I am me.
I am me.
In all the world, there is no one exactly like me.
There are persons who have some parts like me, but no one adds up exactly like me.
Therefore, everything that comes out of me is authentically mine because I alone choose it.
I own everything about me My body including everything it does; My mind including all its thoughts and ideas; My eyes including the images of all they behold; My feelings whatever they may be… anger, joy, frustration, love, disappointment, excitement My Mouth and all the words that come out of it polite, sweet or rough, correct or incorrect; My Voice loud or soft. And all my actions, whether they be to others or to myself.
I own my fantasies, my dreams, my hopes, my fears. I own all my triumphs and successes, all my failures and mistakes.
Because I own all of me, I can become intimately acquainted with me. By doing so I can love me and be friendly with me in all parts. I can then make it possible for all of me to work in my best interests.
I know there are aspects about myself that puzzle me, and other aspects that I do not know. But as long as I am friendly and loving to myself, I can courageously and hopefully, look for solutions to the puzzles and for ways to find out more about me.
However I look and sound, whatever I say and do,
And whatever I think and feel at a given moment in time is me. This is authentic and represents where I am in that moment in time. When I review later how I looked and sounded, what I said and did,
And how I thought and felt, some parts may turn out to be unfitting.
I can discard that which is unfitting,
And keep that which proved fitting, And invent something new for that which I discarded.
I can see, hear, feel, think, say and do. I have the tools to survive, to be close to others, to be productive, and to make sense and order out of the world of people and things outside of me. I own me, and therefore I can engineer me.
I am me and I am okay.
Poem by Virginia Satir
I wanted to start this month’s post with this poem as a celebration of our selves, as a celebration of who we are, truly, intrinsically and deeply.
You are OK, just the way you are. You are beautiful just the way you are. It is OK to love you just the way you are.
Lately, I have met quite a few people who have expressed feelings of wanting to be different than who they are or how they believe to be. “I should be fitter”, “I should be stronger”, “I should be braver”, “I should be this” and “I should be that”.
In this precise moment, if there were no ‘shoulds’ – Who would you be? How would you be? What would you be? Would you accept you as you just the way you are? With all the amazingness, with all the wrongness, with all the fears, with all the blockages, with all the dreams, with all the happiness and with all the sadness?
Have you ever thought to give yourself a break from shoulds? And the main question I would like to ask you: are all these shoulds yours or someone else’s?
I would like to challenge you for this month of February to give you the freedom to just be. To share your emotions, to seek validation, to validate others, to bring on compassion for yourself and for others, to be grateful for the journey, to be grateful for the person you are and for the person you are going to become through this journey, to show your truth rather than showing what people are expecting of you.
What beliefs are you still carrying with you from when you were a child? What are you holding on to that you are not ready to share? Who has imposed your standards? Who has made you believe that to fit in to have to suppress a part or parts of you?
Let’s make space to just be who we really are. Let’s give a chance to our inner child to be heard, to be validated, to know that it is safe to be who we are.
It is only through being authentic that we can find out who we truly are and how to get there. It is only by getting rid of unneeded resources that we can make space for new ones. It is only by validating what our inner child wants to tell us that we can find out what it is really feeling. It is only by validating and thanking our ego that we can choose differently.
Suppressing is not the way to freedom. Shine the light on your shadows and the light will set you free. Give yourself permission to be who you are right now and know that you have the choice to be a continuously evolved version of you.
We don’t have to buy into the standards, we do not have to buy into all the social media race to be perfect, we don’t have to buy into the struggle to fit in.
The freedom we are so longing for, might just as well be the simple freedom to just ‘be’. The freedom to see what is there to see, to hear what is there to hear, to feel what is there to feel, to say what is there to say, to ask what is there to ask and to step into the unknown territory of being, and dropping the security of the egoic shoulds.
For the next few weeks try these very simple steps in your everyday life:
See and hear things like you saw or heard them for the first time. Allow yourself to see and hear things just as they are, not how you have learned to see or hear them. Give it a different meaning, your own personal meaning, in your own personal story.
Feel and own what you are feeling, exactly as you are feeling them and not as you should feel them or as you have been taught to feel them. Give the feeling the chance to exist, give them a chance to tell their story.
Think and own what you are thinking. Drop the need to be in control. Give the thought a chance to exist, talk to your thought, and then decide whether you choose to keep it or whether you choose to change it. Is the thought limiting or expanding? Is it light or heavy? What’s the feeling underneath it? Repeat the process.
Give yourself permission to express your opinion, to express your needs, to tell your story, to try something new, to wear red, to sing in the shower, to say hello to a stranger, to smile for no reason, to cry for no reason. When the expression of self is done naturally, it will also be perceived naturally.
Question and challenge the standards, the tribal assumption, the social media shining on society, the beliefs you no longer believe but you are holding on to anyway. Be true to yourself and only believe what feels expansive, growing and light.
Take risks, step out of your comfort zone, do a small thing every day that will challenge your ego-based fears, talk to your fears, question them, what’s beneath it?
Tell yourself every day that you are OK just the way you are and in your journey of evolution. You might change your mind and choose differently because this quest is yours and you have the freedom to choose differently as that choice is expanding and evolving.
When you allow yourself the freedom to just be, you come back home to yourself.
Where else would you rather be?
With love and light,
Francesca