Choosing truth and inner authority in uncertain times

Rooted in the yamas and niyamas of yoga philosophy, this is a personal reflection shaped by lived, embodied truth.

It’s impossible to watch what is happening across the Atlantic right now without feeling the weight of it all. We are told that what we are seeing with our own eyes is incorrect, what we’re feeling is misinformation and that we are to override our innate sense of right and wrong, blindly trusting those in authority and power.

But the truth is that what happens there ripples outward. It shapes culture, emboldens bullies in our own lives and in positions of authority, giving permission to those who wish to persecute minorities and the vulnerable. It allows tribalism and personal greed, at the expense of others, to become louder, reminding us how fragile kindness can feel when power is wielded without care.

For many of us, the hardest part isn’t just the fear or the anger, it’s the sense of powerlessness. Watching something unfold that feels deeply wrong, while knowing we cannot single-handedly stop it, can leave us frozen, numb, or quietly despairing.

But this does not mean we are powerless in our own lives. We do have power and that power ripples outward around us.

We still get to choose how we live, how we speak, how we treat others and what we are willing to align ourselves with. We get to choose love over cruelty, truth over convenience and courage over silence, even when our voice shakes. We get to name injustice when we see it, even if doing so makes us uncomfortable, even if it costs us approval or safety or certainty.

This is not abstract for me. I’ve had to live this choice in a very personal way.

There have been times in my own life where staying in a system meant slowly being erased. I constantly wrestled with the narrative of what should be tolerated, what I deserved, who I was, what kind of parent I should be and what the role of a woman meant. My voice has been dismissed, my sense of right and wrong dismantled and my body has screamed with physical pain.

The thing is, we often feel our truth long before our mind and voice catches up. We notice the constriction of our throat when we avoid the consequences of standing up for truth and decency. Our body aches with fear of the illusion of safety being taken away and our chest tightens with denial of what is in our heart and soul.

We have seen, with our own eyes, what the extreme cost of standing up for what is right and what is true can mean with the killings of Alex Pretti and Renee Good. Two people who chose to protect basic humanity. Of course, we may dismiss this as the exception but it sends messages to our subconscious to avoid confrontation, debate and discomfort, choosing the mantra “least said, soonest mended”.

But there is a point when abandoning our own values and voice is just too destructive for ourselves and others. Even if the consequences of standing in our own truth affects our very illusion of safety built on denial, even if aligning with what we believe, what feels true, humane and loving means the loss of everything we have known, the effects of staying within the constraints of a harmful system is the death of our personal freedom.

We are often taught to doubt that knowing. To look outside ourselves for validation, permission, or reassurance. To assume others know better. To stay because leaving is frightening. To comply because speaking out feels risky.

But your body, your heart, your soul are not foolish. They carry a deep intelligence. Learning to trust that inner compass is not selfish. It is how we resist cruelty in its most subtle forms. It is how we refuse to participate in systems, relationships or narratives that require us to abandon our humanity.

Not everything that is harmful announces itself clearly or dramatically. Sometimes it whispers. Sometimes it shows up as exhaustion, dread, shrinking, or the quiet sense that you are disappearing from your own life.

My own personal choices have taught me something I keep returning to now as I watch the wider world unfold.

If something feels wrong in your body, it is worth listening to.

It is actually less damaging if others ridicule (at best), persecute or penalise me for my own personal morality because choosing to accept the consequences rather than abandon my own values is absolutely necessary to my inner peace. It may sound dramatic, but I have learnt the hard way that aligning with what I believe, with what feels true and humane and loving, matters to my very survival.

The world feels unstable right now. Many of us are scared, angry, grieving, or overwhelmed. We may not be able to change everything that is happening on a global stage. But we can change how we show up in our own lives. We can choose honesty over denial, we can choose kindness without passivity and we can choose to believe ourselves when something feels wrong.

And, in doing so, we quietly push back against the very forces that tell us we are small, voiceless, and powerless. Every time we stand in truth and courage, we give others power too.