What if nothing was off limits?

I recently posted on Facebook to celebrate my happiness at how well I did in business in 2015. After what felt like a slower year, I had cleared $60,000 for the third year in a row. I posted:

Cleared $60k this year and it ain't over yet! Whoo hoo! ‪#‎nonstarvingartist‬

I got a good number of likes, one or two congratulatory comments, and then 3 or 4 more comments. The additional comments were from friends and colleagues, other artists, who considered it wrong, impolite, tacky, or inappropriate to discuss money. One posted an article where Emily Post (I think) broached the subject about whether money is still a taboo conversation topic, wondering if maybe that time had passed, only to confirm that it is, indeed, still not cool to talk about money. And there were a few "You tell 'em, sister!" and "haha, just desserts" replies and likes to those comments.

(Okay, those were not direct quotes that I just put in there but that was the spirit I read from them. I'd hate to use quotation marks when I'm not actually quoting without being clear about it.)

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, and to disagree with anyone else's, so I'm not going to be defending myself or attacking anyone else, even faux-nicely. What I will do, since as a coach and an artist I'm interested in possibility, is get curious.

What would be possible if nothing was off limits?

What if, when you had a success you wanted to celebrate, you could share it, no matter what it was?

What if, when you had a fear that was weighing on you, you could voice it, whatever it was?

What if, when you had a creative idea burning inside you, you could let it out, no matter what it concerned?

What if you could be your true self and truly share and connect?

What if, when you just booked a commercial that will pay your rent for two months, you could say exactly that to your friends? What if that job paid $3000 for a day of work, and you could say exactly that to your friends? What if, instead of the conversation going on inside your head and in your community being about struggle and scarcity, you were to share yourself as a shining example of success? To open up possibility to those around you? To show them what's possible, from abundance, because from a context of abundance, your success doesn't lessen or make more difficult anyone else's, but in fact pulls it closer to yourself and those around you?

Might you shake your community? Might you inspire others to see that maybe what's possible for you doesn't point to what's impossible for them but instead toward what is possible for them? Might you start to transform your world and theirs, one small (or huge) step toward more success and happiness for everyone?

What if, when you were afraid or sad about the big project you're working on, you could say exactly that to a friend? Or a loved one? Or a colleague? Or someone you just met? What if, instead of feeling the pressure of pretending that everything's okay, and the self-loathing that comes with thinking you're the only one who doesn't have it together, you shared honestly? 

Might you discover that you're not alone? Might they discover that they're not alone? That it's okay to be scared sometimes (or much of the time)? That we can accept and love ourselves in all our fears and successes, in all our breakdowns and breakthroughs? 

Might you find a new closeness with this person, and then with that access, to every person? Might you cause that possibility in the person you're talking to?

Might you have a breakthrough where you realize that fear or undesirable feelings don't mean failure, don't mean stop, and that you can in fact keep working on this next great project of yours? Or even that the discomfort and fear you're feeling are actually the signs that you're going in exactly the right direction? That they are telling you that you are right up against your comfort zone, about to break into the unknown, where possibility and breakthroughs live?

What if nothing was off limits? 

What if you could talk about sex, shake off repression, live more freely, have more fun and funny conversations, accept yourself and others for being a human in a sexual body, and feel more self-love (and maybe have more sex)? 

What if you could talk about religion, learn about people who are different than you and accept them, find useful kernels of wisdom in other traditions, find new sources of inspiration and connection, foster appreciation one person and group at a time, and be the cause for world peace?

What if you simply knew that every part of every person, including you, was okay? That nothing was taboo, shameful, or wrong? 

That you're not alone. Not the only one feeling what you're feeling, or dealing with what you're dealing with.

What could you create then? Move past? Conquer? Transform?

Try it out this week. Be brave. See how the world changes.