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How You Are Is Not Who You Are
Who have you become? Are you sad, angry, tired or joyful, happy and energetic? How do you live your life? Do you make choices each day to live more fully? How do you respond to daily events and people? Does a long line at the bank make you frustrated? Do you feel lonely or anxious? Is life passing you by because you are too busy doing?
Answering questions like these will help you notice who you have become. However, this is not who you really are. Are you destined to live your life feeling the way you feel right now? Acting the way you do; making the same choices forever?
Of course not! You can change and create whatever life you want. All that is required is a desire to do so, awareness, intention and a little action. Awareness is the key to start change.
In last month’s article LIVING MORE FULLY I talked about seeing a sunset for the first time after getting sober. Moreover, how awe struck I was by the beauty of it all. I could not see this beauty before getting sober because I had become immersed in the illusion of my life. You don’t have to be an alcoholic for this to happen -- it can happen to anyone. We become so conditioned by our circumstances whether it’s work or life events that we cannot see the “sunset”, we cannot see the truth, only the illusion we have created.
You can spend the rest of your life living in the illusion or trying to figure out how you got to where you are or you can begin changing right now. The very act of trying to figure something out means you have to hold onto it until you figure it out (resistance). So what is more important: to figure out how you got where you are, or to let go and change?
We get to where we are in life through many things like social conditioning, genetics, life experiences, such as fearful events, accidents and other traumas, to name a few. Our core beliefs and values shaped by these events lead us into our reactions and responses to life. This causes us to make choices based from our history, which keeps us from being in the moment and acting from our truest self.
I believe that no matter what our circumstances are, even if we feel our life is perfect just the way it is, that we have a responsibility to everyone on the planet and ourselves to continue to evolve through self-discovery and service. It’s not who you’ve become that defines who you really are. That is only a temporary state in which you have a choice to allow the present moment to be created by your history (who you have become) or you can use awareness to shift your responses and reactions. This will begin the process of letting go and allow you to move closer to who you really are.
One of the simplest ways I know to become more aware is to be conscious of the breath. Notice how the breath moves through the body. Observe the air moving through the nose and down the back of the throat. Feel the chest and belly move in- and out.
Being aware of your breath takes your attention away from your thoughts and creates space between the thoughts. This will bring more peace in your life and begin to awaken your awareness. Just start with one or two conscious breaths a day and then notice the breath whenever you remember. Practice this simple process and it will change your life.
This work is licensed under a Creative
Commons License.
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