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Episode 7 - The Masks We Wear (And Why We Hide Behind Them) · Live From Your Heart

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Foreign.
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Welcome to Live from your Heart. I'm your host,
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Les Paul Klein. For three
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decades of my life, I've lived
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trying to get others approval,
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not the truth. I lived to be accepted.
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But I wasn't real, authentic. And what did it cost me?
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Pieces of myself, over and over.
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I didn't realize I was even losing those pieces.
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This podcast, it's for anyone who knows deep down that they've been
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living someone else's version of their
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life. And they're ready,
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you're ready to come home to your own heart
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and be real and be authentic. Doesn't matter
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how old you are, doesn't matter how long you've been doing this.
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It'S possible to reclaim your own heart.
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So every week we're going to talk about reclaiming that identity and healing
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old patterns and finding courage again. And finally living from the truest
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and most grounded place inside of you,
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your heart. This isn't therapy. It's not self
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help. It's just a real huge invitation for you to
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come and learn how to. Live a real life from
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your own heart. So let's jump in.
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Welcome back. My name is Les
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Paul Klein, and you have stepped
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into my podcast called Live for.
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This is the seventh installment
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of the very first season I've ever shared
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my story in a podcast format.
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And I just want to step
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lightly this morning.
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And this particular subject,
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the masks that we wear and
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why do we hide behind it?
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I was born in a little town in Texas up near Panhandle.
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Probably doesn't matter if I tell you when you hit a little
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town called Canadian Texas and
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not that was the local Fundamental Independent
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Baptist preacher.
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And we lived in a house that
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was six feet from the church building. And I was born.
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Later in life, we moved to a
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house on the very next piece of property.
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My parents had already had
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two older children. If you've followed my podcast,
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if you remember that phrase, I've remembered.
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It was. It has an indelible memory in my brain.
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They said we had the first two were failed. So we've had two more.
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Here's our preacher boys, my younger brother,
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and they're preacher boys. But I
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was born on July 4, 1959, in Hinckville
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County Hospital. And unbeknownst
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to me, this is the story that I get from my sister.
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Dad had asked my older brother and sister for
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suggestions for my first name because my middle name's gonna be one that
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was set. That's what my dad. They suggested.
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Wesley. Wesley.
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Okay.
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But the first recollection of
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what I was Given and how it impacted
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my life. So when I went to school in the first
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grade and the teacher uses your full
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name, and my first name wasn't Wesley, it was
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Leslie. Okay.
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I can't tell you the
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pain and the anguish that
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I got from my
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classmates because that's
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a girl's name. In those days,
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in the 60s, that was a girl's name. It's kind
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of like a boy named Sue.
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That's about that time that song came out.
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You know, I have endured through
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childhood and my teen years,
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ending all this amount of pain because my
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first name was Leslie. It became a mask.
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If there was a mask that get settled into my
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world on who I really was,
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that's the moment that I can put content
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to it. For me today at 66 years old.
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So here I am. I've got less
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This preacher who was a cowboy. And gosh,
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there's so much. Suffice it to say
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that I wore that mask for
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a lot of years. I never used my first movie.
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Never bribe them. And it was always
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a point of shame.
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There was a point in my life,
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business took a classic shift.
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I left the large corporate company and
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launched my own business.
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And in doing so, had the help of
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marketing friend who suggested
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I name my company Les Klein,
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use that first name because
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now in today's culture, it's very accepted.
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And so I embraced it for the first time in my life and as
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you can see,
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plugged into me in any way, shape or form. That's what
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I needed. That was my mask. I got
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into this fight a couple of times over in high school
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over my name being Leslie. I got punched
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in grade school because my name is Leslie. Just a little sissy.
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Oh, my gosh. So the mask
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that I wore became this Persona
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of I'm this tough guy. And there
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was this turmoil internally.
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And people saw me for what I. Well, I was. I wasn't
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hiding from them. I was really hiding from myself. I really
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was. And I had to prove to myself,
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right, wrong or indifferent, that I wasn't a sissy,
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that I wasn't weak, strong.
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So I did things that
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in my own mind was proving that I'm not
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sissy. That was the word that was used.
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And, well,
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the ultimate was when they pinned a
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badge on my chest and I took a post and my.
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My dad said this. He said, these things are tough. They're gun
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in your badge. Pray your hand here. My uniform.
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Well, I'll never forget that.
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Well, truthfully, I was wearing a mask then, hiding from who
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I was Because I still had not accepted the
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fact of who I really was. I'm telling you, it took an entire
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lifetime to get to this place.
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But we learn as children to
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protect ourselves. And truthfully, you can call me Sissy
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because I have a girl's name. Will literally
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force you inside to protect yourself.
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I'm not a. Okay, I'm not gonna.
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Was strong,
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Was solid, and it
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allowed a level peace.
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I was performing. Wasn't who I am,
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but I was performing. And you ever
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done that? Hide behind that mask? Yeah.
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Never once letting that mask
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come off. Ever been to a masquerade
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party and everybody wears a mask? You don't know who people
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are. Hey, that's the way a lot of people,
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I mean, a lot of people, the majority of people, have lived their entire
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life. This is who the public sees.
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And over here, those who were intimate with,
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they know who we are. They know the bad of us. They know
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our loss. It's really hard
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to let the mask come off.
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So here's some things that I want you to think about.
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And the reason we keep these masks way into adulthood,
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it. It's safe. We've created safety. I created a
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safe zone around me.
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I literally was predictable. You know,
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steady as she goes, a rock.
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I was accepted. I was in a world that I
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was accepted. So it was safe to
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become a preacher, because in the culture that my
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parents had brought me up in and the things they chose for
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me, that was safe. It was predictable.
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And not that I liked it, but it was predictable.
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I was accepted. And I.
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By doing those things that they wanted me to do,
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I avoided rejection, and I re. Avoided rejection from them.
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And I had my mask up the whole time
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as I was a kid and into adulthood and even into
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my marriage. But there was that day,
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standing in that auditorium, you heard me say this more than once. If you've
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been listening to my podcast. There was a. That day that
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happened when I realized, I can't do this anymore.
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I can't pretend anymore. This mask,
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I didn't know what that meant then, but today I can put
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words to it. The mask began to come off.
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Okay, here's the emotional cough.
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A living in that format.
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I was never fully seen for who I was.
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Leslie Paul. Yeah. And truthfully,
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I was exhausted pretending to be something that
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my parents wanted me to be. And it was
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unknown. People really didn't know who I was.
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I was this Baptist preacher.
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I'll never forget this. We very cutting
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edge of churches
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in church growth,
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where the Baptist name began
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to be removed and everything Starts on the west coast,
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it comes across the country. So I'll never forget this.
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I had a good friend I had gone to college
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with. He was in Carlsbad, New Mexico.
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Carlsbad, California. Excuse me.
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And he had started this new church,
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and I started the room that I pastored in Las
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Vegas. He didn't begin
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with the Baptist name, and I was impressed. And I
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plugged myself into him. As it turns out, he was plugged into John Maxwell.
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And later on, he. He actually was on the staff.
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With. John Maxwell's church down in San Diego. And this was
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long before John Maxwell became who John Maxwell is today.
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So I literally had full access to John Maxwell in those
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days. It was really cool. I didn't know what I had, but I remember
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Larry in the old groove of
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doing everything non traditional.
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Yeah. There's no Baptist name. There's no Sunday
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night church. There's no visitation, there's no kiwanas,
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there's no Wednesday night prayer service.
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All the things that Baptists do feel
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Baptist, you know, talking about ritual. Okay, in that. In a
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lot of other churches, it's framed differently, but it's still the
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same kind of stuff, ritualism.
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I'll never forget this. I've led our
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body to take the Baptist name off
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of the church. Oh, my.
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It was like we were lowering the mass.
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And I'll tell you, it hit some people so
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hard, they left. Some people
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embraced it widely. They were
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ready. If I had it to do over again, I would never do it there.
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I would have. I would have left that
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church just like it was. Passed it on to
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somebody who fit the mold that I built and gone
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on and started something very non traditional. But you live in London.
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But the bigger story was, is that I really wasn't
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called to be a pastor of a church.
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I mean, that's real. That's the real key that I got out of all of
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it. Doesn't mean I couldn't help people and minister to
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them, but it meant that I didn't have the
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pastor's heart like a lot of guys did.
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That emotional cost in letting down the walls in
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that body was huge.
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And when you and I personally began to take
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off the mask, the emotional cost
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of not being fully seen, the exhaustion
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of pretending, feeling unknown,
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it's all going to come home. And it came home to me, you know,
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over the years after that scene with my father in
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the auditorium, I'll never
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forget it. And I go forward and
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that story I told in the last episode about
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being fully seen, I was fully
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and Completely seen for just who I was by someone who
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had already walked this path. And she was
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available to open her arms and
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just allow me to lower the mask and
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remove it. And I could be me. Yeah.
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And then put that mask off. And it
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did cost to take the mask off.
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And it came in small doses,
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but then it got larger and larger.
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Here's something that I learned as I lowered the mask, I had to seek
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out people that were safe.
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I told that story about moving into
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where I live now in Greblaft. Then this
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lady actually handed me
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her job. And with the blessing of the company and
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her own caveat was, you have to come to church with my husband
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and I. And I said, as long as it's not a Baptist church. Well,
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But what that was really saying was, I have to
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now go places where people are safe. And so I can tell you that I
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navigated into that, and I would push
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back on everyone and everything that was not safe. I would
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remove myself. And quickly. I learned
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that it was safe where
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it was safe to speak freely and be myself.
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And I learned. And I learned that this culture
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that I had stepped into, and it was a group of
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people who had all been divorced, had all had grown
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up in faith. Many of them had come from same
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background that I had come from, gone to a Christian
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college or university. I've been through a divorce.
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So when you go through the divorce, all the
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pretend comes down. If you get really honest,
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most people are forced to. And so
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it was a safe place. And I
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began to feel the safeness on the mask stayed off,
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and it's been off ever since.
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It gave me courage. I know that many of you
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are going. Walking through the mask
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that you've been wearing as I've been talking. You're thinking about the things
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that you have done to hide who you really are.
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I would encourage you. Let me just encourage you.
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Find a safe place with safe people so you
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can be who you are and allow the mask to
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come down. Because you're never going to live. From my own heart unless
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you are honest with yourself and allow that
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mask, that pretend Persona to come down.
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What does it cost? Well,
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it cost a whole lot. My vote.
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Yeah. I lost every pastor friend I had.
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Everyone. They. They weren't available for
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my phone calls, and I
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never received a call from any of them. I mean,
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I lost all of my pretend friends,
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all those people that I pastored. Gone.
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I had to seek a whole new world now.
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And by moving halfway across the country and then west
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coast to east Coast I learned that I never
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had myself to people who were judged
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me some. Now I'm a divorced pastor to talk
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about. There's no Persona anymore. But it's on a lot of judgment
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and to be honest, it still does.
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But that's okay. I'm not trying to pretend to be something I'm not these
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days. If you're living there, let me just encourage
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you, remove yourself from those who
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are unsafe. Find a space you are safe.
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I went to this small recovery rate on time
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just seeking.
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Safeness. And I'll
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never forget that the group dynamics
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were protected by the group leader and there was no cross
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talk or sharing. It was tell your story,
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there's no judgment and you accepted
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right where you were. That's rare and
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it takes time to draw a bond in that world.
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But if you're dealing with this, you need a place
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that's safe. And let me say this in
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the kindest way possible. That's probably not a group at your church of
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people that you go to church with. You probably need to step outside that world
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and seek out people who are
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less judgmental or don't know anything about you.
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Because if you're going to take the mask off,
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you're going to have to peel it one layer at a time. It might take
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some time and I can tell you that you need a safe
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ice safe people to do that.
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So let me encourage you, do it.
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Do it. In my
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effort to help people, here's what I
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coach my students as they enter my coaching and
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I have a one to one coaching to help you learn
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how to live from your heart. I have steps that you
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would walk through to begin to
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remove your mask. Look, it's not a one time event either.
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It takes time. So if this
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is resonating then you
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want more. There's a link in the show notes that
24:59
will connect you to me. And. We can have a conversation
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about where you are and what your needs are
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and I could hear your heart.
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And. I could help if
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you're open to that. So click the link in the show notes if you want
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to connect to me and have a conversation. I hope
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something I said tonight resonated
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with you. But the sooner you take the mask
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off, the sooner you can let God
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bless you. See you on the next episode.
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If today's episode stirred something in you.
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That'S your heart speaking. If you're ready to go
25:55
deeper into this work, let me invite you to come and join me
25:59
in my live from your heart coaching experience.
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It's a six month journey I can take you
26:07
back to the truth, help you learn your
26:12
real identity and uncover that
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emotional freedom that's yours to have. If you'd like
26:20
to know more about my coaching experience,
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live from your heart, you'll find the link down
26:28
in the show notes. Until next time,
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folks. Live from your heart, it's the only
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life that's truly yours.