I’m not the church lady | Living inside a world that mistakes appearance for essence

||| I’M NOT THE CHURCH LADY by ROSIE KUHN |||

Can I continue being who I am when being who I am doesn’t produce the response I so hope for? Only once, that I can remember as a child, did I have the experience of another human being seeing me—straight through all of the stuff, recognizing something at the very core of my being. I knew instantly what was happening. There I was! THIS IS ME!!! Someone sees me! Someone gets me!

My first thought was, “Wow, what just happened?” My second thought was, “Now, how do I get everybody else to see me that way, too?” HA!!! Isn’t that what we humans do?

We have an experience of being seen, heard, valued, loved—not for what we do, what we produce, how attractive we are, how successful we are, or what role we play, but for something essential within us. And because the experience is so exquisite, we want it again. And again. And again.

Someone can see something essential in us. They can even awaken within us the recognition of something we had forgotten or perhaps had never consciously known was… us.

There is nothing wrong with wanting to be seen. We are relational beings. Being witnessed matters. Being loved matters. Resonance matters. It is essential to thriving and to the fulfillment of our human spirit. The trouble begins when we entrust them with maintaining that recognition of us.

Somewhere along the way, an innocent mistake gets made. Someone sees something essential in me and, in their seeing, I suddenly experience myself with astonishing clarity. Here I am! But, what’s important here is that I then attribute my experience of myself to the person who reflected me. You made me feel that. And if you made me feel that, then perhaps I need you—or someone else—to make me feel it again. And now I’m chasing the hit.

I’ve heard people who have struggled with drug addiction describe the experience of that first extraordinary high. From then on, they spend years trying to reproduce what happened that first time. I’m not suggesting that our desire to be seen is the equivalent of heroin addiction. But I do recognize something familiar in the pattern.

We get that original hit of “I am seen!” and then begin organizing ourselves around getting it again. Another compliment. Another achievement. Another relationship. Another client. Another publication. Another Like. Another Subscriber. Another family gathering where maybe this time everyone will connect in the way I’ve dreamed they would. Another chance for the external world to get me back to myself. Wowee Zowee!

And because we are enormously creative creatures, we develop all kinds of strategies for getting that hit. I work at: becoming beautiful, successful helpful, indispensable, accommodating, wise, funny. I work at becoming whatever seems most likely to produce the response I long for. And here is where this gets particularly sneaky: even authenticity can become a strategy.

I’ll get sober, and then you’ll come back to me.

I’ll stop leaning, and then maybe you’ll lean toward me.

I’ll become sovereign, and then maybe you’ll respect me.

I’ll love myself, and then maybe you’ll love me.

I’ll stop performing, and then maybe you’ll finally see me.

I’ll become completely and authentically myself, and surely then my people will find me.

What if being myself is still something I’m doing to get something?

Holy moley.

Because if being myself is a strategy for producing love, belonging, recognition, intimacy, success, or even spiritual fulfillment, I’m still performing. I’m still trying to get that initial hit of “I’m ME!” It’s just a much more sophisticated performance. This is where the rubber meets the road for me. Can I continue being who I am when being who I am does not produce the response I hoped for?

Suppose I love baking. I make beautiful bread. I love everything about it—the flour on the counter, working the dough with my hands, watching it rise, the smell that fills the house when it comes out of the oven. I offer some to the people I love and they say, “No thanks.”

What then? Do I stop baking?

Suppose I love playing the guitar. Something in me comes alive when I play. Nobody particularly likes my music. Nobody wants to come hear me play. Do I put the guitar away?

Suppose I write something that resonates with the deepest core of me. I publish it and three people read it. Do I stop writing? Do I write what people want to read? Do I change who I am so I can get people to like me?

Unrequited
Suppose I love someone deeply. I show up with openness, curiosity, affection and a genuine desire for relationship. And the other person doesn’t meet me as the intimate, mutually engaged partner I imagined. Do I conclude there must be something wrong with how I love? Do I try harder to get that person to see me as the awesome person I am? This, to me, is where we encounter what seems to be the unrectifiable. Because being who I am guarantees absolutely nothing about how anybody will see me, hear me or get me. Damn!

I think many of us secretly believe authenticity comes with a guarantee. If I do enough inner work, if I heal enough of my wounds, if I become conscious enough, if I stop performing, if I speak my truth lovingly enough, then surely I’ll get what I want:

People will understand me. My relationships will deepen. My children will want to spend time with me. My work will be valued. My writing will find its audience. My bread will be eaten.

But what if it doesn’t?

What if I become increasingly resonant with my own essence and the external world still does whatever the external world does?

Now What?

When being myself can no longer be a strategy. How do I do me? This moment can suck, believe you me! When I give up using whatever strategy I think will get me likes from social media, my family, my readers, my friends, from my cat…Now what?

Recognition: Here I am.

This is a glorious moment when I recognize something undeniably true about myself. I’m not my strategies. And in this recognition, I get that working to get people to get me, well, what’s the point. It’s a lot of effort, as every drug addict will tell you, and you will never get the high you’ve been chasing. Because, they… whoever they are, were never the source. You are the source, and there you are!

Recovering
For me, recovery is abstaining from doing or being anything or anyone that isn’t aligned with my true knowing of who I am. YIKES! OUCH! YUCK! No Thank you!!!

Recovery is letting go of what isn’t, so I can practice being increasingly present to what is.

For me, this means becoming curious about all of the ways I ignore and distract myself from what I know about myself in order to produce a response I am intending to get.

Do I perform? Do I please? Do I accommodate? Do I prove? Do I improve?

And, if I notice when I perform, please, accommodate and prove in order to get something, can I stop myself, just for a moment, because it doesn’t feel good to do all that doing and not get the results I’m after. Can I just be? Can my life just be an expression of Life?

Can I bake because I bake. Can I write because I write. Can I play because I play. Can I love because I love. I am because I am. Do I need to get a Like for that?
And then there’s resonance.
Resonance says: Ah. Yes. This is me.

Not defiantly. Not, “Screw all of you! I don’t need anybody!” That isn’t resonance. That’s another strategy.

I know what uplifts me. I know what is true for me. I know what I love. I know what I value. I know how I want to be in relationship with myself, with other people, with my work, with the Divine and with this strange, astonishing experience of being human.

Resonance has to do with being/living/experiencing me living in relationship with myself in others that feels true, yummy, YES!

Living in resonance with yourself is a huge practice, especially if you live with others, work with other, communicate with others. It’s a huge practice!

I practice living in resonance when nobody is looking. I practice living in resonance when writing, relating to others… I practice living in resonance in every moment. It doesn’t mean I’m going to get LIKES anywhere from anyone. But if feels so much better than striving to get something from someone who doesn’t actually have what I want. WHAT???

Can I Maintain Resonance with Myself
We have built an entire culture around the ancient human longing to be witnessed. We can now literally count how many people like us, follow us, subscribe to us, comment on us and share us. Before I post myself to my family. Before I post myself to my clients. Before I post myself to social media. Before I post myself to the world. In other words, before I engage with the world…

Can I appreciate, value and recognize myself even if nobody else sees me? Can I continue writing what moves me when nobody reads it? Can I continue loving when my love is not reciprocated? Can I continue being who I am when being who I am does not produce the response I hoped for? Maybe that is the real recovery:

Recognizing: recognizing when I’m trying to get something from others that is not their’s to give.

Recovery: abstaining, as best I can, from abandoning what I know myself to be in order to get another hit of being seen.

Resonance: I continue to live as what I am, whether anyone resonates with me.

And perhaps this is the strange freedom waiting on the other side of all our striving to be seen. I don’t have to stop wanting you love me. I don’t have to stop hoping you’ll recognize me. I don’t have to stop loving the exquisite experience of being seen. I just have to stop making your seeing me responsible for my ability to see myself.

Being in resonance with my essence does not require me to transcend my human longing for connection. I may grieve. I may feel lonely. I may feel disappointed. Sometimes I may just feel bad. But my grief does not have to become a judgment on who I am. My grief, disappointment, sadness is part of my I am-ness. So this too is a place where I can ask, Am I doing this because it expresses me, or because I’m hoping it will produce an experience of me?

That distinction changes everything.

In my line of work, my job isn’t to get people to change. My job is to see people exactly as they are. I recognize and witness the extraordinary being sitting in front of me. Most people hire me because they want something to change. Fine. We can work with that. But I’m not sitting across from them thinking, How do we make you better? Why would I? There is already a phenomenally extraordinary being sitting there.

My interest is: What’s in the way? What’s obscuring this person’s ability to experience what is  already here? I want them to get what I get just sitting with them. AWESOME!!!

“Here you are. Awesome as awesome can be. Now, what has gotten in the way of you knowing that?”