This morning, I awoke out of a deep sleep, with an epiphany!! A 2-part epiphany! A know-in-my-body-and-feel-in-my-bones epiphany!

It is alright to be different.

My whole nervous system completely relaxed into the safety of that welcoming allowance.

Ahhhhhhhhh.

UNTIL . . . I asked all my Parts how they felt about this. NOTE: By “Parts”, I mean the Internal Family Systems parts who have been my protectors, pleasers, managers, hiders, overdoers, and all the other trigger-keepers of old ways of coping. (Thank you little Parts for your many years of dedicated service. 💗)

Well, as soon as these old Parts heard “It’s alright to be different!” most of them immediately leapt out of the room and hid under a rug . . . until they heard the second part of the epiphany:

It is safe to be different.

When they heard that safety was part of the deal, they got curious and slowly peeked out . . . and then, with encouraging nods from Self, they finally rejoined the rest of us at the celebrate-the-epiphany party! 🙂

It is alright to be different.
It is safe to be different.

These are big words to feel and know in my bones for a recovering pleaser who, as a child, learned to stay “safe” by carefully tracking and attuning to the emotional swings of overpowering authority figures. It can take a while (um, decades of dedicated inner work) to dismantle that kind of patterning. It’s an ongoing work in progress (lots of progress)! 💪💗💗💗

Dedicated inner work & dismantling dominator culture

The work we do for (and inside) ourselves has wider ripples . . .

If it’s alright (in myself) for me to be different, I know it’s alright for everyone to be different.

If I am safe (in myself) in my differentness, I am a better creator of safety for everyone’s differentness.

By knowing in our bodies and feeling in our bones
That it is alright to be different,
May our world become safe and welcoming
For ALL who feel different . . .
Which is every being,
In at least some way,
Throughout space and time.
💗🌈 🙏💗💗

Scarlet macaw in Costa Rica │ Photo Credit: Zdenek Machacek (on Unsplash)

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