Bravely Be Better

(Written for & read aloud at women’s storytelling hour at Alight - March 6, 2020)

It would have been easier to tell a 10 minute story

if I approached it from a place of having everything figured out.

Pick a topic.

Make a list.

Top ten ways.

Do this. Done.  

But life is messy

and in recent years

I have journeyed away from certainty, from knowing,

from sitting in the comfort of being right.

These days, I try to ask myself harder questions. 

Take a step back. What did I miss?

Turn upside down. What can't I see?

Look in the mirror. How’d I come to be? 

I dive straight into the parts of me I used to avoid.

The ones that hide.

But I grab a strand and start pulling,

like UNWEAVING fabric, like undoing habit. 

This practice

is the process

of re-learning

what I actually think, what I believe.

“What I know for sure” is diminished daily

and I'm afraid, more than anything,

that the thing I know least  - is me. 

I was the dramatic one

and can still be reduced to that young girl,

the sensitive teenager,

the middle sister who complicates everything.

The relational patterns are like contracts

written in blood, in love, in years, in tears,

into the muscle memory. 

Label.

Name.

Sort - in order to understand, to relate,

but also to contain and limit the deviation. 

We use the labels so we all can know

the same thing. 

The crazy thing –

even while we know how they limit us,

our own mind stretches to identify with 'em.

Identify as them.

We internalize and seek more of the same.

After years - it’s second nature,

second learned behavior,

second rule follower,

second word adopter.

Stay inside the lines. 

The beauty standard.

The patriarchy.

The political party.

Stay inside the lines.

The way I learn. The way I behave.

The way I dare. The way I don’t. 

Stayed inside the lines

And fell in love with the way he drew them.

Distracted from the wool being pulled over my eyes

Criticized through affection.

Empowered by gas-lit freedom.

Weakened by whispered judgement of others.

Hypnotized with voices that turned into disorders .

He left the door open,

But cut me loose.

No scratches means no scars. 

No scars can be invisible for years.

Because living things want to thrive –

to reach for the sun, to drink it up

and push down the feelings that become too much.

Push them down while walking down the street,

while sitting in meetings,

while falling in love,

while having babies,

while building businesses,

while running marathons,

while following diet plan > after diet points > after diet measure > after diet cleanse,

while working out,

while being thin,

while buzzing from hot yoga,

while weeping on my mat,

while sobbing silently so no one will notice,

while gasping for breath from a panic attack.

Push them down til I can’t hear them

Push them down, just reach for the sun.

I’m fine. I’m good. I’m winning.

Push them down. Get up. 

When my body stops, shuts-down, breaks out.

When it refuses to do, do, do – more, more, more.

When it refuses to go any further this way –

that is when the bravery begins. 

The bravery begins

when I have no other choice,

when I can’t turn back or left or right -  just forward.

When I can’t control my way out of it,

Or muscle my way back to it.

Bravery begins when I see myself as broken

When I see everything I knew as a second truth

and I have no idea how to begin to learn

how to begin to know again. 

Bravery begins

When I breathe in and breathe in and breathe in –

in order to breathe out.

When I learn to let go,

sit still,

sit in the discomfort,

don’t run away.

When I feel the desire to give myself space,

to step out,

to sense myself,

to feel myself,

to hear myself,

to see myself

for the first time

clearly.

Bravery begins

When I do that thing that I’ve always done,

but pause to listen intrinsically this time.

First the desire,

then the permissions,

then the nudge –

and holding my own hand

because I’ve never done this, this way, before.

Take time > to get a way, to breathe new air.

Then make time > amidst the mayhem of daily life.

Five minutes, twenty, an hour, a weekend.

I give myself what no one else can give me. 

Someone offered me a space,

but no one gave me permission

to return to my hands, to my work, to my weaving.

Someone asked about metalworking,

but no one gave me permission to learn something new.

The wall that existed wasn’t true.

It wasn’t there, built only in my mind.

When I gave myself an inch,

my self took a mile

and showed me how easy, how smoothly, how lovely,

how boldly I can move forward.

I can do. I could do …

I knew how to do,

but I didn’t know how to be. 

With my baggage on my back I stretched my arms.

I stretched my art.

I dared to start.

To paint each day,

one at a time,

one hour,

strong limits like rigid rules to contain me.

I knew that feeling.

I knew what do with it,

how to move around it.

And still … I learned to let go, to flow free,

to open my heart and my soul and let them swim in the me.

I faced the uncomfortable and I sat inside it

and trusted the little girl spirit within.

Each day I sat down and welcomed her to join me.

I painted and photographed and posted in the morning.

I time-lapsed and edited and posted at night.

Day and night. Day and night. Day and night times 855.

I was busy again, felt full and happy and meaningful. 

The practice changed me. Changed my work.

It made me feel free and excited and ready to

bravely be better. 

Hearts exploded everywhere, the virals ate it up.

Like a cheering squad, my own cheerleaders, rah rah rah-ing. 

I loved the attention,

I wanted the love,

I was beholden to the love.

And then I wasn’t.

And then I couldn’t.

I couldn’t perform without losing myself again.

Chasing the mirage is not the same as real life engagement.

Why did I start?

What had I learned?

What did my instinct tell me?

Why am I doing this? 

Why am I doing this?!

Taking time away from selling,

from money-making,

from saving,

from building,

from growing,

from dominating?

Why am I risking it all

on my-self,

my artist,

my voice? 

Bravery is going against the grain

choosing my voice,

choosing to dig,

to unearth the buried wounds,

to channel the inheritance from grandmothers I never knew,

to bring it all up,

to bring it all out,

to give it form.

My painting practice taught me

to be still enough to hear my inner compass.

It spread from pen and paint and paper

to metal and wire and fiber –

became symbols of my strength,

became vessels for my sorrow,

becoming maps to my future. 

My practice of playing with material

and the words in my head

is a dance that helps me make sense

of my past and my present, the world, and me.

And it is the truest thing I can offer. 

Bravery is using my voice

to express,

to inspire others -

to inquire within themselves. 

Learning how to sit in discomfort,

to shed the labels or titles or credentials or direction

is the path to embodying the truth

that our value is inherent,

not earned

or given

or taken away.

When we know our inherent value,

we can bravely be better.  

-Tia Keobounpheng