Extreme emotional peaks are the ideal catalyst for profound transformational change. 
The worst things in life having around 10x the learning potential and ability to transform than the best things.

Why are the worst things more powerful than the best things? Because we are comfortable with 'best'. 
The 'worst' is the road less travelled. It's littered in golden coins of realisation, but it means letting go of something, looking at your flaws, accepting your weaknesses, sitting in your fears. 

It's a state in which we are imperfect and out of control.....
...but out of control is where the magic happens!!!!

Out of control awakens us from our dormant comfort zone. We are alive, wide awake and on high alert. Can you imagine a more ideal state to create transformation from? 

If we learnt to love the bad days as much as the good...
If we learnt to love each other on bad days, whilst in bad moods.....
If we didn't presume that someone broken needed fixed......
If we shared our bad times as much as our good times so it became ok to be at our worst.....

Wear your pain proudly. This is different to dwelling on something, moaning about something, become the victim of something. It's accepting something. Accepting that you're built to experience the bad and the good. 
Humanity has a sickness - we're addicted to good.

Allow bad times, be comfortably uncomfortable, find the beauty in your beast and learn a lesson that 'good' could never teach. 

Laura

Brute honesty
Brute honesty is when people who haven't fully integrated compassion try to deliver the truth...and by truth I mean their personal judgment that they don't realise is different from the truth. They don't select an appropriate time or place, they don't say it with tact and what comes out of their mouth is a judgemental, thoughtless way of delivering what is usually a negative exaggeration of the truth. 

Giving it
Never, shut your pie hole ;)
​Brute honesty is always more brutal than honest. It's cruel and it wounds the other person long after you have delivered it. Don't  convince yourself for one second longer that you are doing the other person a favour. 

Receiving it
Don't accept it. When someone says 'can I be brutally honest?' say 'no thank you, I prefer compassionate honesty'. 
A friend who doesn't know how to deliver something with sensitivity and compassion will hurt you not help you. You don't have to take it. 


Compassionate honesty
Compassionate honesty is honesty delivered with sensitivity and compassion. It considers the current emotional state of the other person, it let's the other person know that you have their best interest at heart and it allows you to deliver a message that most people will stay open to hearing. 

Giving it
Give compassionate honesty when someone asks for your honest opinion. 
Honesty without compassion equals brutality, but compassion without honesty equals enabling, so instead of sugar coating, find the right mix by delivering the truth in a compassionate and considerate way.  
The easiest way to do this is to imagine how it would feel to receive that information if you were them. 

Receiving it
Try to understand that the better you receive honesty the more people will stay truthful with you. If you lose your mind or instantly defend yourself, most people will start lying to you or saying the truth in a more brutal way. 
When someone is being compassionately  honest, thank them, be honest if it sucked to hear, and ask yourself if there is truth to what they are saying. 


Straight talking honesty
This form of honesty is reserved for two people who are at polar opposite ends of the scale to each other. The people who want the truth and the people who aren't truthful intentionally or unintentionally.
Compassionate honesty can be lost on someone who is in a state of victim, avoidance, denial, narcissism or ego and it can over complicate a message for someone who simply wants to receive the truth. 
Straight talking avoids the fillers so as little as possible can be misconstrued and personal growth can be achieved efficiently. 

Giving it
Giving it to a person who wants it is easy. You give them the information, they receive it, acknowledge it and are grateful for it. 
For the other type of person you have to understand that you can only give the truth, you have no control over their ability to process it, so drop the expectation of any form of resolution and focus on reflecting honesty. 
It's best to give it simply, kindly and concisely from a neutral, non judgmental state. Be prepared for a reaction that focuses on your delivery rather than the information you tried to deliver or another form of defensive response. 
Don't get caught up in justifying yourself, remember you are doing this to place a healthy boundary up to state that you won't play the game and won't tolerate it. 

Receiving it
If someone says something and you react to it over-emotionally or jump into defence then it would be good to take a moment to check yourself. Consider the following before receiving:
Do I trust this persons judgment?
Does this person genuinely want good things for me?
If the answer is yes to both then it might be a good time (despite lots of high emotions) to remember that often people we know can see things that we can't!! 

Instead of focusing on how you feel about what theyve said, focus on what they have said that has value.

How you deliver honest says a lot about how willing you are to see and understand others.
How you receive honesty says a lot about how willing you are to see and understand yourself.

Honesty and authenticity
​Laura