Be yourself
Why do so many people try to be what they are not? Why do so many think they are not good enough? Why do we fret about our appearance, status, performance, and what others think of us? Why do so many young women want to be Paris, Jessica, Mischa, Cameron, Fergie, or Britney rather than themselves? Why aren’t they putting all their energy and effort into developing and expressing their own unique selves instead of trying to be an inferior copy of some celebrity’s projected image?
Human beings are highly sensitive to social conditioning. Countless messages tell us how and who we are supposed to be. But our society is infatuated with surface images and the cult of celebrity. People are valued for getting attention - by being rich, beautiful, successful, entertaining, or outrageous. We assume the more attention people get the more worthy they must be.
And in an overpopulated, competitive, highly judgmental, and commercially driven world, we are polarized into ‘winners’ and ‘losers’. But the definition of ’success’ is very narrow. Qualities such as kindness, generosity, caring for and helping others, championing underdogs and causes, honesty, decency, modesty and humility, have little currency, and unless they are accompanied by stunning good looks or wealth, they don’t make you a ‘winner’.
Marketing and advertising distorts our judgement of what is realistically attainable and what is not. They constantly attack our self-images with depictions of phony perfection so that we think we should, and must be able to attain it. They play on our insecurities and cultivate a sense of inferiority in order to sell us products to ‘fix’ our problem.
Society and the media also promote and encourage high and often unrealistic expectations - presenting images of wealth, fame, beauty and glory - as though they are the norm. It is easy to feel inadequate and a failure when we compare our fallible, flawed selves against such images.
In a society that supposedly encourages individualism we are also encouraged to squash it in case the individual ‘us’ does not fit the mold.
Is it such a tragedy not to be beautiful/handsome, strong, athletic, thin, young, rich, sexy, or famous? As my mother used to say: ‘Beauty is as beauty does.’ Life can be wonderful even for the less than perfect! Having wrinkles is not the end of the world. We don’t need surgeons mutilating our bodies in the name of ’self-improvement’ to be loved. Being ‘ordinary’ is not crime. We need to learn to value character and experience more than surface appearances.
There is nothing wrong with trying to improve ourselves but if we reject our essential self, or worse, hate ourselves for not being ‘perfect’, we disconnect from ourselves and other people, we become alienated, envious, critical, dissatisfied, resentful. And concentration on our ‘not good enoughness’ takes our attention away from more important things (such as our unique strengths). If we don’t accept ourselves, no one else will. Depression and despair follow if we keep denying ourselves.
We need to be our real, authentic selves, in order to reach our potential and live a full and satisfying life.
Some others’ thoughts on being yourself:
To be nobody—but yourself—in a world that is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else—means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight, and never stop fighting. E E Cummings.
I am someone; I am someone worth being; I am committed to being myself. Carl Rogers.
The question is not, Why aren’t I like so and so? But Why am I not fulfilling my own potential?
You have the right to be you—the way you are, the way you want to be.
You have the right to grow, to change, to become, to strive, to reach for any goal, to be limited only by your degree of talent and amount of effort. D Viscott.
(The) aim of life is to be that self which one truly is. The only question that matters is, Am I living in a way which is deeply satisfying to me, and which truly expresses me? Carl Rogers.
A person who doubts himself is like a man who would enlist in the ranks of his enemies and bear arms against himself. He makes his failure certain by himself being the first person convinced of it. Alexander Dumas.
Theologians used to use the word accidie to describe the sin of failing to do with one’s life all that one knows one can. Abraham Maslow.
I am me.
In all the world there is no one else exactly like me. ..
I own me, and therefore I can engineer me.
I am me and I am okay. Virginia Satir
Oh, let the self exalt itself,
Not sink itself below;
Self is the only friend of self,
And self self’s only foe.
Hindu scriptures (First century)
The greatest evil that can befall a man is that he should come to think ill of himself. Goethe.
Self love, my liege, is not so vile a thing as self neglecting. William Shakespeare.
What can you do better than anyone else in the world? You can be yourself better than anyone else.
It is impossible to compare individuals because it is like comparing apples and oranges. We are all best at being different and unique.
Once a person perceives himself as being worthwhile, he has no need to continue to present falsified versions of himself to himself and the world. Lou Benson.
Yes, I’m my own best friend. I’ve always been that way, even when I felt other people didn’t understand me, because I knew I still had to be true to myself. There were times when I allowed people to get me off the track about who I was but I’d analyze myself and find out what was happening before I got myself in too much trouble. Eartha Kitt.
Nothing is a greater impediment to being on good terms with others then being ill at ease with yourself. Honore de Balzac.
…shyness is mine, like it or not. It’s the best of me and the worst of me, and only the covering it up, the hiding it, and the running from it, is not me. Sheldon Kopp.
Copyright Ultimate-self.com 2007 All rights reserved.
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