Quotes About Authenticity

If we want to be fully engaged, to be connected, we have to be vulnerable. In order to be vulnerable, we need to develop resilience to shame.

Mean and nasty is my default setting. It doesn't take courage for me to be shaming back. I can use my shame superpowers for evil in a split second. Letting myself feel hurt—that's a totally different story. I think your default is my courage.

Cultivating authenticity: letting go of

To let ourselves sink into the joyful moments of our lives even though we know that they are fleeting, even though the world tells us not to be too happy lest we invite disaster—that's an intense form of vulnerability.

I'm not here so my business self can talk to their business selves. I'm here to talk from my heart to their hearts. This is who I am.

Who do you call to work through the mean-nasties or the cry 'n' hides or the people-pleasing? 4. What's the most courageous thing you could do for yourself when you feel small and hurt?

comparing ourselves to others leads us to fear, anger, shame, and sadness.

Living into our values means that we do more than profess our values, we practice them. We walk our talk—we are clear about what we believe and hold important, and we take care that our intentions, words, thoughts, and behaviors align with those beliefs.

define narcissism as the shame-based fear of being ordinary.

Perfectionism is not the key to success.

Healthy striving is self-focused: How can I improve? Perfectionism is other-focused: What will people think? Perfectionism is a hustle.

I didn't realize it then, but looking back, those permission slips to myself were actually an attempt to belong to myself and to no one else.

If we want greater clarity in our purpose or deeper and more meaningful spiritual lives, vulnerability is the path.

In 2010, two years after that event, I wrote The Gifts of Imperfection, a book that introduced my research on the ten guideposts for wholeheartedness.

Get Inspired: I'm inspired by everyone who shares their work and opinions with the world. Courage is contagious. My friend Katherine Center says, "You have to be brave with your life so that others can be brave with theirs." 3

If you want to kick-start your shame resilience and story-claiming, start with these questions. Figuring out the answers can change your life: 1. Who do you become when you're backed into that shame corner? 2. How do you protect yourself? 3.

As a shame researcher, I've learned that wherever perfectionism is driving us, shame is riding shotgun.

know that asking for what we need and talking openly about our expectations is vulnerable.

vulnerability—the willingness to show up and be seen with no guarantee of outcome—is the only path to more love, belonging, and joy.

courage insists that I honor it by choosing my voice over my comfort.

The root of the word courage is cor—the Latin word for heart. In one of its earliest forms, the word courage had a very different definition than it does today. Courage originally meant "To speak one's mind by telling all one's heart." Over

When we spend our lives pushing away and protecting ourselves from feeling vulnerable or from being perceived as too emotional, we feel contempt when others are less capable or willing to mask feelings, suck it up, and soldier on.

Courage and fear are not mutually exclusive. Most of us feel brave and afraid at the exact same time. We feel vulnerable.

but in our social media world, it's increasingly difficult to determine what's a real attempt to connect and what's performance. The only thing I do know is that it's not vulnerability.