How a Bulldog Helped Me Become My Authentic Self

How do you know when you’re living as your AUTHENTIC SELF?

More importantly: How do you know when you’re NOT living as your true, authentic self?

I’ve asked myself this question a lot over the last 2 years. And my latest round of soul searching began after I suffered a major shoulder injury when I was walking my British Bulldog, Sava. In the blink of an eye, the injury brought a world of physical and emotional pain into my life.

But, in retrospect, I understand that this injury was actually a blessing in disguise. Maybe it was even meant to be.

Why?

Because it forced me to slow down and take a hard look at all the choices I was making – or not making. It even made me realise that I wasn’t living authentically in my relationships and career. And that I needed to recreate these areas if I wanted to be truly happy.

 

What is Authenticity?

What does it mean to be authentic?

From a very basic perspective, when you’re being authentic you’re trusting yourself.

You’re aware when that little voice inside of you, your intuition, your gut feelings or serendipity ‘speak’ to you. Then, if it feels correct for you, you allow yourself to follow that thread to see where it leads.

It’s a natural, organic process that connects you with the flow of life.

And it makes you feel GOOD!

You get the satisfying or peaceful or contended or delightfully surprised vibes as a result of acting on what feels correct for you.

This leads you to your highest potential and life purpose, simply because you’re trusting those smaller inner sparks that find you on a daily basis.

 

How To Know When You’re Not Authentic

Living as your authentic self is not always easy.

We are all conditioned to live/think/act in certain ways from birth. Often, this creates adults with a rigid set of expectations that dictate how we should – or should not – live.

If your intuition, gut feelings or inner spark don’t align with your conditioning, it’s very easy to shut down your inner voice. The more you do that, the more you stray from your true, authentic self – little by little.

For me, being off my life path didn’t necessarily mean that life was bad. In fact, from an outsider’s perspective, everything in my world seemed peachy.

However, deep down, I knew that I wasn’t meeting my potential. I felt empty in some areas of my life, and like I was regularly compromising what I REALLY wanted. Most likely, I was taking the easy road in order to avoid the inevitable, i.e. change.

As a Human Design Analyst and Naturopath who’s been in the health industry since 1999, one thing I know for sure is:

Your mind-body connection is powerful!

Every symptom that you – and everyone else on this planet experience, begins as a form of resistance in your energy.

Resist a thought, situation, experience, etc. for too long, and your energy field changes so much so that your physical body feels it too. It notices that something in your energy has become ‘blocked’, and as a result the free flow of energy in your body also becomes blocked.

Where in your body the symptom arises depends on what you’re been resisting, and how you’ve been resisting it.

Rest assured, your mind-body connection is always keeping score on how regularly you’re:

• resisting what feels correct for you
• embracing and trusting what feels correct for you.

My injury was a perfect example of how mind-body connection works.

 

My Journey to Authenticity

 

 

Sava (in my opinion) is likely one of my Spirit Guides or Earth Angels. One of his missions is to help me (and the rest of my family) realign with my beautiful authentic self.

This slobbery dude is hyper-sensitive to energy – always has been. My claircognisance tells me that, before my injury, he picked up on the misalignment in my aura, and that I wasn’t being my true, real, authentic self. The injury was his (or spirit’s) way of nudging me towards where I was meant to be. The slow down my injury created plunged me into yet another dark night of the soul, where I began reassessing all areas of my life.

It was a few months into my healing journey that I discovered Human Design. This is when I I truly started to understand the lesson that Sava was trying to teach me.

If you don’t know, Human Design is also called the Science of Differentiation. It a magical synergy of quantum physics, astrology, the I Ching, Kabbalah, and the Chakra system which shows you WHO you came here to be this lifetime. It gives a roadmap for how to live in a way that decreases resistance, stress and sickness, and amplifies ease, flow and wellness.

Through Human Design, I learned just how much I was denying who I truly was. And how that was creating a bunch of resistance in my aura, and body, which led to my accident (this accident, and a few other major ones I’ve had).

It also revealed that my open spleen center was running the show.

What this means is that I was denying making changes and releasing things that are no longer serving me. With an open spleen, quickly releasing outdated situations is not something that comes naturally to me. But, fortunately, Sava saw my potential and became the catalyst for the change that needed to happen in my life. It was a wake-up call that helped me discover where I was off my path, and how I could realign with my higher potential (and joy).

 

Evolving Into Your Authentic Self

Shifting from a people-pleasing or conditioned you, into your authentic self, isn’t always easy or comfortable. It can be filled with struggles, arguments, depression and pain, especially if you’ve resisted your true self for a while.

These authentic-living tips can help you simplify the process:

1. Set an intention to live as your authentic self

Your intention is the most powerful thing you possess. Therefore, even if you’re not close to being your authentic self yet, setting the intention still works. In fact, change cannot happen until you do this.

2. Listen to your inner voice

The key to making the shift is to start listening to your intuition, gut feelings and inner nudges. They’re all connected to the highest version of you who is living your higher potential. Therefore, paying attention to that inner voice is your ticket to faster alignment.

3. Trust your inner voice

Trusting is different to just listening. After you listen to (or notice) your inner guidance, you need to trust it enough to act on it. No good will be done if you hear the message, feel aligned with it, but then over process it in your mind and decide not to act. All that does is create resistance. So, my friend, it IS safe for you to trust your inner guidance.

4. Rest

You cannot become your authentic self if you’re tired, exhausted, stressed or sleep-deprived. Rest is an important part of being human, as it helps you connect with your inner voice. Resting looks different for everyone and it’s important to rest in ways that feel nurturing for you. Ideas include:

• Listening to music
• Being in nature
• Meditating
• Watching your favourite TV show or movie
• Reading
• Sleeping
• Being alone.

5. Human Design

Do you know your Human Design? If not, it can help clarify who you came here to be in this incarnation. Knowing your soul blueprint is a powerful way to instigate your self-discovery journey. It can show you how to connect with your highest level of feeling good, as well as how you’re designed to make soul-aligned decisions. You can start with the HD basics and learn about your Strategy and Authority (the 2 most important elements of your design). Or, you can dive deep into your human design and absorb all the juicy details hiding in your gates, channels and variables. Whatever you choose to absorb will be perfect.

 

Personal Growth and Authenticity

Not living living in a self-empowered way usually begins with feeling like something is missing or not quite right. You may feel discontented in an area of your life, or have an underlying feeling of unease.

Your personal growth journey activates when you own this uneasy feeling and step into it with vulnerability.

This is when you start aligning with your authentic self, even if you don’t know it yet. The very first thing you may notice is something in your life becoming a little easier, a little less stressful. This is the outer world reflecting to you that you’re doing the inner work and evolving.

Then, you may begin feeling more fulfilled and content, even if life isn’t perfect. Because living authentically means accepting and embracing all parts of yourself – the good, the bad, and the ugly.

Sava threw me into an evolutionary journey that I simply wasn’t expecting. But, he ultimately helped guide me back to myself. He reminded me that sometimes, the universe has to intervene and make us stop and take a look at our lives, before we can make the necessary changes.

For that, I am forever grateful. Because now, I have made the changes and am living my life authentically, and it feels amazing.

The biggest change I made was merging my knowledge of Naturopathy with Human Design. My mission is to help clients understand the emotional roots of their physical symptoms, so they can clear them faster and step more into they truly are. It brings me so much joy to see them transform their health challenges into opportunities for healing, growth, and empowerment – by design.

So if you’re feeling off your life path, take a moment to listen to your intuition and pay attention to those subtle messages from your higher self. And remember, the universe is always guiding you towards your highest potential. You just have to trust the process, listen and act on what feels correct for YOU.

Thank you, Sava, for being one of my personal guides and for sharing your Bulldog medicine with me. You will always hold a special place in my heart.

Are you ready to live authentically and in alignment with your true purpose? Let me help you unlock the power of your Human Design

About the author:

Hi, I’m Clare Zivanovic – a qualified and experienced Naturopath and Human Design Analyst who’s been part of the health industry since 1999.