I once heard Kiran Trace say we want to play the ‘clarity card’ in life. By this she means living the truth—which does not mean spilling all of our beans, being blunt (‘cold, hard truth’) or even necessarily speaking the truth in any given moment. It means being inside truth—which will feel effortless & easy, inside our body.
It means living authentically.
And truth is simply what is true. It’s not abstract: You’re hungry. You’re fussy. You don’t want to go to that party. You like being around that person. You aren’t attracted to that person. You could use a hug. You need some quiet.
As Kiran says, we are either moving from clarity or from fear (fear takes many forms; check out her free book, Freedom vs Fear).
This phrasing—playing the clarity card or fear card—has come back to me time and again, and it emerged when I was in a session with a client recently. He was talking about high stakes meetings with the company president, the head of finance, and other execs at his level. It is very clear the finance guy isn’t doing his job—my client doesn’t have the numbers he needs.
This is simply true. My client needs these numbers to do his job. It’s not a matter of opinion.
But the head of finance is playing fear cards. Fear in the form of fuzzy information. He says things like:
‘(So and so) is working on it.’
‘I need to check with human resources.’
‘Things are changing with our Asian markets’
‘We need to factor in new data’
‘Things are looking really good!’
Sound familiar? Do you know someone who sounds like this? Do you sometimes sound like this? No facts. Just a kind-of dancing around what is actually happening.
During conversations with my client, the president plays different fear cards:
‘Is there something going on between the two of you?’
‘Our financial officer just works like that’
‘We don’t need conflict in this company.’
‘We need all perspectives.’
‘It’s important we stay a team.’
Huh? What does any of this actually mean?
We can summarize all these cards as politics. Politics is a very polished face of fear—protecting one’s image as a person who is right, good, fair, smart, kind, peaceful, or busy—in an attempt to stay accepted, seen as valuable, connected, and thus safe. The president is playing the card of polite & fair, the finance officer is playing busy & smart—both based in their childhood dynamics. They are both deflecting from underlying pain, and getting the company nowhere in the meantime.
We’ve all done conversational politics. We’ve all played the fear game. For years (& still now, sometimes) I projected ‘smart,’ & ‘independent’ because this was the value in my family as a child. I’m safe if I’m smart. I’m safe if I’ve ‘figured it out’ on my own. Forget what is true (eg. that i don’t know something, need help, etc). Fear told me to play smart & independent cards, because that is what (seemingly) kept me connected in my childhood.
But all fear/politics can do is alienate us from ourselves and others. It isn’t true. Therefore it cannot serve.
When a fear card is played it sounds abstract, hard to follow, and often dramatic. It might feel pressured and urgent (eg. Bush selling the Iraq war), or kind of hazy and hyped-up (Obama’s Hope). It might feel exciting, like a high. Or it might be syrupy sweet—like a cheap wine that leaves you with a headache. There can be a kind-of religious fervor (eg. evangelical self-help gurus & angry mobs) or a checked-out quality (eg. flat recitations of verse in church).
Fear doesn’t have solution in it. It isn’t built for that; it’s built as a zero-sum game—to zero out the identified enemy. So it stays in place. It often talks a lot. Frankly, a lot of therapy does this—lots of processing & ’coping mechanisms,’ but not much forward movement.
When truth is played it will sound clear, precise, non-personal, non-dramatic, and light. It will simply feel true—you already knew it. You won’t need to ‘try and understand’ what someone is saying.
Right now, as we are educating ourselves as a nation regarding racial disparities, we are hearing both movements—the urgent, abstract & hazy (fear-based). And the clear & specific (truth-based). We are also hearing confusing & ungrounded messages regarding COVID 19, alongside some clear insights.
Here are two examples of clarity—people speaking from direct, embodied experience, with natural solutions that emerge from personal engagement.
A New Way of Life assists women post-incarceration. Check out the straightforward language, clear vision, & results. The founder, Susan Burton, built the very organization she once needed.
Zach Bush, MD predicted where the next virus would come from 2 years ago. He predicted it because viruses emerge from polluted ecosystems, in an attempt to return us to biodiversity. Dr Bush speaks from a vast knowledge of biology, both as a doctor & soil specialist. He speaks about what this virus actually is, versus what we’ve projected onto it. Again, notice the clear language & simple facts in the interview.
Back to my client and playing his clarity cards at work.
What he’s been doing is simply not engaging with the political conversations (fear games). He is simply not responding to emails or not attending meetings he knows will go this way. Now, when he is with the president, (who is easier to get through to), he redirects her using I-statements:
“Ok. I still need those numbers.”
He repeats simple facts. “I am unable to accept delays like this and still do my job.”
I’ve also advised him to debunk the premises set up in the double-speak of fear (such as the statements ‘we can’t have conflict’ or ‘we need all perspectives’) and redirecting the conversation to on-ground realities:
“There is no conflict between the two of us. Our orders are simply not being manufactured.”
Or, “I’m not talking about perspectives. I’m talking about not having the funds to develop this product.”
In time, the president has stopped playing with fear and started playing with truth. Because truth eventually wins out (if someone is willing to hear it). It’s too compelling. It feels too good! And it’s much more fun.
My client has been amazed at the turnaround in his boss. He actually enjoys conversations with her now. He was sure he’d have to ‘play the game’ again, as he has in the past, having believed he needed to ‘play nice’ and ‘play smart’ to keep his jobs—two aspects of his childhood conditioning. Now, he just plays the truth card—which, as Kiran says, might include lying, if the other person simply cannot hear what is true. (This only works if you are not lying to yourself, however!)
Playing the truth card in relationships is, really, playing no card at all. Playing no games.
Initially, that’s so scary. Growing up, most folks around you weren’t that authentic, were they?
But feel the underlying ease of telling the truth. That feeling of release—of letting things be as they are. No maneuvers. No more gaming. Trust that good feeling of moving in truth. Don’t trust your mind—it is playing old tapes and hijacking the fun. Playing the truth card is playing in a game you can’t lose. And willing participants will join you there (sometimes surprising ones, like my client’s boss!).
It’s like being a little kid again—those no-stakes games before winning and losing came on the scene. And if you do ‘lose’ when you play the truth card…well…you didn’t really want to play with those kids anyway, did you..?
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Want to find that clarity within? Meditate with us. Every third Sunday of the month, streaming live on YouTube at 10am CST, with recording available for one month after. Go here to join us & to find additional recordings to start meditating right now.
Want to go even deeper? Join us in Kiran Trace’s Embodiment class this Fall 2020. Enter into a community of sane people playing with truth and letting go of fear.
xo