Your truth makes a difference. Honesty’s a good thing, but truth means more. It’s about who you really are and how you’ve evolved as a result of what you’ve been through. For years, many people hide from the truth of who they are. Some people do it their whole lives. But just recently, an impressive person showed us the truth of who she is. We felt what it was like to be her. And it was the purest of privileges.
Being ‘ourselves’ is a curious challenge. If we’re constantly evolving, which bits stay the same and define who we are… and which bits are the temporary things that we can – and sometimes should - make changes to? What is our 'truth'?
Let’s first take a look at the impact a person’s honesty can have on us.
Think back to the last time you were in the company of someone being dishonest with you. It might have been a salesman using their upper facial muscles or exaggerating their intonation that bit too much; it might have been someone covering up their embarrassment about why they haven’t delivered to agreed expectations; it might even have been a mischievous three year old learning the language of deceit… it might have been anyone really. They’re convinced they’re convincing you. But what happened to you as you heard the fibs? And as you listened, what happened to your respect for them? What happened to your belief in what they stood for? And how soon did you want to remove this person from your reality? And what about the last time you were in someone’s company where… well… for some reason… without really knowing why… something wasn’t quite right... you simply didn’t trust them… but couldn’t work out why?
Now forget the above. Bin it. Instead, imagine the opposite. Instead of thinking about the honesty of what people are ‘saying’, let’s now think about the honesty of who someone’s actually ‘being’.
There’s a special business we know. They’ve rapidly climbed to the top half of The Times Top 100 list of companies to work for, and my instinct is that that’s where they’ll stay for a long time to come. Their offering is exceptionally popular. But it’s not only that that really sets them apart. You get a sense of them as soon as you walk through their doors. You very quickly notice senior Directors holding open the doors for the younger staff. You hear people laughing out loud. Really loud. Without analysing, you can’t help noticing people’s healthy body posture, how there’s real intonation in people’s voices, how the smiles are from the core, and how very few people seem to be walking around on their own. These people were different. You didn’t need to analyse it, you could just feel that things work differently there. And it’s no surprise their business is going from one success to another.
And as we sat down to meet with them again in recent weeks, something happened. You could feel it very quickly. It was nourishing.
We’d been chatting only for a few minutes when a special moment thrust itself into the open. While talking about what we were meeting to discuss, it suddenly became clear that all three of us had been through something similar in our lives. In our earlier careers, we’d each gone the corporate route and reached that point in your 20s or 30s where you lie awake at night weighing things up something like this: “If I stay here, my future’s secure. I love the people here. And there’s some challenge to keep things interesting. But is this really what I want to be doing with the one life I’ve got”?
And all of a sudden, the conversation became about truth.
One after the other, we all opened up about why we’d left the businesses around the world we’d worked so hard to do well in. There was nothing wrong with these businesses, but that life simply hadn’t been ‘us’. We were suddenly laughing out loud while hearing each other talk about those moments when you’re giving it all up and your closest friends are asking whether you’re serious. And those moments when once you’ve given it all up and you say to yourself “bloody heck”. And then the laughs were replaced with the warmest smiles. We each remembered that first moment when that thing happened that rewarded the brave decision to give it all up, to move on, to do what we’re truly about. When you feel truer than you’ve ever felt.
And this transformed the discussion. In contrast to those times when you attend meetings and the discussion’s like a kind of Q & A session, this discussion was rare in its healthiness. As we discussed their business, their successes, their experiences and their plans, we saw everything through the truth of the passion for the business of this person.
This person was being her own truth. Nothing was being ‘presented’ or ‘delivered’. Instead, she was guiding us through their company’s passion, exploring it with us, seeing opportunities for the first time as we together talked things through, walking through the landscape of their truest, realisable potential. She shared with frankness the moments when she suddenly saw a new strain of buzzing potential for the first time. We felt the thoroughness of her intellect, the clarity of her vision and the honesty of her awareness, and as we explored the energy of their business’s future through the energy of her own connection with it, some things didn’t make sense initially. All the time, she was being completely real and true.
Yet as we looked around the truth of the energy of their people, it didn’t take long for everything to fall into place and for ways through challenges to be found. Answers sometimes took a moment to come. Conclusions also sometimes took a minute or two. But all the way through, you knew she was devoted to the truest, real growth of the colleagues she was passionate about. Some people talk about intentions, but this person was pulling together in real-time how to soon make things happen. And all the time, she was speaking the truth of their people. She was alive. She was real. She was true. She was the kind of person many businesses will never find. She was different. She was committed. She was her.
And as we said goodbye, Lisa and I had a new taste in our mouths. It was the taste of this company’s passion and energy. The taste is still there. And it tastes truly good.
When we’re true, people taste it. When we’re passionate about the commitments we’re making, people sense it. They sense its realness and they instinctively feel its truth. When we don’t always make sense straight away because we’re so busy enjoying being passionate about our truth that we don’t really know how to explain it, it unlocks new truth in others. It makes them feel alive. When people sense the truth of our aliveness, they feel alive too. When we’re being our truth, we ignite each other. And when we’re so alive that our passions are simply part of who we’re here to be, it makes a difference. A massive difference. It’s a difference which, without being true, we couldn’t make even if we tried our hardest.
Being your truth - not just speaking it - makes the world different. It makes lives better. And the more of your truth you show, the more people will listen. Enjoy each day of your own personal truth this week. It’ll inspire the rest of us.
:-) Jonathan
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