Marcy Axelrod

The Power of Truly Showing Up

Talk Summary: Our interactions and proceedings are where our lives are lived – yet 20 years of research prove the majority of us “just show up”. Instead of deeply knowing ourselves and being ready, we improvise endlessly and call it living. Yet, this winging it is more coping, managing, and defaulting than achieving. And it’s certainly not our best. This partial readiness in which we live succumbs to conditioning, culture, and habit. It fails us.

My research shows 80% of Americans feel we underachieve, fueling epidemics of discontent, loneliness, depression, substance abuse, violence, suicide and so much more. “Just showing up” is also a failure to take possession of our own minds or exert agency over our lives. Then we, as evolutionary products of the universe, follow and fall prey to her governance.

This default-life legacy impacts not just us, but all those within three degrees of us since our behavior spreads through society. Culture, like nature, absorbs and rebirths our decisions. They root in others’ minds, playing out in others’ homes and dorm rooms, endlessly. How are we showing up for this meaningful responsibility? Do we bring our best, having considered our past, purpose, plan, and emotional leave-behinds? Regardless of whether we’ve consciously thought this through, we present it – and plant it – perpetually.

Our quality of showing up exposes our sincerity, conscientiousness, emotional insight, clinging-to or freedom-from assumption, racialized predisposition, effort, preparation, and care. All are laid bare. This is what it means to CHOOSE how to show up. What is your choice? I detail – based on 20 years of research – what it means to truly show up.