How To Be You (2bU)
With my tongue in my cheek, I put together this list of how to be more you. Hope they help!
- First of all, admit you are not you: unless of course you are. Then skip this whole thing.
- Get introduced: you can’t become yourself until you know who the real you is. Hardest part!
- Like what you see. No matter how repugnant or glorious the real you seems to you, you’re stuck with you, and that’s the real thing.
- Murder the masks: Detect the masks and say bye-bye to them. Shed no tears. Their death is feigned because they are phantoms.
- Don’t be dissuaded: Even those closest to you may rebel against your transformation. “I liked the old you!” “Too bad! Buried him yesterday.”
- Forgive all those who assembled and affirmed the false you for you, including you. They didn’t mean it, unless they did.
- Use every tool at your disposal to get this job done: dreams, intuitions, heart and brain. Especially your brain. This isn’t a hobby! It is 99% demolition work.
- Don’t get all snobby-spiritual about it. This is every person’s project, as naturally necessary as birth.
- However, you are transformed by the re-creation of your mind. The Spirit can help.
- Fly solo: I can’t help you! You have to do this alone.
That’s it! Light-hearted, but I think these points are important. So, get to it, and I’ll see the real you later.
The fine art photograph is the creation of my friend, Mark Hemmings, and it is from his Mannequins series.
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What a let-down!
Couldn’t read points 2 to 10 ‘cos of the last sentence in point 1!
Please let me read them anyway!
Wonderful list.
Hi David,
I just wanted to say how much I love reading your blog. I’m not a religious person (well, not in the conventional sense anyway) but I love where you are coming from - the things that you write feel especially meaningful to me at the moment.
Cheers,
Rob.
Excellent Dave - thanks as always for humor, encouragement and truth.
This is going to be tough work. I am going to have to hire that personal coach after all….
Wish me (or the “other” me, or the “yet to be” me) luck!
i really enjoyed this post. thanks dave!
Dave, I really liked what you wrote until I got to # 10. Here’s what my ‘true me’ has to say aobut #10. Here goes: with my twist on this thoughtful piece you wrote,
#10. Fly in formation, you get there faster and you get to experince the real you in context of the royal ‘us’.
Isn’t the the real me a constant reflection of what my true friends (and sometimes enemy’s) see in me that I couldn’t possibly see myself. Isn’t it about how the true ‘one’ who made me defines me in the context of the community I find myself in? Does He not define the true me, among my enemy’s and my friends? Doesn’t He do that in comunity? Isn’t it really about us, the ‘true we’, not the ‘generic we’, but the ‘we’ that helps me be the real me so that we can fly together? Oh gosh Dave, you really got the true me going, I just don’t see how the true me can fly without you!
I tried to discuss this with the true me, but he just doesn’t seem interested. He kept mumbling something about disconnection, distraction, and the fear of wool socks. Oh well, maybe next time.
ah, grasshoppers! to fly in formation though, you must be flying the real you. i suppose there is some reciprocity going on. but i must fly my own plane, whatever that is. good thoughts, all of yous!
Fly solo? Sometimes being myself means being instrament rated. Bad weather gives me a sense of vertigo when it comes to figure out who I am, where I am, and to keep my attitude and altitude on track. Blessings.
Nice list. What about identifying one’s self through Christ? This is notable.
Is it okay if we skip around?
No.6 is pretty crucial…. and tough when you’re still angry with them.
I think I might add a number 4.5. Consider the cost so you are prepared for the fallout.
I think sometimes we assume personal transformation will be good for us and for everyone around us. I wasn’t all that thrilled about having my world rocked by Truth in the beginning, but eventually meeting the real “me” and starting to live from that place was freeing.
However, it cost me my marriage.
I was surprised by my then-husband’s reaction to my becoming real–but I shouldn’t have been. Although I came to see this metamorphosis as the best thing ever to happen to me, he didn’t feel the same. It meant he would have to adapt to my change. He didn’t want to. And he proved it by leaving.
Transformation is never easy, but it’s a bit less difficult if you anticipate that.
Wow, good points ttm.
Wow ttm. Thank you for sharing that.
I have been known to ‘harp on’ about being real. It is one of my passions to live authentically and also to see those around me live freely. There are sometimes those who silently send the message…”you’re an extrovert, it’s easy for you” or “must be nice to be so free!” as though it was something I simply inherited. Being real is hard work. It is an intentional daily pursuit. One does not arrive at “real” and then rest. I often envision the “Game of Risk” where we are constantly juggling the defense and concurrent advancement of our borders. And as ttm so honestly stated, being real does have a cost. Many (read MOST) cannot seem to handle ‘real’ though they might think they can.
One of the things I most love about our community is the genuine invitation to be real. I’ve responded to similar invitations in the past and then found myself slandered and standing trial…my faith suddenly in question because I shared my true thoughts in what was to have been a ’safe place.’ Not so. Though the pursuit of authenticity is still a vulnerable place to be (exposing one’s self always is!), I have found in my community a place of open pasture.
Sometimes I wonder,Who am I,wHAT AM i here on this earth for.I have come to this conclusion I am here for a purpose:The Great Comission,Go YE into all the world ,share the Gospel of Jesus Christ to who soever will listen.Just like the question asked John the Baptist:Who are you?I am one crying out in the wilderness
repare the way of the Lord.Praise the Lord David LOVE EDWIN
Profound thoughts. Often the hardest person to forgive for the masks is indeed ourself. I love the “Too bad! Buried him yesterday!” bit. As I have changed over the years that reaction by those around me wanting the old me has come as quite a shock at times. Great mantra.
Awesome thought from all. Major subject .. in jest or not! Romans 6-8 realized!!! Look out if you are headed there. God forgot to mention how many times he has to kill us on the way to our once and for all final death of the old person (man/woman). Some say “Pain? Try prison!” I say “Pain? Try dying to self”!
BTW .. isn’t oneself the one person we really cannot forgive? After all - who am I forgiving? Which of me is doing the forgiving? Just questions.
“Don’t get all snobby-spiritual about it.” But David, it’s sooooo easy to think that we have “arrived” - like, we’re so authentic and they’re not… yeeks, then you smell religious and that stinks. Bad.
Heb 10:14 says by one sacrifice he has made PERFECT FOREVER those who are BEING made holy. Thats Amazing Grace!