Life has a tendency to live itself when left alone. If there were any simple formula for living your best life I would say it is that. Relax into the experience of being you as best you can and trust that things will work out once you learn to trust yourself.
Of course, for some people that might be all they need to hear.
For others, they will be asking, “O.k. How?”
I tend not to be to prescriptive when it comes to formulas for life because any formula that does not encourage the individual to work out their own needs, their own values, their own loves, and their own truths for themselves, is missing the point.
Why people stop trusting themselves, or never start, is because they were either never taught they could, or they tried it, made a mistake, and then got scared off of the idea.
Of course, it’s a little more complex that this, but I trust you get the point.
When people don’t trust themselves, when they relinquish their control and responsibility over themselves, then what happens? They relinquish control to someone or something else – maybe a system, or an ideology, or an organisation – maybe even a formula.
Whichever way, if there is anything that will return them to living true to themselves, to trusting themselves, it usually involves the principle of courage.
Courage can set people free: The courage to seek, and then follow the light that is within them.
We could call this light truth and/or love. Or value. Or meaning. Or Self. It doesn’t really matter what we call it. The power, the freedom, is in seeking and then choosing that light as your guide.
What follows then is not intended to be definitive, but, like so much that is offered here, an invitation; an invitation to you to discover, find, and develop your own light.
Relating, Adapting, and Creating
When people talk about the value of ‘being conscious’ or ‘being aware’ of yourself, this can mean different things. There is a way to know yourself that is in knowing what you like, what your true disposition and character is, because you know how you have been in the past. You know what you are like. This is not to say that you will always do the same, rather you have this knowing as a baseline. This type of consciousness about ourselves can translate to a self consciousness.
There is another type of knowing yourself that exists in the simple act of being, of being present with yourself. This being present is really little more than being present with life as it is unfolding, not just in you, in how you feel, in what you think, but in the events unfolding around you.
Knowing and being yourself then, in these terms can just be as simple as, be present with your experience of being alive.
In many ways this is the baseline to what enables you to find the light within that I mentioned above. The better you are able to relate, to yourself, to others, and to the environment that sustains you, the the better able you are to notice what life is for you.
At some levels it is no more complex than that.
What is Life Asking of You?
Another invitation.
Generally we are motivated away from pain and towards pleasure. Of course, there are exceptions, but the principle holds some weight. Of course, too much pleasure can dull our sense of proportion. Not recognising that discomfort can sometimes be an essential component in reaching a goal. So pleasure and pain is mitigated by right and wrong. I don’t mean this is a moral sense, rather in a pragmatic sense. In addition to this, we also know what needs to be done.
Often, the challenges we face in life are the result of conflicts between one or more of these positions. To meet our basic needs we must be able to buy or grow food, to pay rent or a mortgage, or to build a house or a shelter. In the majority of nations this means earning money to do so. Sadly, for many people, how they earn that money is often as the result of working in a job they dislike but they do it because they need to ‘pays the bills’.
For some people it is the other way round, they must do what they know to be right and good for them even if it means struggling to pay the bills.
Relaxing into your own truth and living that is the formula I am suggestion.
Doing what YOU love. Doing what YOU know to be right. Doing what YOU know needs to be done.
It is about living in the world and seeing what works and what doesn’t work for you. Working out what is true and what isn’t – how you can live authentically.
Knowing and Being Yourself
This brings us back full circle to the principle of relating, because it is the act of relating, to ourselves, to others, and to the world, that is the key, and, more over, recognising that it is never finished. Rather that we just refine how we relate. We get clearer about things the more honest we are with ourselves, the more truthful we can be. It is through this process of refining that a better life can emerge.
Also, you do not know your limits until you test them.
You find them out (and yourself) through engaging in life.
You are uncovered through action.
In this sense you are never a finished article. There is not a finished you in there waiting to be made. There is just a process of being and of becoming that is You. Yes, it has its own consistency. You know who you are in that sense. Also, there is a you that you don’t know. The mystery of you, the person you might become and the version you have yet to become.
In other words you know who you are when you know what you have done so far, but you are not limited by this, you are just informed by it.
What Next?
The ongoing process of your life, of your being, of your becoming, is the result of how you relate; to yourself, to others, and to the world.
There will always be elements of life that lay beyond your control. These you will discover as they reveal themselves. For those aspects for which you are in control, you can choose what to do next.
So, to the degree that you consider it is right and good for you to do so, feel free to relax and be yourself.
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