30 Days of Navigating Life as a 23-Year-Old: Day 16 — On Being Human
It Is Time We Celebrate Our Humanness.
Yesterday I happened to chat with a wonderful woman who reached out to me on a networking platform. She noticed that I had transitioned from a tech job to a creative field of work (writing). She was greatly impressed by it and wanted to have a chat with me.
As the conversation flowed, I couldn’t help but feel so at ease talking to her. It felt so easy, so light to be able to communicate with her. Of course, she was a stranger and I did not let all my guards down in our first conversation. But her energy and aura were so warm and welcoming that I couldn’t help but drop my walls down a little bit and be. From the first couple of words she uttered till the end of our half-hour conversation, it felt so effortless and easy with her.
As we got to talking, she informed me that she writes as well and wanted to have a conversation to get her creative juices flowing. I was more than happy to be of help to her and more importantly, grateful for the fact that she felt the urge to reach out to me for a craft that I resonate deeply with.
By the end of the conversation, I was compelled to tell her how welcoming and warm her energy felt since the very start of our call. Her aura, her words made it so easy for me to communicate so smoothly with her. She was definitely flattered by this compliment and admitted that she could have this energy, this conversation with me only because she was aware of the fact that I was a writer—a creative person.
And that’s when the discussion opened up on how there comes up a barrier, a mask when there is so much technicality and very little human touch involved.
Let me put this into context. I have had the privilege to connect and chat with a number of people from different fields in the past week. But a majority of them have been from brain-first fields. By brain-first, I mean fields that employ more thinking than feeling in their process of producing outcomes. Where they are needed to think with their brains more than feel with their hearts. Where logic and data overpower intuition and nudges.
Throughout all of those conversations, the one thing I felt in common was a sort of barrier, a wall that propped up around me. It was as if I had to hide my genuine human side, my feelings side and talk with logic, talk from the mind, the brain. Now, don’t get me wrong — every person I conversed with was respectful, never made me uncomfortable or was never stern or rude to me. Every single one of them was sweet, ready to help and ready to get on a call with me any time of day. But there was something different about the energy of the conversation and their aura that made me want to not show my human side, my feelings side.
It was as if I had witnessed a stark contrast between the conversations that were brain-first versus when they were heart-first. There was a contrast between the conversations I had with technical people and the creative ones. Of course, a difference is expected. But yesterday, I experienced it first-hand. And a lot of reflections came through.
Why do we humans forget to bring our human touch into human conversations? Why do we encourage not bringing up feelings and emotions while they are the basic essence of being human? Why do we feel the need to mask our true energy, our true aura when in ‘professional’ settings? Why is it the norm to suppress the very things that make us human in the first place? Why are we so uncomfortable with emoting, and expressing when clearly, conversations that involve our humanness are so much more worthwhile and fulfilling than when they’re not? Why would we rather speak from logic than from intuition?
Of course, not everyone can and should be given access to our energy. But why is it that the majority of our conversations do not involve that energy at all? Why is it that we are encouraged to hide our authentic energy to fit into some unwritten rules that happen to be the norm? Why are we running so far away from our true selves, our very authentic selves? Why would we rather suppress our aura than let it shine loud and bright?
Our professional lives are being steered in a direction that is taking us far away from ourselves. We are being distanced from ourselves by being encouraged to not express our truest selves in the first place. This is deeply concerning. Moreover, considering the fact that a huge chunk of the population puts their professional lives over their personal lives (and sometimes, makes work their life), it is alarming how less of a human touch there is in our work lives.
We fear having emotions and feelings because we are not taught how to feel and express them healthily. So, instead of teaching and learning the healthy ways, we decide to avoid them altogether. But avoidance is hardly ever the solution. It eventually creates a huge pile under the rug that explodes in our faces one day. In our professional lives, it may take the form of burnout — something so many of us experience regularly (including ones who have newly started their professional career). This is concerning.
It is time we stop running from our authentic selves. It is time we embrace our very essence of being human. It is time we start embracing our humanness and encouraging it in our workplaces as well. It is time we start getting comfortable expressing our emotions and feelings. It is time we get comfortable with others expressing and emoting their authentic selves around us.
It is time we encourage being our true human selves.
It is time we get back in touch with our humanness.
It is time we celebrate our humanness.
