Yourself. The book emerged from my own struggles with fear, feelings of limitation, and the unrelenting criticism I heaped upon myself. Because I needed to practice the art of loving and being myself, this book was born. But it has survived and thrived because of you, the readers. Thank you from the depths of my heart!
Many of the women who first read the book are now mothers and grandmothers, and it's my hope and prayer that this revised edition will become a legacy they will want to pass on to their daughters and granddaughters.
The idea of writing The Courage to Be Yourself first occurred to me in the small groups and seminars that I and a dear friend, Bonnie Hampton, led for several years. As we explored women's issues— which included hopes, dreams, frustrations, fantasies, and fears—I was struck by the fact that whether married or single, stay-at-home moms or career women, old or young, the women in the groups struggled with similar anxieties and were saddled with comparable limiting beliefs. Amid both laughter and anguish, we helped each other transform common fears into the courage to express our authentic selves. Bonnie's and my goal was to provide simple but powerful tools for helping ourselves and participants enhance self-esteem and tap into our elusive but ever-present core of emotional strength.
I'm hoping the true stories and examples shared in The Courage to Be Yourself will act as a group experience for you to help you overcome any tendency you may have to undervalue yourself and to encourage you, instead, to fully love and appreciate how wonderful you really are. Sharing our journey with other women can uphold and sustain us as we find the courage to be uniquely ourselves and realize that emotional strength and self-esteem are, in fact, our birthright, our privilege, and our responsibility.
PART ONE
FINDING THE COURAGE TO BE YOURSELF
CHAPTER ONE
AN EXPANDED VISION OF SELF
I want, by understanding myself, to understand others. I want to be all that I am capable of becoming. . . . This all sounds very strenuous and serious. But now that I have wrestled with it, it's no longer so. I feel happy—deep down. All is well.
KATHERINE MANSFIELD (LAST JOURNAL ENTRY)
Because we have learned so much, finding the courage to be ourselves may be easier for some of us now than it was fifteen years ago when I began writing the first edition of this book. Easier because many women are reveling in a greater sense of personal freedom and embracing a more expansive vision of themselves. While we can still fall prey to fears and beliefs that limit us, we have also become more psychologically aware and therefore better able to understand, move through, and overcome challenging feelings and circumstances.
That's the good news. The flip side is that finding and sustaining the courage to be ourselves continue to be a challenge for many women, myself included. Why is it still so darn hard? One of the main reasons is that many of us were weaned on subtle and not-sosubtle innuendos regarding a “woman's role” and, as a result, were well trained to put ourselves last, if at all. Old, familiar habits and expectations such as these are not easily or quickly changed. Another deterrent to authenticity is the seemingly endless and ever expanding demands upon us. Over-commitment robs us of the time, energy, and interest necessary to ponder who we are and what we want or need.
It's true, we women are becoming increasingly independent and strong while continuing to love and support our friends, families, and communities. Ironically, the difficulty of being ourselves continues to be a common topic among women. Why do we so easily give ourselves away by doing more than we're comfortable doing? Why do we often succumb to the habit of devaluing ourselves and putting ourselves down? While no one is totally immune to the charm of outside approval, many of us are periodically mystified by the seemingly tenuous stability of our self-esteem and emotional well-being.
Most of us have spent a lot of time and effort redefining ourselves and discrediting inhibiting stereotypes. Given our hard and dedicated work to improve our feelings of self-worth, why is it so hard to hold on to a belief in ourselves when people react less than positively toward us? What causes our emotional strength to ebb away in the face of disapproval? Why does it take such effort for us to express what we really think and feel?
Faced with speaking my truth, especially if I fear it will lead to rejection of either myself or my ideas, often causes a lump to clog my throat and a heavy weight to settle on my heart. Am I a slow learner? Am I actually afraid of equality? Worse yet, am I an imposter?
No, I don't think so. And neither are you.
As the saying goes, we've come a long way. However, our training and socialization to accept second-class citizenry runs deep. And why wouldn't it? For millennia women have suffered punishments, ranging from denial of affection and support to being burned at the stake, for “stepping out of their rightful places.” Given our history, it makes sense that a deep-seated fear of speaking our mind, being ourselves, and living our dreams is woven into the very fabric of our being. We now have the unprecedented opportunity to courageously recreate and reweave our lives and, consequently, the lives of our daughters and granddaughters.
Granted, many societal and individual assumptions are very different than they were a decade ago when this book was first published. However, under the seemingly solid ground of respect and equality that women have earned often lurks a quagmire of lingering patriarchal attitudes and desires.
Laura and Dan's story is a good example. As a young couple, their roles were traditional. Laura stayed home with their three children while Dan worked to support the family. When the children left home, Laura wanted to return to her career as a home decorator. Dan was all for it, or so they thought. Laura said to me, “You know, Sue, I believed him when he encouraged me to take the necessary classes and resume my career. So I was confused and angry when he put blocks in my way. First, he upped his requests for me to do errands for him, like going to the bank and cleaners and picking up stuff for his business. Then he had a series of little accidents and needed me to care for him.” With a sigh, she continued, “I finally got it and asked him if, deep down, he resented my working. He denied it emphatically. But when he complained about never getting a good meal at home anymore, I knew that what he thought about my working was not what he felt!”
Luckily Laura and Dan have been able to work through this passage in their lives and consequently understand themselves and each other better. Dan was eventually able to see that, although he really wanted to support Laura's choice to work, he'd had a good thing going with a stay-at-home wife and felt abandoned when those perks diminished.
Change is hard for us all, men and women alike.
In fact, I have great compassion for both sexes as we weather the inevitable storms that accompany a change in paradigm. Thankfully many societies are now immersed in the process of converting from a patriarchal to an egalitarian paradigm. More simply put, we're transforming the model of Top Dog /Bottom Dog into Equal Partnership. In order to create and sustain these new cultural patterns we women must confront our own fears, including each tenacious tentacle that strangles our freedom to be ourselves. Not an easy task.
It's not easy for men or Top Dog–based organizations to adapt to the current necessary changes either. At the onset, women's increase in self-esteem and emotional strength can easily be perceived as a demotion in power and position to those accustomed to the loftiest perches on the pedestal. I clearly remember my husband, Gene, pensively lamenting, “I liked it the way it used
