I‘ve Commanded the Attention of More Than a Million People Face to Face

But I’ve been gaslighting myself

I’m a socially anxious, secret introvert

Not only that, but I struggle with bouts of depression, deep self-doubt, imposter syndrome, and multiple deadline disorder. (Ok, yes…procrastination if you’re going to be picky about what to call it.)

Yet I have one of the strongest work ethics of anyone I’ve met. I don’t know anyone who works harder than me.

I used to wear that as a badge, but now I can see how my “hard work” has been a smokescreen to mask long-standing fears, high sensitivity, social awkwardness, and shame.

The people you know who work the hardest are often sustained by the same fears and insecurities. People like me will have an immediate answer, articulate goals, and lofty visions when asked what we’re working toward, but these are a form of self-deception. We’re actually not working toward anything. We’re working on emotional safety and coping with our hidden shadow.

For the last 20 years, I’ve been flown from city to city, resort to resort, on someone else’s expense account. On top of that, I charge $7,500 an hour if you want the privilege of having me address your audience.

That should be a potent cocktail of self-esteem, self-confidence, and self-worth. But in actuality, it’s been the opposite.

The appearance of success, acceptance, praise, and love from those I can keep at a distance (audiences and clients) has buffered me from the reality of how isolated I feel and how much fear I have of opportunities for human connection.

How this happened, I’m not sure. I have loving, intelligent parents who always supported me to follow my passions and dreams. Sure, they’re not perfect, but I haven’t been physically, emotionally, or mentally abused. I’m just wired for the experience of struggling with shame.

Here’s what I haven’t been doing while I’m out on the road a third of the year as a professional speaker and entertainer, being treated like a VIP.

• Spending time with my kids.
• Feeding my marriage.
• Pursuing my inner life.
• Developing friendships.
• Getting to know my town and the people who live in it.
• Pursuing my passion for writing.

I’ve been gaslighting myself.

An article in Psychology Today defines gaslighting like this.

Gaslighting is an insidious form of manipulation and psychological control. Victims of gaslighting are deliberately and systematically fed false information that leads them to question what they know to be true, often about themselves.

I’m not a psychologist, but I think gaslighting oneself to some degree must be at the foundation of becoming victim to it by others.

You can’t have spent much time on Medium without having run across the viral and inspiring article Prepare for the Ultimate Gaslighting by Julio Vincent Gambuto.

It’s a deeply compelling call to hold on to whatever saner perspective we may have gained during the pandemic. But I have to say that I believe the “ultimate” gaslighting is even closer to home and more subtle than any corporate or government messaging could ever be. We’ve already internalized a disconnection from reality, from our own deepest needs, and that makes us susceptible to losing track of our priorities and being gaslit by others.

My experience is that most of the business environment is rife with self-gaslighting that is fueling the complete breakdown of planet earth.

The environmental, economic, and social collapse we’re seeing is powered by deep personal disconnection, multiplied by the billions. Yes, that disconnection is encouraged by media which is funded by those with a profit motive. But that doesn’t absolve us from doing the personal work of confronting our own inner spin machine, the part of us that desperately wants to keep seeing things in a certain way, despite all evidence to the contrary.

For me that way of seeing has been, “I have to be out on the road to earn a living and to support my family.”

In truth, that narrative has always been more about my need to preserve a sense of status, importance, and identity — a safe emotional distance — than it was an actual survival issue. My wife has been telling me for years that our survival is not in question, but I’ve always managed to convince myself that she just didn’t understand.

Truth is a casualty when we’re battling inside to keep seeing ourselves in a particular way. Our identification with the American dream, the concept of “freedom,” the symbols of success — those attachments are at the core of personal gaslighting, which can be accurately described by making a few minor adjustments to the definition above.

Gaslighting is an insidious form of self-manipulation and psychological control. Users of gaslighting deliberately and systematically feed themselves false information that leads them to question what they know to be true about themselves.

The bank told me it was no problem

In late 2019 we decided to move. According to my identifications and consumerist training, it had to be a step up from our previous circumstances. We went from a small paid-off home to a mortgage of $2,500/month.

But hey, the bank told me this was no problem. Based on my demonstrated income, they were happy to lend me both the money and the confidence I needed to invest in this move.

We closed on our new home in the spring of 2020. The last piece of our furniture had barely been unloaded and set on the floor when I saw a brief article about some kind of virus that was cropping up in the Orient.

Within a month of seeing that article my entire year of planned speaking dates had been canceled, as it had for most other professional speakers. The meeting industry was decimated. And in two years it hasn’t yet come back.

It’s been hell. But it’s also been one of the best things that have ever happened to me.

After 45 years of life on the road, I know what it’s like to see the continuity of seasonal change in one location. In curiosity, I looked back at my travel history and discovered I haven’t spent more than four weeks in one location in 30 years. Now I’m present for the day-to-day miracle of my 12-year-old becoming a human being. I am witness to the explosion of learning, thinking, expression, struggle, and expansion of my son.

And I would have missed it.

The places that this pandemic has taken me in relation to my marriage, my sense of identity, purpose, direction, and future would be impossible to describe. It’s been a day after day process of questioning, doubting, exploring, and trying new things. I’ve hit walls of depression, panic, hopelessness, and disorientation. But there’s been one saving through-line to the struggle: my relationships.

My marriage, my parenting, my friendships—even my relationship with my own parents and birth family—have evolved and grown into a field of sanctuary for my humility to unfold. My defenses have not evaporated, but they’re now riddled with holes, large enough for my loved ones to reach through, touch my heart, and remind me what I really came here for.

Connection.

I’m rediscovering a lifelong love for writing

The hidden truth of my performing life is how much I care about people. When I’m standing in front of an audience, pretending that the best I have to offer them is a good laugh and or inspirational idea, I’m hiding.

What I really wish I could say is, “I love you.”

I’ve had too many opportunities, looking out at a corporate audience, to be fooled by professional success. I see the struggle, the pain, the sense of something missing, the defense of territory, the posturing, the masks.

I know that every single attendee, however poised or composed they appear, wants to be seen, known, heard, and understood. And yet the vulnerability that would foster that kind of connection is not the purpose of sales meetings, motivational sessions, or even team-building events. And rightly so. To embrace our pain and wounds, and then share them in trustworthy company, is a quieter, more private, and more delicate affair. And so I find myself in search of a new kind of venue to connect in a meaningful way.

What I’m rediscovering now, after two years of stumbling and experimentation, is my lifelong love of writing.

At first glance, writing seems to be a solitary activity. But when I’m sitting here, writing words like these, the defined edges of time and space soften and I experience a palpable connection with other humans. I am owning my story and our collective story in the same telling. As the truth tumbles out, my isolation and loneliness are relieved, even before the words are shared. There is little that heals as miraculously as expressing the truth and having it be heard. And what is writing if not truth-sharing and truth-receiving?

Slowly, it seems, the event industry is coming back, and yet I’ve turned down most of the recent speaking offers that are now coming in to stay home with my family and write instead. My head is telling me that’s a stupid decision in light of the monthly drain on our savings account, but how can I write a new story if I don’t write “The End” on the current one—as safe and familiar as it is?

So I don’t know where this is all going; how I might cover my mortgage by giving myself over to written expression. But somehow I trust it’s going to lead me to the right place — guide me in the right direction.

I don’t know you. But that doesn’t mean I can’t love you and the journey you’re on. After all, you’re a human, and we’re coexisting on this pulsing, beautiful, crying orb in the Milky Way. We’re all searching for meaningful lives, hungering for connection as we struggle to navigate the biggest human transition in the history of the planet.

The unknowns are greater than the knowns right now. But then, they always have been. We don’t know where we’re going, but I think most of us could agree that, if we go together, it’s a path with heart.