Dear friends, do you recall the dreams and wishes you had as a child? They were alive and vivid then, right? There wasn’t a doubt about them. We knew exactly what we wanted. So where are they now? Did they come true? Did we just give them up, or did we forget them? Apparently something went wrong along the way and we lost track of what we really wanted - but even more, we stopped being true to ourself.
All of this starts pretty early in life. When we first came into this world, the first thing we ask was ”what is it, and how do you do it?” Then our parents, doing the best they could, started telling us the difference between right and wrong, including which political party was the good one, and by all means which were the bad ones. In my case, which soccer team was the best one. Then we were introduced to society with all its rules and regulations, and if that wasn’t confusing enough, then came religion with all its should’s and shouldnt’s. All we wanted was to be introduced to the world, and be supported and loved on our journey. We wanted to experience life and get that wisdom that only comes through first hand experience. Unfortunately that wasn’t the case for most of us. And as you can see, there were many good reasons why we lost touch with our truth and reality.
But now we are adults. We are free to do as we wish. No more mami and papi telling us what to do, or any other grown-ups. We are the grown-ups now. We could choose new ideas, new beliefs, political direction, and so on, But do we do it? or are we still complaining about the same old film, only with new characters now. The old programs are still inside of us, running and influencing every move we make. What can we do?
These programs have become so much part of us that we can not just get rid of them without losing a true part of ourself. We could spend years doing psychoanalysis, and try to understand why everything happened, or we could go into some cave in the Himalayas and meditate for, lets say 20 years! I would miss Toastmasters.
But I have even a better idea. How about compensating for all the things I don’t like about myself and putting on a mask to convince the world, and hopefully myself as well, that everything is just great? I don’t have any problems. For me there was only one problem with these strategies. I already tried them all, and guess what - they didn’t work.
So what I’m doing right now is taking my life into my own hands, and starting to be honest with myself. In a sense I’m going back to being a kid. I’m trying to look at everything without judgement or a preconceived idea. But even more important, I’m trying stop the old self-attacks, like I’m not good enough, I’m too stupid, I’m guilty, nobody loves me, and so on. Instead, I’m allowing myself to make mistakes, and learn from them. And I tell you ever since I started this, things got better for me. I have less stress. I feel as if a weight is off my shoulders, and I have stopped critizicing people, and therefore, have more friends.
My dear friends, a new year is about to begin now, and not too many of us are in the position to say “I am just fine with the way things are going, and I don’t have to change a thing.” So I would propose to you all to think about your life. Remember success is measured by the amount of peace you have, not how many cars you have, or how much money you have in the bank. Shakespeare wrote in Hamlet “To thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night follow the day, thou canst not then be false to any man” I’m certainly giving it a try, how about you?