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If we value reality and truth as we value sunshine, clean air, and clear water, we might realize it is the breath of life. It’s one with our integrity, joy, health, relationships, and stability.

In our journey to truth, we start having deeper conversations that simultaneously can be relieving and anxiety-provoking because our secrets, hiding places, and devious thoughts will be exposed. Coming into reality and feeling the incredible luster of truth means stepping beyond the grip of fear over and over again. You take action, fear and all. You say what’s true, fear and all. Ultimately you risk losing everything but yourself and your connection to the flow of life. Once you truly experience that anything but the truth hurts inside—it creates uneasiness, tightness, dullness, a nagging feeling—you become all the more motivated to get to the truth as quickly as possible and allow the internal sunshine and soft breezes to return.

Being real with people does run the risk of evoking strong feelings or conflict and can sometimes lead to loss. It also has the potential to deepen understanding, draw you closer together, and change the direction of a relationship. I have seen snarly relationships improve dramatically when the protected heart is revealed and the tears start to flow. Some people are relieved when secrets are brought to light—like being able to get out of a private prison by having a friend who understands. “You don’t think I’m disgusting and terrible for what I’ve done?” “No, I’m glad you told me. I feel trusted.” Our connection grows stronger, we drop into silence together, and there is more love available than we ever could have dreamed of.

Once we commit to living in reality and telling the truth as best we can, life becomes simple. Not easy, but simple. Instead of second guessing our responses, we listen internally and reveal whatever arises—again with kindness, right timing, and appropriateness. We realize it is our task to accept the outcome, even if it is very difficult because being at one with reality and truth is at the heart of our commitment to live with integrity.

This is June’s account of waking up to what it means to tell the truth: “I had a terribly hard time telling people the truth, but I wouldn’t have called it that. I would have said I wanted to say the right thing or please others or not create conflict. I was completely afraid to express anger, but often my words would come out sideways or like little digs. Then on a camping trip with a friend and her daughter, we got into a hot situation and I dropped the ‘nice’ facade and started to cry. ‘What should I have said?’ I asked my friend. ‘Just say the truth!’ she shouted in frustration. ‘Say what’s true—what you like or want or feel . . . and let the chips fall where they may!’ I was stunned. It was like waking up to a burst of bright energy. ‘Oh, that’s all I have to do. Just say what’s going on with me. No guessing, wondering, anticipating, just let it all happen.’ My life was forever changed.”

Committing to living by the truth is similar to saying, “I will not live in fear,” because fear is the prime motivator for distorting the truth. I’m afraid you won’t like me so I’ll flatter you. I’m afraid I’m inadequate so I’ll work seventy hours a week and prove I’m successful. When you can say to yourself, “Let it all fall apart, let me be alone, disliked, broke, but I will not live in fear, I will not tolerate this knot in my gut, this tight body or racing thoughts,” you are free. Returning to Gandhi’s words, we remember that “there is an indescribable lustre to the truth.”

31. My Truth, Thy Truth: We Are Part of a Web

In Experiments with Truth, Mahatma Gandhi wrote that ahimsa is based on the search for the truth and that “a perfect vision of truth can only follow a complete realization of ahimsa.” Ahimsa refers to the underlying unity of all life.

It is quite proper to resist and attack a system, but to resist and attack its author is tantamount to resisting and attacking oneself. For we are all tarred with the same brush, and are children