At the end of 2019, I wrote about the elderly in our society, whom we sadly treat as invisible and voiceless in our society.
But here’s the other side of this: I have been given a voice, and yet, too often I’ve failed to raise it to speak up for what I deeply believe.
The number one reason for failing to speak up is fear of rejection.
I learned from a very early age that speaking up too much leads to rejection. I was beaten as a child for standing up to my father; I was thrown out of summer Bible School for asking ‘why’ too many times; and I’m rejected by members of my family today for writing about challenging aspects of our family’s life.
Fear of rejection is a powerful motivator to silence my voice, or worse, to speak my voice in an inauthentic way. I cannot survive alone any better than you can. We all need to feel like we belong to a tribe that accepts us – it’s what enables us to grow and thrive.
I refuse to allow fear to mask who I am and what I deeply believe. My intention for 2020 is to continue creating a space for mutual exploration and engagement, and for enabling new wisdom to emerge from raising our shared voices.
I hope you’ll join me.
In retrospect I believe I was also rejected or maybe just ignore for not speaking up. There is probably no way to win by trying to please everyone. Instead Marlena’s choice of investing in knowing and being true to herself looks like to me like a far higher road to travel.
Well, I suppose there’s a happy balance in there somewhere between not speaking up enough and speaking up to loudly – or too inappropriately. I’m still searching for the right balance!
Love your blogs, and can truly relate, Marlena. Not beaten or rejected by either one of my parents for speaking up (thank God), but rejected by Society for being authentic until I got married and was able to move away. To this day I work on breaking free from shackles I still perceive on me, and finding my voice. With the full support of my loving husband of 48 years. It’s difficult to shed feelings of inadequacy, and fears of rejection. Especially after having been criticized (and bullied) almost on a daily basis by peers, Sunday school teachers and Society as a whole, for being different (authentic). While growing up, and for years after by in-laws. Now in my quest for authenticity, most days are 2 steps forward and 1 step back. But making progress. – Thought I add a little humour for the women on this blog, heard on the radio while driving this afternoon. A quote from Laurel Thatcher Ulrich: “Well Behaved Women Seldom Make History”. I will keep that in mind as I start the new year. (And just so no one here will “reject” me for the way I express myself, English is my 2nd language, doing the best I can, ha 🙂
Nora, what an amazing post. Thank you so much for sharing this! I think many of us experience the two steps forward and one back…but HEY, that IS making progress! I love it that we’re together on this journey. Dankschaen!!