Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, “Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented and fabulous?”
Actually, who are you not to be?  You are a child of God.
Your playing small doesn’t serve the world.  There’s nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you.
We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.
It’s not just in some of us;  it’s in everyone.
And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

On Monday I wrote about the challenges of being the change you want to see in the world.  I didn’t expect to return so soon to this subject to highlight another challenge – the challenge of owning my “genius”.  I take this term genius from Gay Hendricks’ book The Big Leap, a book which invites readers to step beyond their “zone of excellence” and embrace their true genius.

Marianne Williamson’s famous passage, from her book A Return to Love which quotes in turn from the book A Course In Miracles from the Foundation for Inner Peace, points squarely to this challenge and to its implications.  Society’s call to modesty often holds us back and at the same time to hold back is to embrace the law of unintended consequences.  As a coach with a passion to help people to embrace and inhabit their full potential I feel the challenge of choosing between society’s call and my own authenticity in modelling to my clients what I yearn for them to be able to do for themselves.

Today, Kathy Mallary, my coach (with special skills in the area of marketing for coaches) has been holding my feet to the fire, challenging me not only to write a statement of my genius (using the questions Gay Hendricks offers in his book) but also to place myself firmly in the centre.  This is what I came up with (how does it land with you?):

I’m at my best when I’m growing and developing powerful, compassionate and authentic relationships with myself and between myself and others.

When I’m at my best, the exact thing I’m doing is seeing beyond my current limitations to be present to my full potential so that I can develop a trust or knowing that I have a place in the world – a place of true belonging, a place in which my true self is truly a gift to the world. I am also identifying and taking meaningful practical actions towards living in and from my place of true belonging.

When I’m doing this, the thing I most love about it is seeing things falling into place (my own sense of self, new insights into my true path etc.) and experiencing – seeing and feeling – the sense of peace and harmony that comes from this: within myself, within others, and in the relationships between myself and others. This is life within nature’s true and harmonious laws – no “forcing” needed. As I blossom everyone and everything around me also blossoms.