 people listening. But when I show my face, let's say, on social media or I show up to a a family gathering. I wouldn't have the same ease talking about this chosen way of life. And there's this 1 person that comes to mind in my circle whose opinion I am more scared of. I imagine what they would say, and what that tells me is that part of me still thinks They are right, and it is my job to unshame these parts of me. These people, and I'm sure you have them too.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:21:21]:
The people whose opinions, worry you the most are your teachers. They teach you how to stop standing in your own way. You wanna get to a place where whatever they say, you just think it's cute or funny or, you know, you just don't make a fuss about it because you know that they're wrong, and you let them be wrong about you because you know who you are. You know what's true about you. Let's say you're a parent and you have decided to take on a personal project. That means you're gonna spend time away from your kids, and some other parents says that it's selfish of you or implies that it is. What they say is going only going to impact you if part of you It agrees with them. If part of you thinks that it's selfish to, put yourself first once in a while, to have your own thing and also have kids.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:22:19]:
So that's when you have to go back to episode number 2 from last week and question this false belief that limits you from pursuing your truth. Because once it's been fully deconstructed and you own a different way of being and you're okay with your desires, What other parents say is not going to feel like an attack. It's just going to tell you about how They think how they might be limiting themselves, or maybe it's not a limit for them. It's just their values who are different from yours. It's not a matter of, better or worst or right and wrong. It's just, everyone has different truths. So Once you've seen the culture that you swim in clearly, once you have removed your blinders, Once you've started speaking the truth, once you have dealt with the pushback, What comes next is filling your time with life, is doing what you really wanna be doing in your heart. And that's when many of you, especially those socialized as women, are gonna go, no.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:23:39]:
But isn't that selfish? Like, I was, talking about in the example about parents. But no. Because when we commit to truth and start showing up as we are in doing what we want. We, quote, emanate the love in our essence. When we feel free, and it's been my personal experience, we wanna be kind, the real kind of kindness, not politeness, Not niceness. Real authentic kindness. We experience inner peace and wanna help others around us free themselves and feel the same, and that is beautiful. There was a a person in my life towards whom I used to feel a lot of, I wanna say hatred, but not quite hatred.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:24:31]:
It was mostly like A mix of jealousy and envy because I felt like they were living their best life, and I was not I was far from reaching my potential. And then the day I decided to attempt a thru hike of the Pacific Crest Trail, it was like magic. The vitriol I felt in their direction completely disappeared because suddenly, I was also allowing myself to do what I wanted. So I was not angry at them for being free because I had set myself free. We don't become selfish. We become more loving. The other thing that you might be afraid of is that if you, Let yourself do what you want. You're just gonna wanna stop working completely, become super lazy, and stay in bed all day.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:25:21]:
You know, the the 7 deadly sins we want to avoid at all costs. Well, in the book, Martha says that the things like sloth, greed, gluttony, and loss are just unbalanced relationships with rest, abundance, nourishment, and sex. And the lack of balance doesn't come when you allow yourself to be your true self. No. It comes when you have an internal split and need to try to make yourself feel better. If you have a job you hate, of course, you wanna you're gonna wanna spend all day sleeping. But think about a time where you might have been on holiday and you wanted to wake up early because you were excited about your day. Think about if you're in a relationship where you feel like you can't be yourself, When you're at home with your partner in the evening, you'll be much more likely to wanna binge Netflix shows so that you don't have to Sit with that partner and be reminded of how you feel around them.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:26:24]:
Versus if you're in a relationship that feels like home, You won't necessarily feel the need to to numb yourself with the shows or with whatever else you choose in order to avoid the situation that you're in. Something that will happen when you commit to truth is that you will start to glow, Just like you might glow when you're on vacation and you're really relaxed or how you might glow when you're with people that you really love that you laughed with. Your your smile is just different. And living like this on a daily basis, Not just 2 weeks per year requires a lot of courage because you're being seen as you r, and culture has taught us to make ourselves small, to not be too happy. Otherwise, it's obnoxious. So that's in the back of our mind. But Marianne Williamson wrote, quote, our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:27:34]:
It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us, end quote. When you start letting go of the lies and you start touching your truth, you start To shine. And, yes, lots of people might be blinded by your light like we talked about previously, but some people will be attracted to your light. I remember I had a a client who said she was starting to feel like a candle. Like, she was is lighting her herself up. And instead of chasing people, people would gather around her in the the halo of light that she was creating. That was such a beautiful image. It's interesting though because I've been there where I owned myself fully, and people told me, wow.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:28:30]:
There's something different about your presence. And one of my first reactions with fear. In the book, Martha writes, quote, remember, culture imbues almost all of us with the primal shame that tells us Our true nature is somehow bad, so we hide parts of ourselves, end quote. To me, being in Full integrity kind of feels like taking your foot off the brake of a car going down a hill. You're going fast and it's amazing. You've got You're here in the wind feeling great, but you could crash. And it makes you feel so vulnerable because you're not used to living this way. Have you ever experienced, revealing something you were scared to reveal To someone or, like, telling them something you felt ashamed of and the the other person doesn't budge, It's like they show you that they love you just as you are and what you said is is no big deal to them.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:29:34]:
They just receive you with open arms. It can almost be hard to accept. It can be hard to look them in the eyes. Kind of tempted to just put your foot back on the brake to go back in hiding where it feels more comfortable. It takes a lot of courage to be seen completely, for our soul to be naked. Martha says that in those moment, you must look the other person in the eye. These are transformative moments. She writes that she has seen these moments, quote, reduce primal shame and create the dance of being safe among humans.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:30:22]:
She says that if you allow yourself to be seen, if you keep following the way of integrity, You will, quote, learn to tolerate the radiance of your own soul and the beams of love it inevitably attracts. I'm gonna read that again. The radiant you will learn to tolerate the radiance of your own soul. That I don't know about you, but that is what I aspire to. I would not choose any other way of life. Life. I'd much rather be true to myself and be completely accepted as I am by 5 people then pretend to be someone that I'm not and be approved of by 200 people. Now you listen to this, and you might be thinking, yes.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:31:13]:
I want this as well. But keep in mind that transformation does not happen overnight. Instead, it happens in what Martha calls one degree turns and a lot of practice. We must deliberately act different and repeatedly so until old circuits in the brain fade and are replaced with the new ones. We have been wired for cultural compliance for years years years, and we are working to rewire ourselves for honesty and happiness. It takes time. Martha jokes that it's like DIY brain surgery, so you've got to be kind to yourself. And If you want help, if you're ready to dig deep and do the work, get on a free call with me.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:32:09]:
We're gonna chat about what feels true for you. What you have kept yourself from saying and experiencing, what you're afraid of might happen if you move forward on on the path of truth. And we're gonna also discuss how I can help you free yourself from those fears and find your way back to peace. So just go to self growth nerds.com/audacity, and there's a button there to book a call. It's completely free, and you get to decide if you wanna work together after or not. I'm gonna leave you with, a part of the book that I really loved. By the way, if you enjoyed these 3 episodes, go get the book, The Way of Integrity by Martha Beck. So she writes, quote, whenever we humans long for something, the powers that be immediately send it.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:33:07]:
Everything we have ordered is always delivered to our real home address. Peace. Everything you long for will meet you there, end quote. And peace is something that all my clients report to feeling more and more when we work together. So if that's something you long for, I cannot wait to meet you. And, otherwise, I will talk to you next week for the next episode. In the meantime, please share this series series about integrity with everyone in your life that you think could benefit. I'm sending you lots and lots of love, and I will talk to you soon.
Marie-Pier Tremblay [00:33:52]:
Bye. If you love what you're hearing on the Self Growth Nerds podcast and you want individual help finding a new direction for your life and developing the courage page to make your dreams a reality. You have to check out how we can work together on self growth around at self growth nerds. My clients say they would have needed that support years ago. So if you're tired of feeling like you're wasting your life, Don't wait. Get in touch now, and I cannot wait to meet you.