Clarity is a knowing that is beyond an intellectual, didactic understanding.
Clarity, to me, is a harmonious marriage of knowledge, intuition and focus that despite its innate sharpness exuberates compassion and grace.
I mention compassion, because being clear can feel sharp sometimes, especially on the receiving end, but there is a distinctly different quality to the fierceness of clarity then to the cutting edges of harshness. And the difference lies in healthy boundaries. And while healthy boundaries can still be painful to meet, they are always expressed with a softness of heart that comes from honoring ones truth above complying or pleasing. In that inherently lies compassion toward oneself and therefor, in turn, toward the other.
A beautiful Quote on this subject by Brené Brown, author of “Daring greatly” and “The power of vulnerability” is: “Clear is kind, unclear is unkind.”
This quote has become an anthem by which I try to live to the best of my ability, simply because I have found it to be profoundly true. The odd thing about this is that most people become unclear in order not to hurt others, to “soften the blow”, or to “protect them from the truth”, but the result usually is the opposite.
Not being straight, in most cases, is hurtful toward ourselves and others in the long run.
The other big dilemma around clarity, is that we don’t always have it and so can not respond and act according to it.
That is what makes this particular theme so rich and exciting to me. Clarity, when present, is a superpower. It is a direct lifeline to the truth of our heart, sensed decidedly in the chest, head and/or gut, from where it gets transmitted and registered in our cognitive brain and can thus be communicated without distortion.
It is a beautiful, liberating and empowering process. One that not everyone is well acquainted with, but that everyone can acquire by walking the arduous and rewarding path toward self-realization.
A work that slowly but surely exposes and disperses that within ourselves which is not true, whilst bringing to light and crystallizing that which is.
With time, clarity emerges naturally and recognizing that clarity comes to our awareness faster.
But like with everything, we also stumble and fall along the way. We get confused and uncertain. We doubt and mistrust.
But the more we acknowledge in ourselves this inner knowing, the more we act upon it and see and feel the consequences of that enriching process, the more we learn to trust that inner voice, that is and always has been guiding us unwaveringly. Only we have forgotten how to listen. But that can be mended through time, intention and a soft practice of courage and awareness.
Awareness is needed to see and discern. Courage is needed to face the not knowing as well as the truth beyond it and then, of course, to live according to it.
A teacher of mine once said: “The moment you completely and utterly surrender to not-knowing, inner guidance comes in.”
This was a big insight and fundamentally shifted my approach to situations in which I feel lost.
We are so afraid to simply relax into not having answers, not being able to foresee or control that we try to “gain” clarity, or “become” clear.
In my experience, at least on the level of deep, intuitional, aligned knowing, this is utterly counter-productive, even misleading.
To put it differently, the task is not to find clarity, the task is to peel away the obscuring layers of un-clarity. THAT needs awareness and courage.
Clarity is already there, at the core.
By Kanika Frings
Co-Founder DIMA Mallorca – Centre for Conscious Living
Holistic Counsellor
