Saying grace before a family meal is one of my favourite moments during family gatherings. My mom is usually the one on the task. As with most things with my family, it is never a dull moment. So much happening all at once: the background noise coming from the TV we forgot to turn off, rushing steps heading to the kitchen to check on the meal still in the oven, the grimacing face of my cousin attempting to make me lose my focus, and the firm stare of my sister, demanding my nephew to stay quiet. And let’s not forget about the curious cat hushed away from the dining table. These few minutes of prayer encapsulate so much of the liveliness of my family. These moments, I like to think, are the expression of life’s constant movement, raw and loud and honest and imperfect. Even in its slowness and sweetness.

That’s what I am saying yes to.

And from that, I came to learn that at the centre of my heart, anytime I dare ask, openly and honestly, always, I find it. Truth. In the spacious land of truth, good or bad, right or wrong, there are no favourites. No matter how out of the norm, ugly or uncomfortable, superficial or deep, truth never sacrifices itself for anything. Whether we like it or not.

And yet, for a long time, I associated truth with shame. Unaware and unable to live it, I was performing it.

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Truth is intimacy.

I learned this through several friends. This was years ago. I called my friend O. and shared with him the sorrow I was in. There was no apparent reason behind the sadness I felt, except maybe for the dark days of the Dutch winter. And he simply advised me to let myself feel it. Let yourself cry if you feel like crying, he said. This is part of the life journey, to move through its many shapes and textures and colours with as little resistance as possible. I remember how comforting it felt to hear his words. It was the warmest of embraces because I knew he understood exactly what I was going through.

I think about this exchange to remind myself of the power of connection and what a safe space truly feels like. Specially for the days I struggle to offer and receive with so much generosity and openness. With no judgment.

Especially to loved ones. I think about how judgmental and disrespectful of their soul journey I have been at times, because of my fear of truth. I didn’t know how to deal with the unsettling, the big waves of my life, let alone their lives. So, my energy was focused on fixing their problem fast so I could feel good about myself and get some respite. Rushing into fix-it mode is often a sign of our discomfort with pain. Our actions towards friends and loved ones then become an attempt at self-soothing. I fix you, so I don’t have to fix me. Or, I fix you because I don’t know how to fix me.

Well, who said we needed fixing in the first place anyway?

I wanted to become the hero of their story without having to claim it. I was showing up in a cowardly way to make sure my smarts and ability to make the world go round were obvious even to the blind. “What a great healer I am!” — my behaviour was screaming in an imposing way. Showing support for my friends became a way to showcase my knowledge, talents, and self. Rather than creating bridges to connection, I was creating distance in every way possible.

That’s what happened when we normalise our performative life. When we are dissociated from our emotions. From our truth. We close the doors on exactly what we desire most.

I was othering others, myself included, because I was unable to truly receive what they were sharing. Giving is not so much about doing or saying anything, I came to learn. It is simply about being present, receiving, and allowing the experience to penetrate us.

However messy the situation on the table is, when our intention is in the right place, the receiver and giver become inseparable. When we are present in the exchange with someone, we become one another. Because we understand each other.

This is intimacy. And this was both what I was so desperate for and equally running away from.

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When we don’t yet own our truth

Every situation, every wave of life, big or small, I now know, is an invitation to look inward and discover new layers of our being. But instead of accepting those opportunities, I used to judge them, size them up and down with the hidden agenda of my covert healer self on the forefront, seeking validation.

This is what happens when we don’t yet own our truth. When we don’t yet own our destiny. Conversations, even with people we love, sound cacophonic, and superficial and disappointing. Because instead of being who we are, we secretly practice how we wish to be perceived, no matter the needs of the person beside us. That’s why, when we look at life and the people around us, we get envious and insecure, get distracted, and jump onto paths that aren’t ours.

“I need my friend, not a guru!” These words were thrown at me by a beautiful friend of mine a few years ago. It took me a while to understand what he meant. I was treating him, without his consent, as my audience, a guinea pig on whom I could secretly test new tools.

Learning to move inward, sitting with and accepting whichever version of myself I am in the moment, is also teaching me to share more openly, with no fear of judgment. Indeed, locking myself up in the guru seat was making it difficult to accept my fallible humanness. Which was why I was asking for help like a pretend doctor attempting to self-diagnose in front of an audience. The Miss Independent I was pretending to be was too full of herself to admit she, too, needed others. I was too full of myself to own my truth.

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Truth is receiving, is giving

But new days rose, and I have learned that giving and receiving are two sides of the same coin. When sitting in love with a friend, moving at their pace and respecting their path, there is no part of ourselves that is ever betrayed or left behind. If anything, really, exchanges of such depth are spaces where our souls reveal themselves to us.

I am learning to float in the warm embrace of life and move as gracefully as I can through its waves. To receive it with grace, let it fuel me without trying to control it. Because those waves too, are truth. Raw and loud and honest and imperfect.

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I used to think being a healer meant having all the answers. Fixing things. Being the one who stands above the mess and offers a hand down. But that was the guru in disguise. Now I know a healer is not someone who saves others. A healer is someone who has stopped running from their own truth — and in doing so, gives others permission to stop running too. That’s all.

I am embracing my path. I am embracing being who I have always been. Basking in that leap of faith, I am allowing my truth to shine. Feel it and be it. Because who I am, after all, however imperfect, is God’s creation.

And the whole thing about life certainly is not about becoming good people or perfect people. It is more about remembering that, even flawed and all, we are good people.