The Art of Showing Up: How to Be There for Yourself and Your People

by Rachel Wilkerson Miller

Showing up is what turns the people you know into your people.

Showing up is the act of bearing witness to people’s joy, pain, and true selves; validating their experiences; easing their load; and communicating that they are not alone in this life.

Showing up for yourself isn’t about feeling happiness, exactly; it’s about feeling grounded and content and believing that you are enough.

social capital—connections among individuals and the sense of reciprocity and trustworthiness that arises from these social networks—plays

Your people can expand to include your coworkers, acquaintances, family members, and whoever else you want it to—it’s basically anyone you care about and have a connection with.

They define “compassion” as noticing, feeling, and responding; I think of showing up as noticing, processing, naming, and responding.

Noticing is perceiving behavior, words, or circumstances that communicate a need. And the need doesn’t have to be negative; it could be a need to celebrate or connect.

Processing is using the knowledge you already have—about yourself, about the other person, about certain behaviors, etc.—to analyze what you’ve just noticed.

Naming is identifying the “what’s really going on here”—the deeper need, the bigger behavior, the narrative of what actually happened—and recognizing its legitimacy and worthiness. Naming can be sort of small (e.g., “What is being described sounds really effing annoying”) or pretty significant (e.g., “What is being described sounds incredibly abusive”). Naming is powerful—it’s validating, and is how our experiences begin to take shape and make sense to us.

Responding is reacting in a way that makes the receiver (which, remember, might mean you!) feel seen, supported, and more whole. (And by the way, in practice, responding might be naming the behavior.)

Showing up for yourself and others is rooted in nine core values: curiosity, intelligence, intuition, compassion, generosity, creativity, self-awareness, confidence, and a willingness to be vulnerable.

Self-awareness: Without a working knowledge of your own personality, character, and feelings, you can’t figure out what you need or fully grasp the way your actions affect other people (for better or worse).

Confidence in your intentions, decisions, and abilities is what will help you push through your feelings of inadequacy when you’re faced with an opportunity to show up.

Vulnerability: Showing up for yourself requires acknowledging your own needs . . . but so often, we’d prefer to pretend we don’t have those! Meanwhile, showing up for others requires taking a risk. You have to set aside your fear of looking foolish or failing.

There’s not much space for generosity, confidence, or vulnerability when you’re constantly worried about whether you have enough and are enough.

So, what does knowing yourself even mean? Being able to name the main qualities that make you you Having a clear sense of your core values and your priorities Knowing what you like and don’t like Identifying what makes you feel comfortable and uncomfortable Acknowledging what you are willing and unwilling to do Being aware of how you’re likely to react (or are reacting) in a given situation

When I say acceptance, I mean bearing witness to what is true about yourself and your life—even the messy, painful, embarrassing parts—so you can respond to that reality. Acceptance is about being brave enough to look at who you are and not turning away or immediately looking for a fix when you don’t like what you see. It’s not about settling; after all, you may still want to make significant changes that will ultimately make your life better. It’s about grace—offering yourself compassion and mercy, even if you’re not totally convinced you deserve it.

a journal expressly devoted to, well, you, and to the things about you that seem unchanging, significant, and close to your heart. That could include answers to some of the questions in this chapter; compliments or kind words you want to remember; prayers, meditations, or mantras that move you; things you like about yourself; and your go-to self-care ideas.

an encyclopedia of you, a little scrapbook of the soul.

Here are some of the everyday decisions that are typically tied to your values. How you get to school/work The foods you eat The clothes you buy and wear Who you spend time with (friends, family, coworkers) How much time you spend with them How much time you spend on your phone and what specifically you’re doing on it

if your choices aren’t rooted in your values, it just means that someone else’s values will dictate what you do.

Acceptance

Faith

Achie...

Adve...

Open-mind...

Financial s...

Friendships

Hard work

Dependability Honesty Self-control

Fairness

Independence

The goal is to determine what arrangements or qualities allow you to experience satisfaction, relief, encouragement, and enjoyment in a given day or situation.

When you have a clear sense of what specifically makes you feel good (or bad), you can improve your self-awareness, recognize your true needs, set boundaries, and effectively respond to problems (big and small).

the best way to get something out of a personality test is to discuss the results with someone you’re really close to—that person who can say, “Actually . . . you do kind of do that,” when you’re insisting you don’t.

Personality tests create a safe space for naming and sharing needs. And they give us a shared vocabulary that allows us to be better at showing up for each other.

“Being able to give the emotions you experience a name is not some touchy-feely idea about sensitivity. Naming it involves consciously thinking about what is happening and choosing how to react.

Admitting you need something is a vulnerable act, which is why it can be so difficult.

Taking care of something means protecting it, and strong, well-considered boundaries—which therapist Andrea Bonior defines as “principles that you establish in order to keep yourself feeling safe and comfortable, emotionally and physically”8—will allow you to protect yourself from all of the negativity waiting just outside the gates: draining conversations, useless apps, toxic people.

Showing up for yourself isn’t possible if you don’t make space for yourself—space to notice and respond; space to flourish and thrive; space that you can fill with the habits, activities, and people that truly make you feel good.

Making space means you have to say no sometimes—no to your beloved friends, to your coworkers, to the things you “want” (but don’t really want), to the things you genuinely want (but not right this second), to your notifications and goddamn phone.

it’s considerably easier when you are able to do it intentionally and wholeheartedly, confident in who you are and secure in the knowledge that your decision is the best one you could make in this moment.

But everything we do costs us time, money, or energy (also known as TME). Your TME is your most valuable resource, and if you want to better show up for yourself, it’s helpful to think about how you’re spending it—and how you’d like to be spending it.

“Answer a single question, in writing, each night before bed: ‘As I look back on today, what did I do that was actually worth my time?’”

“Excuses are things that people use to justify not doing something because they don’t want to do it. Reasons are how people explain not doing something because they aren’t able to do it.

Who are you? What do you value? What do you need and want? What does your life really look like? What do you realistically have time and energy for? How are you actually spending your days? And going forward, what will you prioritize?

There are 168 hours in a week, but we aren’t robots! We can only realistically do so much in that time. While I genuinely believe that evaluating how you’re currently spending your time and energy will make it possible to do more of the things that matter most to you, I don’t think any of us will ever be able to do everything we’d like to do.

It’s impossible to honor your own needs if you’re constantly worried that everyone you care about is going to leave you. Being OK with being alone is critical to showing up for yourself, and to living an authentic, fulfilling life.

And the more you create, the more you invite responses, which traps you in a cycle of liking and responding even more.

Sometimes, having friends means doing things that aren’t exactly your idea of a good time.