What is your WHY story? Here is mine.

We all have a Why Story, a reason why we do things. My Why Story is fear. I have come to realize that we live most of our lives in fear of some unspoken truth and attempt to avoid an unavoidable painful aspect of life. The thing about fear is that it is not pretty, it is hurtful and can be incredibly stressful and frustrating. If you are anything like me, it is a sneaky manipulator disguised as self-preservation, the act of being right or even the misguided pretense of determination and achievement.

It has been difficult to admit out loud that I am afraid. It has been so much more challenging to accept fear as part of who I am. We, as human beings, are many things that are both ugly and beautiful. The truth - that truth we are so afraid of - is that even the ugly is beautiful and that pain is healing, happiness is imperfect, and we are part of a chaotic world. We can’t outrun the chaos. We can’t outrun the drama. We can’t outrun ourselves. Accepting the world for what it is, accepting yourself for who you are, and expressing all of that beauty, will likely be one of the scariest things you ever do.

Acceptance is not agreement. Acceptance is not the same as never changing. Acceptance is the freedom to express yourself and the freedom to continuously grow, to continuously change as you become wiser and stronger. Acceptance is more powerful than fear and yet we have such a close relationship with fear, a toxic one. What if we befriended our fears and truly listened to what they have to say?

My fear is that no matter what I do, I will never find that fire or burning inside of me that so many novels and movies talk about. I fear fear itself. I am afraid of losing my loved ones. I am afraid of making the wrong choices. Half of the time, I do not believe in myself. I lose myself in a maze of “what ifs” and “yeah buts”. I am not alone in my confusion and vulnerability. There is not a single person out there who has never been afraid, hurt, confused, frustrated or lost. Even the Dalai Lama, the Queen, Michelle Obama, Michael Jordan or any other idol you can think of has experienced all of the former.

What my fear is trying to do, is help me. It is trying to keep me safe, it is trying to hep me navigate the strangeness of this world. It is protecting me from other aspects of myself that might jump too high or too fast or too soon. Your fear, just like mine, is in a way, loving you. Unfortunately, we have built up a bit of an unhealthy relationship there and allowed our fear to control us. We are more than what we are afraid of. So, what is my fear telling me, what am I hearing when I truly listen? It is telling me to embrace it. It is telling me to listen to it when it speaks but not to let it hold me back from my authentic self expression. When we live by fear, we are using it as an excuse not to grow while we should be using it as our guide along a path of impactful discomfort.

I thought my Why Story was determination, ambition and intelligence. I was going to get that degree, validate that I am smart and spend my life scientifically researching the ocean. I thought I wanted a life as a scientist. I’ve wanted to be a marine biologist since I was a little girl. I love everything about the ocean. I love the playful marine mammals, I love the trillions of little plant cells called phytoplankton and everything in between. I’d read books and books about the most random facts of the animal kingdom. I was called to be a biologist. I was really good at it. Why wouldn’t I be a biologist? Why shouldn’t I be a biologist?

A secret I have discovered recently is that you do not have to be what school says you are good at. My love for the wild, natural world has not changed but my expression of it has. I went to school and got the fancy degree. I studied for years, I have written papers and countless of exams. At the end of it all, I could only think; “Now what?”. What does this fancy piece of paper offer me in life? Turns out, not much that truly makes me happy. I do not regret my university years, I will likely keep on studying in pursuit of more pieces of paper saying I met a particular set of requirements. However, this time, I will not do it because I am afraid I can’t be anything else. I won’t make decisions based on what I think I am good enough for.

When I was 4 years old, I already thought of myself as a biologist, a teacher, a dancer, a singer, a sister, a friend, a daughter, … at 4 years old I was unapologetically and happily myself. My fear has been trying to protect me from the crashing of those dreams. But I ended up never truly trying to chase them. If you don’t try you can’t fail. You can’t succeed and discover it is not at all what you dreamt either. It was cautioning me that breaking the rules can end badly. It showed me how to survive, how to work inside my box and how to meet the expectations of other people.

Today, my fear is telling me that I could fall. My acceptance and friendship with fear is telling me I will be okay. You will be okay too. I now know I am walking in the right direction because I am scared shitless of even writing this little essay. At the same time I am utterly thrilled and empowered to keep on sharing. If I help one other person to break free and they pay it forward, we could end up with thousands if not millions more empowered and free beautiful human beings expressing and living their authentic selves.

My unspoken truth is that I am amazing at many things. I do not have to live in the box of being a scientist. I can love the ocean in more ways than that. My truth is that I am fortunate enough that I can speak up and share this with you, so I will keep on doing so. My unavoidable pain is that life will go on and there will be days that I do not live up to my expectations. I will hurt those that I love more than once. I will fail and fall and hurt many times. But I will get up that many times too. My Why Story is growing and changing every day but it is guided by acceptance, love, gratitude and excitement.

What is your Why Story? Are you ready to discover it?

-

Join our community to embark on the journey of exploring your authentic self to discover your why.

Author

Layla Olefs

Co-founder of Conversations By YOU