The Mask Whisperer

“We can’t avoid pain, but we can transform our response to it.” -  Sharon Salzberg  In my last blog post, I wrote about the masks we wear. Some may have been left wondering, what the hell is a mask, and what the heck does she mean she can see it? A mask is invisible, protective armor we wear to cover up our pain. .....to cover up our pain..... We all have pain. And don't we know it by the amount of shootings, suicides, drug overdoses, divorces, etc. that happen every day. We are all hurting. A mask is our ego's way of protecting us from having to deal with our pain. Put on the mask and viola! the pain is gone. Or so we think. The pain never goes away until it's dealt with.  You name it, there’s a mask for it. Here are some popular masks that I see every day. The perfection mask. The jealousy mask. The “I’m fine” mask. The people pleasing mask. The pillar of strength mask. The angry mask. When I see someone trying so hard to be perfect,...

“The soul speaks its truth only under quiet, inviting, and trustworthy conditions.” - Parker Palmer  Who are you? Do you even know? Authenticity is something I value tremendously, but not everyone knows what being authentic means. Not only that, but even if you do know what it means, it can be scary to live from that place. Openness and vulnerability aren’t valued in our culture. Somewhere along the line, we were taught to hide behind masks and become the people we think people want us, or need, us to be.  Don’t show your weakness! Don’t ask for help! Don’t be anything less than perfect! Don’t cry in public! Don’t tell anyone you did that ! Don’t tell anyone you are scared! I could go on, but you get the point. We spend all of our time hiding our true self, afraid to be judged. Even worse, we don’t even know who our true self is. Take some time to ask yourself, who am I? What do you come up with? You might say, I’m a teacher or a parent or ­­­ (fill in th...