Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."
-- Martin Luther King, Jr.

     Why is speaking up one of the hardest things to do? The lessons repeat themselves with vigor, yet they seem to never be fully learned.   This principle maybe the “big one” – the ultimate affirmation of your beliefs!   Until you can stand up and be counted the beliefs you hold are merely paper tigers, shadows of the real thing.  Only these paper tigers have real teeth, biting you every time you deny who you are, every time you remain silent.   They painfully remind you that you do not have the conviction of your beliefs, that you truly have no strong platform on which to base your life.  You profess these beliefs to yourself just like you profess to change habits each New Years.   Without support, these beliefs have no substance.   While you are saying, “yes” silently, the reality of your silence, echoes a profound “no.” 

     So much is lost in your unwillingness to speak up, to be counted.   On a personal level, your word is meaningless.  No one else knows; you keep your self-betrayal hidden.  Yet, the most important one, the self, knows all too well.  You teach yourself not to trust your own words, to question your own commitment – all because you fear separation.  You are afraid that others will not like you, will not value your opinion and that they will ostracize you – that you will be alone.  And as a result, what have you done?  You have caused the first separation.  You have separated yourself from the personal assertion of your own self worth.   Is it any surprise that you constantly question whether or not you will meet acceptance by others when you don’t fully accept yourself?  Denial of your beliefs is denial of self.  Even when it is wrapped imaginatively in silence, denial is denial.  

    The personal loss is obvious, but the loss to the world in which you spend enormous amounts of time and energy – your work world – is not quite so visible.  While not easily quantifiable, it remains substantial.   In your unwillingness to speak up you sub-optimize your contribution and your ability to effect change.  You make yourself, and the companies in which you work, a victim of your imagination.  You lose the ability to capitalize on the synergy of great minds working together in collaboration.   Nothing changes!   Nothing has a chance to.  No one is willing to say “but, what about this?”   No one is willing to step outside of the accepted norm, to push the limits, to create something truly new.

     Yet, who is it that you admire?   Who are the people that warm your heart, that are doing the things that capture your imagination? Take a moment and think about this and you will see that you admire those people who are willing to be counted, to step up and be heard, often regardless of the content of their beliefs.  You admire their ability to take the risk.  Only when they are doing it, it doesn’t appear risky.  It looks natural, like it has never been otherwise, like they were never like you.

    The only difference between them and you is that they make a choice to participate fully in this life.  The choice is always there.  Each decision you make, each action you take is a choice, conscious or not.  Your body tells you when you are making a bad choice, that is, if you are willing to listen.   When you don’t speak up there will be a knot in the middle of your gut.  It will gnaw at you until you successfully divert its attention to something else.  One way, a healthy way, to remove the knot is to speak up – to say what you really think, to say what you really believe.   The knot is made of fear. It is there to help you, not to stop you in your tracks.   It is there to show you the way through it, to show you when you are functioning in fear, rather than from love. 

     When you are speaking from a place of love, your truth will not cause harm to yourself or others.  Doubt is absent.  You feel good about yourself.   You know that your word is priceless, that trusting yourself is what this life is all about.  You even know that any other choice begins the downward spiral into doubt, into the wounded mind, body and spirit.   Once you bring the choice into conscious awareness, the shift into fear becomes less automatic.  It becomes an opportunity to choose love, to heal the self.  It presents the opportunity to become one of those you admire.