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Authenticity and Healing

In the past month, I am so grateful to have mentored teens ages 12-17 to help explore relevant issues for  their age groups and co-faciliate power groups that allow for topics like communication, relationships, and school/home life.  

I went in with the intention to source authenticity- and boy, were they some amazing teachers!! Young leaders taking a stand for themselves brought me back to an age where I was overwhelmed with very adult issues and struggled until recently with expressing myself.

Last Monday, I had a breakthrough in front of a room of about thirty teens, and ten adults and shared a very personal experience from the Summer of 2013.

In that moment, I experienced myself as authentic- without a story, with tears flowing from my eyes knowing that sharing my own brush with life could impact others and set myself free.

And so, I shared unexpectedly- and in that, I was set free from the shame, guilt and judgement I had of myself and was able to forgive.

So, the idea of authenticity has been on my mind a lot lately- especially in expressing myself through art.

With my own experience, I can see beneath and beyond the masks people wear- including my own, as I open up and share, without regard for how I look.

I am beyond grateful.

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