Quotes About Authenticity

connection with others can only be as deep as our connection with ourselves. If I don't know and understand who I am and what I need, want, and believe, I can't share myself with you.

if we want freedom from perfectionism, we have to make the long journey from "What will people think?" to "I am enough." That journey begins with shame resilience, self-compassion, and owning our stories.

Belonging is being somewhere where you want to be, and they want you. Fitting in is being somewhere where you really want to be, but they don't care one way or the other. Belonging is being accepted for you. Fitting in is being accepted for being like everyone else. I get to be me if I belong. I have to be like you to fit in.

Shame resilience is the ability to practice authenticity when we experience shame, to move through the experience without sacrificing our values, and to come out on the other side of the shame experience with more courage, compassion, and connection than we had going into it. Ultimately, shame resilience is about moving from shame to empathy—the real antidote to shame.

The irony is that when we're standing across from someone who is hidden or shielded by masks and armor, we feel frustrated and disconnected. That's the paradox here: Vulnerability is the last thing I want you to see in me, but the first thing I look for in you.

Last, perfectionism is not a way to avoid shame. Perfectionism is a function of shame.

We can only belong when we offer our most authentic selves and when we're embraced for who we are.

I learned how to worry more about how I felt and less about "what people might think." I was setting new boundaries and began to let go of my need to please, perform, and perfect. I started saying no rather than sure (and being resentful and pissed off later).

connections, so part of my transformation was owning and celebrating

Here's the crux of the struggle: I want to experience your vulnerability but I don't want to be vulnerable. Vulnerability is courage in you and inadequacy in me. I'm drawn to your vulnerability but repelled by mine. As

If we want to live a life of meaning and contribution, we have to become intentional about cultivating sleep and play. We have to let go of exhaustion, busyness, and productivity as status symbols and measures of self-worth. We are impressing no one.

Don't get too emotional, but don't be too detached either. Too emotional and you're hysterical. Too detached and you're a coldhearted bitch.

We either own our stories (even the messy ones), or we stand outside of them—denying our vulnerabilities and imperfections, orphaning the parts of us that don't fit in with who/what we think we're supposed to be, and hustling for other people's approval of our worthiness.

You can't fully grow and contribute behind armor. It takes a massive amount of energy just to carry it around—sometimes it takes all of our energy.

Nothing - not prestige, power or pride - is worth sacrificing the things that you truly want, the things that you truly love. "Don't be afraid to take time and smell the roses. Don't hesitate in seeking out those things you hold dear. Seeking them out and holding on to them. And don't ever cease standing up for what you believe in, and fighting for those things that you want. Life is too short. Do what makes you happy, regardless of how others might feel.

But, if we're not careful, it is quite possible and tempting to be more in love with the idea of reconciliation than to actually engage in the actual work of reconciliation—the arduous, painful and messy marathon work of reconciliation. That's the pivotal question we must ask: Are we more in love with the idea of following Jesus than actually following Jesus—including to and through some difficult areas?

Everybody is original, if he tells the truth, if he speaks from himself. But it must be from his *true* self and not from the self he thinks he *should* be.

Work freely and rollickingly as though you were talking to a friend who loves you. Mentally (at least three or four times a day) thumb your nose at all know-it-alls, jeerers, critics, doubters.

If I did not wear torn pants, orthopedic shoes, frantic disheveled hair, that is to say, if I did not tone down my beauty, people would go mad. Married men would run amuck.

writing is not a performance but a generosity.

The only way to write well, so that people believe what we say and are interested or touched by it, is to slough off all pretentiousness and attitudinizing.

The only way to find your true self is by recklessness and freedom.

Your motto: Be Bold, be Free, be Truthful

In her 93 remarkable years, Brenda Ueland published six million words. She said she had two rules she followed absolutely: to tell the truth, and not to do anything she didn't want to do.