What is Loyalty
Clarify that loyalty to anything outside yourself is likely going to compromise you at some point. Being loyal to your own core values, your truest and highest self is the most effective long term strategy for health, happiness and fulfillment.
What do I really want to say?
Loyalty to anyone outside of yourself is going to create resentment, lost time and inauthenticity. For many years I was loyal to the rules and expectations of my family. The rules of marriage, the rules I understood about parenting and the rules of the company I worked for. Loyalty was something people could rely on mm for. But the more I slowed down, the easier it was to hear my internal wisdom speaking to me. The more I listened to what I wanted and needed the harder it was to fulfill my obligation to be loyal to a system of beliefs that started to not make any sense to me.
And after working with 1000s of women over the last 18 years, Loyalty is one of the biggest lies we have been told about how to create a community of people who love and support us. It’s not about people being loyal to you - you don’t want that. I don’t want that. I don’t want your loyalty. I want You to be honest, authentic and to be loyal to yourself. And I know that could mean that one day you and I will part ways. I also know that in many cases, it means that we will be able to stay in each others lives longer because our relationship is no longer based on historic expectation, obligation and the rule that you have to be loyal to our friendship.
What does Loyalty mean?
By definition it’s about honoring and supporting something or someone outside yourself unwaveringly. Being loyal to someone or something means trusting, sometimes blindly, that they or it has your best interest in their actions and plans. It means making decisions based on this agreement of loyalty rather than the truth of what you need and want for your truest self from moment to moment and it results in inauthenticity. You aren’t being honest if you are choking down your truths in an effort to maintain this agreement to be loyal.
Where in your life have you been asked to be loyal to someone or something outside of yourself? Maybe school, religion, partnership, friendships, company you work for, or governments and nations. But there is NO one who has the exact same life experiences as you or the same needs and vision for their future. So it seems counter productive to make loyalty to anyone other than your own core values and your own purpose. Loyalty is an extension of looking outside ourselves for how to exist. You cannot be loyal to someone else AND maintain integrity with your core values consistently.
Most of us struggle being our truest selves
We have pledged our loyalty to someone or something without realizing it. We agreed to be loyal to our parents and that translates to obeying their rules, following their footsteps, and foregoing our needs in an effort to maintain that loyalty. We agreed to be loyal to a church or a religion and that translates into not questioning the decisions or perspective of those in leadership. We agreed to be loyal to the company we represent or the leader we learned a lot from because their offer made so much sense and was so valuable to us. And when you evolve from that initial experience, add in your own reflection, point of view, observations of the world and your inner wisdom weights in...anxiety, guilt and hesitation to make a decision flood in.
Many of us have learned through our early childhood and adult relationships, personally and professionally, that loyalty is expected, despite the differing core values as we grew into adults and are on our own path. Loyalty to another person is the fast track and breeding ground for codependency. It says something outside of me is where my priority lies and I’ll deny my needs to honor that. We see this in a lot of organizations - in direct sales teams, MLM, in corporations, those structures are built on the foundation of loyalty to the institution and leader above self. And if you’ve ever felt scared or nervous to speak aloud the notion that this space, this container - whatever may not fit any more - that’s because you are in a culture that expects loyalty ...or else.
Trust yourself
Trusting yourself, above all else, is where you will find peace, ease and alignment. You are going to be 100% grounded if your loyalty shifts from facing these institutions and people to your own internal truth and intrinsic motivation. Loyalty to anything outside yourself is going to compromise you at some point. Being loyal to your own core values, your truest and highest self is the most effective long term strategy for health, happiness and fulfillment. This is how you won’t be 140 years old with a long list of regrets and time you can’t get back. Say no to loyalty and yes to your personal path, the journey back to you.
