backbone

Mr. Bossy Pants - Oliver - head of all things here at 29 Black Street / Virgil chillaxin' on Orange Mama / Betty & Virgil / Oliver keeping an eye on watching Betty watching snowflakes mid blizzard / Virg in his penthouse pad with Bleet snoozing on every body's favourite chair / Oliver & Betty / Miss Betty playing with some pink ribbon (check out the expression on Oliver's face - he is not impressed) / itty bitty Betty

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma - which is living the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most importantly, having the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

Steve Jobs

authenticity + self compassion + backbone = brave

Self acceptance. Integrity. Authenticity. Honesty. Trust. Intuition. I believe are all qualities of having a strong backbone. Having backbone is walking your talk and understanding and feeling confident in knowing what your talk actually is. No matter what. No matter that it disappoints, hurts, angers and/or upsets someone else. Having backbone is acknowledging and accepting that you will be vulnerable and you will make mistakes & you will learn great lessons from both. As I reflect back on this year of what still feels like mostly "yuckiness" (yuck in the sense of w-a-y too much anxiety, worry, difficult lessons, mistakes & regret) the most important thing I've learned this year, and still a foreign concept to me in all honesty, is the necessity of extreme self care & self compassion.

"No" is a complete sentence.

Anne Lamott

Self compassion is about not feeling guilty because you've stood up to a bully (even though it made your heart pound, your voice quiver and your stomach queasy - for days and days on end). Self compassion is about knowing your own truth, following your own moral compass, believing in yourself and about being okay on the days you don't believe - it's about trusting yourself and your own intuition. It's about setting solid boundaries (and not second guessing them or retracting them because someone else doesn't approve). Backbone & self compassion is about allowing yourself to feel your feelings (good, bad, thrilling, scary, sad, angry …) and then letting them go. Really letting them go. Not letting them stick to you like goo, eating away at what you know in your heart is true, what you know in your heart is You.

A lot of people are afraid to tell the truth, to say no
That's where toughness comes into play
Toughness is not being a bully - it's having backbone.

Robert Kiyosaki