We have stressed, perhaps too much, the challenge of telling the truth.
Yet it’s also easier… because it is the truth.
There’s some effort involved in self-deceit and prevarication.
There’s a cost involved: to our energy, our power, our sense of self.

“Always tell the truth. That way, you don’t have to remember what you said.”
Mark Twain

“If one tells the truth, one is sure sooner or later to be found out”
Oscar Wilde

The Practice - Part II:
Be 100% authentic in your interactions with others. Really!

Adapted from the practices of Robert Gass

Let’s be clear…
This practice is just about being willing to speak your truth.
Not the Truth.
Our truth is just the truth of our experience.
Just that.
Truth-telling driven by arrogance is at best, obnoxious.
At worst, dangerous.
Let us cultivate humility throughout our experiments with truth.
Yet still be truthful.

“Say not, ‘I have found the truth, but rather, ‘I have found a truth.”
Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet

“The belief that there is only one truth, and that oneself is in possession of it, is the root of all evil in the world”
Max Born, German Physicist; Nobel Prize for Physics

The Practice - Part II:
Be 100% authentic in your interactions with others. Really!

Adapted from the practices of Robert Gass

Here are some varying words of wisdom on how to communicate the truth:

“When you shoot an arrow of truth, dip its point in honey.”
Arab Proverb

“If you are out to describe the truth, leave elegance to the tailor.”
Albert Einstein

“Whenever you have truth it must be given with love, or the message and the messenger will be rejected”
Mahatma Gandhi

I would also offer the following:
skillful truth-telling has a lot to do with presence, respect and connection.

Remember that 93% of communication is non-verbal.

If you are anxious or upset when you approach another to speak your truth, before you even open your mouth your anxiety will have communicated and impacted the other. They will likely start to feel uneasy and reactive without a word having been said.

If you are relaxed into your own truth and your own power, and if you are present and respectful, this too will communicate. And the odds of a successful receiving of our truths are greatly increased.

(But of course, you can do everything “right” and the conversation can still blow up. We don’t control life.)

The Practice - Part II:
Be 100% authentic in your interactions with others. Really!

Adapted from the practices of Robert Gass

We have spoken of the need to speak our truths skillfully.

This begins with intent.
The truth can be used to heal…or to harm.
The truth can be an instrument of love and awakening…
Or a weapon of destruction.
Taking up this practice doesn’t mean that we abandon our other values and practices — kindness… compassion…
Be truthful… and be heartful…
Be truthful…and be kind.

“A truth that’s told with bad intent beats all the lies you can invent.”
William Blake

The Practice - Part II:
Be 100% authentic in your interactions with others. Really!

Adapted from the practices of Robert Gass

Let us be clear that inauthenticity is as much about what we don’t say as
well as the untruths we utter.

“Truth is not only violated by falsehood; it may be equally outraged by silence.”
Henri Frederic Amiel, Swiss philosopher & poet (1821-1881)

“In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.” Martin Luther King Jr.

Watch your impulses to hold back your truths.

Of course, the world doesn’t need to hear every thought and feeling that crosses
through our body/mind. (Thankfully–as we have some 70,000 thoughts per day!)

But we want to pay attention to those thoughts and feelings that deserve their
moment in the sun–our wisdom, our power, words of healing, the feelings that
keep us separate from those we love, our creative impulses…

For his practice period, let our guideline be these words of Mark Twain:
“When in doubt, tell the truth.”

The Practice- Part II:
Be 100% authentic in your interactions with others. Really!

Adapted from the practices of Robert Gass

“As scarce as truth is, the supply has always been in excess of the demand.”
Josh Billings, pen name of American humorist Henry Wheeler Shaw (1818-1885)

One of the challenges we run into regarding truth-telling are social norms.

Our organizations and our relationships have certain established expectations
around authenticity.

In most organizations, if anyone in a meeting spoke the full truth of what people
routinely say privately around the water cooler, the “immune system” of the organization
would usher them right out the door.

Swami Beyondananda speaks of an epidemic of “truth decay.”

As leaders, we want people to trust that what comes out of our mouth is what we
believe inside.

“Hide nothing from the masses of our people. Tell no lies. Expose lies whenever they are told. Mask no difficulties, mistakes, failures. Claim no easy victories.”
Amilcar Cabral, African freedom fighter (1924-1973)

Even in our personal relationships, there’s a level of truth-telling that is avoided
to varying degrees.

When we come up to one of these norms, it’s a boundary that can feel very scary
to cross. Like jumping off a cliff. Maybe it will cause conflict. Their feelings
might be hurt. Maybe people won’t like what we say. Maybe… Who knows what?

And in the face of our fears:

The Practice - Part II:
Be 100% authentic in your interactions with others. Really!

Adapted from the practices of Robert Gass

“Above all, the Rosa Parks and the Vaclav Havels and the Nelson Mandelas
and the Dorothy Days of this world are authentic. These are people who have come
to understand that no punishment that anybody could lay on us could possibly be
worse than the punishment we lay on ourselves by conspiring in our own
diminishment, by living a divided life, by failing to make that fundamental decision
to act and speak on the outside in ways consonant with what we know to be true
on the inside.”
Parker Palmer

Today, be like Rosa Parks, who sat in the front of the bus.
Today, be like Vaclav Havel, who helped throw off the yoke of tyranny.
Today, be like Nelson Mandela, who helped free his people.
Today, be like Dorothy Day, who spoke for those without a voice.
Do not conspire in your own diminishment.
Do not live a divided life.
Make “that fundamental decision to act and speak on the outside in ways consonant” with your inner truth.

The Practice - Part II:
Be 100% authentic in your interactions with others. Really!

Adapted from the practices of Robert Gass

Those of you diligently working with part one of our Authenticity practice have probably had
an “interesting” and possibly somewhat uncomfortable time observing all the situations and
ways in which you are less than authentic.

We now come to the culmination of this practice series:

The Practice - Part II:
Be 100% authentic in your interactions with others. Really!

Wow. Here’s some strong medicine!
Can you, even for just a few days, be and speak the truth of who you are?
A bit scary?
Also very enlivening and powerful.

You must continue to keep your attention very focused and alert…both on your inner
authenticity… and what comes out of your mouth. When we don’t tell the truth to ourselves, it’s rather impossible to be truthful with others.

But as we explored in our retreats, there are skills to authentic communication. Being
authentic doesn’t mean blurting or projectile vomiting with your words.

We want to be RUTHLESSLY honest with ourselves.
But SKILLFUL in our authentic communications with others.

Please read Dialogue Inhibitors.

You want to be present and contactful even as you speak to someone… as if you were
breathing with them and listening to them even while you speak.

You want to speak vulnerably of your own feelings and real human needs, rather than
your judgments of others. You want to address the behaviors of others… not your theories of who people are on the inside or why they do what they do.

You want to approach others with respect, rather than arrogance.

After all, your truth is only the truth of your experience.
They have their truth as well.

You want to contextualize and time some of your more difficult communications in a way that
maximizes the others’ capacity to receive.

But… I invite you to take up the challenge of 100% authentic communication for the next week.

Are there some situations where it’s more serving to withhold some of the truth?
Yes.
But not nearly as many as your anxiety tries to convince you.

Also please read the Risk reward Assessment.
Where real concerns arise around communicating truthfully, use this tool to help you sort out
what to do…

In the end, make a thoughtful, considered and committed choice. (And if you choose not to
deal directly, it should be from a very different place than your habitual avoidance patterns).

And this week, such choices should be rare indeed, as Part II of this Practice invites us to
challenge a lifetime of hiding.

The Practice - Part II:
Be 100% authentic in your interactions with others. Really!

Adapted from the practices of Robert Gass

“The truth is cruel, but it can be loved and it makes free those who have loved it.”
George Santayana

Are you ready for freedom?
Are you ready to start telling the truth?
Really?

We’ll be moving to Part II of this practice tomorrow.
You might imagine where this is going.
But your truth-telling is completely dependent on being able to tell the truth to yourself.

There is great power in the truth.
The truth will rock your world.
The truth will heal our world.
Are you ready?

“The Truth will set you free.”
Jesus Christ

“The truth will set you free. But first, it will piss you off.”
Gloria Steinem

The Practice - Part 1
Notice each and every time you do not express the truth of what you think
and feel. In each occurrence, explore what this is about for you.

Adapted from the practices of Robert Gass

“Falsehood is invariably the child of fear in one form or another.”
Aleister Crowley

What are you afraid of?
This is an important question.
It is almost always fear that precedes a lie.
What are you protecting?
Each time you become aware of the impulse to tell less than the truth, feel what’s in there.
See if you can actually feel the fear that drives all our deceit… to ourselves and others.
Explore the “elevator shaft” that sits under the behavior.

The Practice - Part 1
Notice each and every time you do not express the truth of what you think
and feel. In each occurrence, explore what this is about for you.

Adapted from the practices of Robert Gass