Why do anything—seriously, anything—if you aren’t going to give yourself the full experience?  Feel into that question. And yes, you read it right. You give to yourself fully or you hold yourself back.   No one else is involved, my friend, and that is the #wholetruth.  

I’m fresh off of a four-day self-discovery course and I’ve been feeling into this question since the moment it was over.  The concept reminds me of that old instruction to “dance like no one is watching.”  You’ve heard of it, surely. Perhaps you’ve told someone else to live that way in a heartfelt moment of giving advice. Heck, you may even have that saying on a placard on your wall somewhere.

It seems we all understand that saying.  But do we feel it?

I know I hadn’t until very recently.  I have an identity that is fiercely attached to following rules.  That part of me enjoys being accurate. Correct. Doing things the way they’re “supposed” to be done.  It enjoys being told, “Yes! You did it right!” That’s the part of me that graduated first in her class from law school.  Literally no one in Class of 2006 did better than I did.  Not. A. One. I know what it means to execute impeccably.  It’s a safe, comfortable place for me to be.

On the flip side of that identity is a gut-wrenching, hysterical fear of making a mistake.  What if people are indeed watching me dance? What if I’m not doing it right? What if I fall?  What if I screw up?

That fear has existed within me my entire life and, despite my success on paper, it has stifled me.  For every A+ there is a tantrum during which I’ve ripped to shreds the coloring book page evidencing my crayon marks outside the lines.  Behind every award there’s hair that I ripped from my own head strewn on the floor. Getting it right is all that has ever mattered. The result, ironically, is that I don’t turn up the dial and fully use my gifts. Except for a few stand-alone moments, I don’t play full out.  I don’t allow myself to simply be one with the experience. I have always had one eye on the result.

That’s why I rip unreturnable tennis balls with graceful, deliberate power in practice but shrink into myself and merely dink balls over the net during a real match.  It’s why I belt out tunes in my car but only hum at church. It’s why I married my ex-husband, who I knew wasn’t in love with me. It’s why I stayed after even he told me to leave.  It’s why I went through with a wedding that should never have been.

I couldn’t admit the mistake.  I couldn’t stand the thought of failing.

What I didn’t realize until now is that admitting the mistake and walking into the unknown to find real love—even at the risk of failure— still would have allowed me to claim a win.  Even if I was single for awhile; even if balls go flying off my racquet into the fence; even if I sing off key, I can still win at giving myself the full experience, of never wondering what could have been if I had played full out instead of holding back for fear of doing it wrong.

Allowing yourself to feel it all is the win, girlfriend.

The most hilarious part about all of this is that when you’re playing full out instead of playing not to lose, you’re much more likely to get what you wanted (and were so fearful of losing) in the first place.  Your results are 100 times better than you could have imagined.

I gave myself this experience the other night.  I let myself be totally immersed in conversations without wondering who else might be at the party or what I might be missing out on by giving one person at a time my clear, neutral attention.  I got up on a stage and danced my heart out, indeed, as if no one was watching. I didn’t care at all if I was “doing it right” or if I looked stupid.

As it turns out, people were watching.  My adoring husband, for one. And you know what?  I didn’t look stupid. I looked amazing. It was awesome.  I had fun. A blast, really.

My new anthem is Capital Letters by Hailee Steinfeld.  I can listen to it over and over and over again.  It accelerates this feeling I’ve harnessed—this feeling of having been unleashed.  (It also reminds me of Fifty Shades Freed, which is always quite enjoyable in a steamy, quivering kind of way).  When I hear the chorus I hear my higher and true self singing to me.  I hear myself signing back to her, “our heart a little clearer.” I’m done with not giving myself the full experience.  I’m going to live my life emphatically. In capital letters, so to speak.

If I lose the match, so be it.  I’ll win at playing full out, at being all in with the process—result be damned, at not leaving anything bottled inside of me. I am a bold, unapologetic badass.  Imma let that girl out.

No more tiptoeing for me. I’m blowing out speakers.  I am alive. You with me, girlfriend?