67: When Speaking Truth Feels Dangerous — and Why You Must Do It Anyway

When you’ve been silenced your whole life — by family, religion, or systems of control — telling the truth can feel like the most dangerous thing you’ll ever do.

In this raw and powerful episode (episode 2 of the From Silence to Solitude series), Darla Ridilla shares her personal journey through the layers of silencing — from childhood threats and betrayal to religious and workplace systems that punished honesty and rewarded obedience.

She reveals how cultural conditioning, gaslighting, and patriarchal structures teach women to keep the peace at the cost of their power — and how reclaiming your voice, no matter the fallout, is the ultimate act of sovereignty.

You’ll learn:

• Why silence may feel safe, but it’s actually self-abandonment
• How institutions protect image over innocence
• Why questioning is a form of spiritual and emotional freedom
• What it looks like to rebuild trust — not in others, but in yourself
• How truth-telling becomes a sacred act of liberation

Because truth-telling isn’t rebellion — it’s reclamation.
And when you stop protecting the people who hurt you, you start protecting your peace.

Connect with Darla Ridilla:

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Transcript

Darla Ridilla (00:00)
Secrets disease, they create depression, they create anger, they create mental illness. That's a high price. And why should we carry that price to protect somebody else who's done something wrong?

You know, and later in life, I was able to recognize those patterns and see the shame that it was attached to it, the shame of others' behaviors. And that shame didn't belong to me.

when you look at the religious and institutional silencing in more detail.

when we lose our agency and we lose our empowerments, basically, whether it's a pulpit, a family, or a boardroom, any place that punishes truth is a place that worships control.

There's a lot of cultural conditioning as well that reinforces suppression, All of them have some form of a silencing dynamic. And this is a form of emotional manipulation, spiritual obedience, spiritual bypassing. But what it really is, is control.

Darla Ridilla (00:56)
Welcome to You Have the Power, the road to truth, freedom, and real connection. I'm Darla Vardilla, a somatic trauma-informed relationship coach for high achieving women who are done shrinking and ready to live life fully expressed. If you've done the healing work, you've set the boundaries, reclaimed your worth, and yet your connections still don't feel magnetic, you're not broken. You're just ready for your next evolution. This podcast is your guide.

through the magnetic connections pathway from presence to agency to empowerment. So you can create relationships that feel like home. Each episode brings bold truths, somatic tools and embodied strategies to help you stop over giving, stand in your power and connect from your deepest truth. Because you're not here to be chosen, you are here to choose from your power, your presence.

and your truth. Let's begin with today's topic.

Darla Ridilla (02:00)
Hello everyone and welcome to another episode of You Have the Power. We are on the second episode of the From Silence to Sovereignty series. And if you listened to the last episode, there was an interview with Brooke Kikos. And she talked about indoctrination from a religious standpoint and how that also is connected to narcissistic abuse and gaslighting and control.

The next episode is also going to focus on religious abuse and how a young man was able to help some children that were in an orphanage to have their voice. Their voices were silenced in an abusive situation. I don't want to be a spoiler, so make sure you tune in to get the full story. these two interviews really connect because the theme between them is that

When we silence our truth, we lose our sovereignty. We lose our agency. We lose our empowerment. So let's go through that. Because truth telling, it's rarely easy. And it's often the road that cost us the most. But silence cost us ourselves.

The first time that I told the truth, I was threatened into silence. I learned to equate quiet with safety, but that was survival and that wasn't peace.

And I had early conditioning from childhood around silence and fear. And at that time, I didn't know what that was. I didn't know how that felt in my body. I do know that I lived in a state of confusion and I felt betrayed. I felt invalidated because

The very people that were supposed to protect me were the ones that were silencing me. I can remember growing up as a child and I confronted my parents one day, I was probably middle school age, and I said, show me the adoption papers. There's no way that I could be your biological child based on the way that you treat me. Of course, that wasn't received very well by my parents.

But I think it really shows the level of betrayal that I felt in my home environment growing up. those experiences really created these lifelong patterns in me of self-doubt, people-pleasing, silencing my truths.

Some specific examples is my father was abusive in many ways. And he ⁓ one of them was he was verbally abusive. And he was extremely unpredictable as well. And one day he was berating me about something. And I said, I'm going to go to school tomorrow. And I'm going to tell my teacher what you were doing. And he threatened me. Of course, it was physical violence.

I'll beat you, I'll spank you. If you tell your teacher this or that is going to happen and he threatens me. And to have grace for ourselves as children, when we are dependent on our parents for our survival, for our shelter, for ⁓ the very basic needs, unfortunately, it sets up this power dynamic that we have to conform to survive. And those lessons

don't just end when we turn 18. They follow us into our adult life until we recognize them and we work through that.

My mother accused me of lying once. So I did tell her at one point that I wanted my parents to get divorced. And this is not a very normal thing for a child to think. Most kids are upset when their parents split up. But my father was sexually abusive. And when I was a teenager, I told my mom. And of course, she confronted him. And of course, the abuser is not going to say, yeah, I did that.

He denied it. And she came back to me and accused me of lying and said that you did that because you would say or do anything to split us up. You know, the unfortunate thing is she was stuck in her own denial and her own stuff. And I'm not justifying her behavior, but she was acting from her own wounds, which transferred to me. But this created a lot of shame and confusion.

Like, I don't understand. You're my mom. You're supposed to protect me from the danger, not throw me into the lion's den to get more. And so that early lesson was that love was conditional, and I could lose it if I spoke my truth. And so I remained silent in a lot of things growing up because it felt safe to me. Safe. I say that in quotes because it wasn't safe, but it was.

felt safe to the nervous system.

So they told me that truth would destroy people.

What they didn't see is that the silence was destroying me.

When we lose our agency in our experiences, we often see examples in systems, in institutions. Sometimes when they are dysfunctional and abusive, they will protect their image over others' innocence.

And this happens a lot. This doesn't just happen in religion. It happens in relationships. It happens in our careers and in our jobs.

As women, we are also taught that we are supposed to be the peacemakers, we are supposed to be good girls, and this also transfers to all areas of our life. And we're taught that we have to protect other people's reputations at the expense of our own.

And I have seen examples of this. I've been fortunate most of my career to work for some outstanding people, but that hasn't always been the case. I've had a couple of examples of institutions that were doing something wrong, or there was an individual who was hurting people on an emotional level.

And there has been a couple of times where I spoke out either publicly or privately with upper management about these, these dysfunctional, abusive behaviors, sometimes even just questioning why something was done a certain way because it negatively affected someone that was close to me.

And instead of being curious about exploring what I was telling them, they protected their system. And so what that meant for me is I was blacklisted within the organization. I was passed up and denied any form of advancement or promotions.

I was threatened that I wouldn't be paid because I was a turncoat.

I ⁓ suspect that there may be incidences where they told untruths during a job reference.

And word got out on the street per se in that office environment that I was a threat or I was a troublemaker.

the one of the ⁓ ones that really personally hit me deeply was I worked at an organization a few years ago. And some of the things that were they were doing went against my moral values and my moral beliefs.

And we went from these people being my work family and offering a place to stay when I was going through my divorce, should I need it, to advancing a year later that they were demonizing me and ostracizing me and refusing to ⁓ move me from a temporary position into a permanent position. And that one cut deeply because I really saw these people as family, not just coworkers or friends.

deep-seated family to me. was hard to deal with. I was punished for my honesty.

questioned my sense of loyalty and even my own personal self worth out of this.

In my personal life, my mom had a best friend and the friend's husband molested me one time when we were over there visiting. And when I told my mother that night, her reaction was, no, you can't say anything. It would destroy my friend's marriage. This is another example of how people try to stop us from speaking our truth.

You'll see an example of that that the ⁓ guest will give in the next episode about how institutions will sometimes try to gaslight you. They'll say things like, well, if you say this about this person, you'll destroy their life. You'll destroy this organization. All the people that are benefiting from that organization, you're hurting them.

there's always another option. And if you are being hurt by this organization or this person, who else is? And who else is not speaking up? And so there's a collective now of abuse going on.

And just the emotional weight of it, you know, have the secret and you're carrying it. Secrets kill. And I do believe that. They emotionally kill you, they physically kill you. I do think they create disease, they create depression, they create anger, they create mental illness. That's a high price. And why should we carry that price to protect somebody else who's done something wrong?

You know, and later in life, I was able to recognize those patterns and see the shame that it was attached to it, the shame of others' behaviors. And that shame didn't belong to me.

when you look at the religious and institutional silencing in more detail.

when we lose our agency and we lose our empowerments, basically, whether it's a pulpit, a family, or a boardroom, any place that punishes truth is a place that worships control.

There's a lot of cultural conditioning as well that reinforces suppression, in particular in religious structures, in workplaces, and in family systems. All of them have some form of a silencing dynamic. And this is a form of emotional manipulation, spiritual obedience, spiritual bypassing. But what it really is, is control.

I want to start by saying that I don't believe that all churches are bad. I do not believe that all people who have a religious belief are bad.

But within those individuals and those institutions, there are bad people and there are bad institutions.

I believe in questioning everything. And when we can't question someone or something, that right there to me is a huge red flag of why not.

What is the real threat? It's not my question. It's the answers that it evokes.

When I ⁓ was with my first husband, I was actually still dating him. I met him as a teenager. I met him very young. And he would go to my youth group meetings with

So besides my daughter, one of the greatest gifts that my first ex-husband gave me was critical thinking when it came to religion. He was very inquisitive, highly intelligent, and he started to ask questions. He started to say, why do you believe that way? I don't understand that. And he went to my youth pastor. Just innocently, he was not being confrontational. He was more from a space of curiosity.

And as he continued to ask more questions, my youth pastor got angry with him, irritated.

If you're so solid in your belief, why is that a threat? And even if you're solid in your belief, what's wrong with somebody else believing something else? He should have opened up curiosity if he had approached it from a different manner.

maybe my ex would have actually accepted religion more. I don't know, we don't know. But his reaction said a lot, which is often the case. He also started to notice that ⁓ when they would do their prayers, they would ask it, you know how they do that. Everybody close your eyes, well, everybody's eyes are closed. So no one was seeing what was really going on. So while I do believe that praise and prayer,

can be a natural thing that naturally evolves. This was not the case in this specific church. They were actually queuing the people that were running the service when to quote unquote speak in tongues, when to stop praying. And they were using it with cues and lights. And because our eyes were closed, we didn't see it. And my ex actually said one day, ⁓ don't close your eyes, watch. That was a

big deal breaker for me because I had been going to this church for many years and was having a really hard time believing what he said to me that they were not being truthful with me. But he was right.

I started to notice that they were shaming. They were shaming us. They were telling us things like dancing is bad. It's a sin.

One girl obviously got they publicly shamed her during a service. While they didn't name her, they said there's someone in this room who, and one girl started sobbing. Who do you think it was?

my mom used to say, if you don't believe exactly how I do, you're going to hell. Well, according to Brooke's definition of a cult, that kind of sounds a little bit like that. It's my way or the highway. And I was shamed and told I was less than because I didn't believe that.

Darla Ridilla (17:14)
If something in today's episode stirred something awake in you, if you've done the work, but something still feels missing, this is your moment to come home to yourself. You're not asking for too much. You simply outgrown the patterns that no longer fit the woman that you've become. And you don't need another mindset shift. You need embodiment.

The kind that moves you through the magnetic connections pathway from presence to agency to empowerment. So you can create relationships that feel magnetic, grounded and true. And it doesn't have to take years. I created this process to shorten the timeline because most women are much closer to peace, clarity and connection than they realize.

That's the bridge my coaching offers. And it begins with a free call, a space to get clear on what's keeping you stuck and what it looks like to lead from your truth instead of your old story. No pressure, no performance, just resonance, clarity, and your next aligned step. You are in the right place and you're closer than you think. Go to High Value Woman.

dot info slash call to book your free call today. Because you already have the power. Now it's time to use it.

Darla Ridilla (18:50)
when we deconstruct systems, ways of thinking,

values.

any type of system expectation that's already built in. When we start to question it and really critically think about that, that's where we get our empowerment from. And I would like to switch a little bit more to the romantic and interpersonal relationships. Because the rise of empowered women isn't the fall of men. It's the invitation for men to grow up.

As women, we used to be very dependent on men. And I'm going to be quite frank, I think the patriarchy set it up that way to suppress women.

Do you know, according to ancient teachings, that there was an era where women were considered goddesses and the females were actually the one, I wouldn't say in charge, but they had a powerful role in society. was a very long time ago. And this is my personal opinion, but I believe that there are certain institutions such as religion, which is male dominated.

careers, jobs, male dominated society in general. I'm not saying that men are bad, but I'm saying that the patriarchy that was created from that is. And it was meant to silence women. It was meant to make us smaller. It was meant to keep us in our place. And as our society has evolved and women have gotten the

the equality that they deserve. You know, we couldn't even vote our own property at one point in our life or not our generation, but generations before and not that far back. Now that we have equal opportunity or are creating that for ourselves, we have our own money. We have our own lives. We have had the luxury of investing in not just our financial security, but our mental health and our personal development.

And we have evolved. And as a rule, and I say this a lot, and I still stand by it, I think, I'm not talking about all men, but a lot haven't evolved. They're stuck in their patriarchy, they're stuck in their dysfunctional thinking, and they are demonizing the women that are rising. They are demonizing the women that are speaking their mind and that are independent.

and claiming what's ours.

They are acting like little boys in men's bodies. It's called a man-child. They want things to stay the same because they were in power. What they don't understand is control isn't power at all. It's fear.

Fear.

is a lot of work.

When you have to control someone, when you have to put them down. That's a lot of effort.

Wouldn't it be better if you started to take accountability for your own behavior? You started to really rethink how things have been and how that shouldn't continue because when you start to invest in yourself as a man and you personally develop

Not only are you increasing your quality of life on a day to day basis within you, you're releasing your childhood wounds because we all have them. You are creating a dynamic to attract a healthily attached woman who's going to be bringing peace and love into your life. And you won't need to feel that you have to control her because there will be mutual respect. There will be

mutual discernment, will be authentic communication. And while those things are hard to learn, they're hard sometimes to do. In my opinion, in the long run, they're a lot easier and better for creating those magnetic connections.

And I'm really seeing a lot in my dating experiences. I haven't been out on a date with anyone in a year because I have not found that man yet who is looking for the same things that I want. He's looking for bread crumbing, games, and the bare minimum. Maybe he's emotionally shut off and he's an avoidant. I've seen a lot of that.

There's nothing wrong with a man dealing with his own shit. In fact, I find that more masculine than him holding on to it.

And as I grow, my dating pool shrinks. But it's gonna affect you too. As men, their dating pool will also shrink because women are done. There are women out, many women like me who have chosen to be single on purpose because I'd rather be by myself even when I'm lonely at times than deal.

with the intense loneliness of laying beside a man and feeling alone in a room with people in it. That's so much worse. Compromising what I deserve. That's way worse. I would rather be alone. be alone the rest of my life, but I'm willing to be because that is much better option than compromising.

who I am.

I learned this empowerment because I realized that healing isn't about blind obedience. It's about reclaiming my right to question things and people.

It's about my right to speak out against people and institutions that need to be deconstructed, particularly those that women dependent, both financially, emotionally and spiritually.

It is taking up space and calling people out and holding them accountable.

It's no longer playing the power dynamic game. It is claiming my own power. And others reactions to that aren't my business.

It's recognizing how these systems and beliefs have shaped the generations. That silencing became the societal norm, like it was a great thing. But as powerful, high achieving women, it's time to rise and say this is not. My voice matters, my experiences matter. My agency matters, my empowerment matters, and so does my presence.

And I choose to create magnetic connections in my life. I choose to let go of anyone that suppresses that. Because I won't allow those people in my life anymore.

when I comment out.

That a weeding out process.

When I withdraw and refuse to speak to a family member, so that I can protect my own peace.

When I tell a man I'm not interested in dating him because of his bad behavior, so that I can attract a man later will honor me for who I am.

When I speak my truth against an organization, it's so that I can reclaim my sovereignty that they tried to take from me.

I used to think healing meant learning to trust again. I know it means learning to trust myself.

One of the things I noticed as I was editing the podcast with Brooke, I recorded that six months ago. And I talked a little bit about trust. If you haven't heard of the episode, go back and listen to it. It's episode 66. And I talked about how ⁓ I trusted too easily that I gave...

gave it all away immediately. I invested in someone before they showed me whether or not they're going to invest in me. And what I found interesting as I was going through the editing process is how much I have changed in just six months time. I was just really getting my feet wet and really starting to do that to change that. I was in the beginning of changing that pattern at that point. And if I look at myself today, just two days ago,

I trusted my intuition about something and I acted on it and it was right. And I did not do that six months ago. I listened to little voice in my head that said I was too harsh. I was overreacting. I was seeing things that weren't there. I wasn't given this guy enough chance. But now,

His reactions and the answers to my questions told me everything I needed to know. And some things, it was more what he didn't say than what he did. learning to trust that and saying, you are someone who can't earn my trust. are someone who's not gonna be good for me.

This is someone who's not gonna be able to earn my trust. I already see it. If I trust myself so much, I'm willing to say no. can do it with kindness unless that person is being aggressive or rude, then that is not okay.

I can say it with kindness and move on.

because I've embodied discernment.

and grounded.

And now I'm taking my time to people, whether it's a friendship or a romantic relationship.

I'm taking more time now to see how they react, to see what their behavior is. their words and their actions match? That's a big one for me now. Because I have self-respect.

I have been able to take back my sovereignty because I now know that trusting my intuition is the ultimate act of power.

In closing, I'd like to say that

Truth may cost you your comfort, but silence costs you your sovereignty.

and I'm going to choose sovereignty every time.

when we have to speak our truth.

Yeah, it's not going to be all shiny and bright and easy. It's just not. especially if we're not used to doing it. People are going to push back. People are going to try to shut us up. People are going to tell us we're too much. If it's an institution, they may make your life a living hell. You may get fired. You may lose a friend. Your relationship might end.

you may have to cut ties with a family member. So yes, there's grief in that. But there's also liberation.

We have to be willing to do the work. We have to be willing to pay the cost because the upfront cost feels like it's too much. But if you take a step back and you think about the long-term cost of being silenced, it's far greater. It goes back to what I said earlier about mental illness, physical illness, death, stress, anxiety.

Wouldn't you rather upfront so you could have the long-term This morning I was listening to a podcast and ⁓ an Olympic gold medalist, or actually she's a silver medalist. She got silver medals. She was being interviewed and she talked about her passion for what she wanted, that she wanted that medal so bad. It was like,

everything that she thought about every minute of the day. She lived, ate and breathed that. And that's what gave her the motivation invest in that 50 hours a week on top of everything else she had to do with her life. There was no question that she was gonna work as hard as she could to get that medal.

I want you to think about your own sovereignty a medal.

How bad do you want And if you do want it, because you are ready for those magnetic connections, that's your shining star. That's your goal poster, your vision board. And every interaction, no matter who or what it is, should support that. And no matter how hard it gets, no matter how frustrating it gets, because

I'm in the middle of it too. There are days when I question what the hell I'm doing. It was 20 years ago when I was blind, when I didn't have the knowledge I have now and I was in total denial of what was going on in my life. You could say it was easier, but was it? I was miserable. I was being abused. I was.

crying a lot because I didn't understand why my ex-husband was so mean to me. I was angry. I was trying to control people around me.

now I have physical symptoms that I'm still working through because of that but now

in spite of those moments, they're moments, not day after day after day. Because I kept the prize, the medal in front of me. I still do, and I still will,

Alignment is not a destination, it's a journey. And creating alignment and empowerment in my life is a daily thing. I work at it every day because I want the medal.

I want to live it on a daily basis and I want to go out when I leave this planet knowing I did my best. Even if it wasn't the gold medal, if I got the silver, I still got what I wanted. I still got what I needed and I still got what I deserved.

I'm going to invite each of you to reflect on your own life, your relationships, the institutions that you're part of.

Are they asking you to silence your voice? Or are they encouraging you to speak your truth?

Are you allowed to question? Are you allowed to say what you need to say without retribution?

And I'm going to ask you and invite you to see the truth in your own life. Because that is a reclamation. It is not a rebellion.

If anything you heard today landed and your body said, my gosh.

I feel that.

I am ready to walk in my truth. I am ready to reclaim my sovereignty. Then I'm going to invite you to book a magnetic connections call with me. Let's sit down together for 30 minutes and figure out what those patterns of silencing are so you can reclaim your sovereignty.

go to highvaluewoman.info slash call.

Reclaim your presence. Reclaim your agency. Reclaim your So you can have those magnetic connections.

that don't silence you?

They ask you to say what's on your mind and what your truth is.

Because you have the power. You always had it.

It's just been pushed out.

It's time to reclaim it.

Darla Ridilla (34:21)
Thank you for listening to You Have the Power, the Road to Truth, Freedom, and Real Connection.

If you've done the work, you've healed, grown and set boundaries, but your relationships still don't match the woman you've become, then this is your moment to rise into the next level of connection. Because this isn't just about staying stuck in the story of what went wrong. It's about stepping into what's possible when you lead your relationships from presence, agency and empowerment and finally experience magnetic connection.

If this episode sparks something in you, share it with the woman who's also ready to come home to herself. Subscribe so you don't miss what's next. And if you're ready to live this, not just to listen to it, let's connect. Go to highvaluewoman.info.

slash call to take the next step toward connection that feels alive, aligned and true to who you are. Because you don't need another podcast episode, you need a new pattern. And you're the one who gets to choose. Stay in the old story or write a new one.