Being your true self is herculean. There are many factors that will be against your achieving this. Pressure from many points like family, culture, community, friends etc. will try to hinder your true self coming out, but it behooves on you to overcome all these barriers in order to be yourself. The discussion of the steps to take listed in the last post will help. Be free to respond and share how your own self-journey is shaping up. Happy reading.
unlimit your self
Most human beings limit themselves through thoughts, fears, ideas or actions. They set limits for what they can achieve or involve themselves in unnecessary fear. They turn themselves into weaklings because they do not dare. Such people sees mirages and treat them as real things. The key to correcting this is by one “unlimiting” oneself. You can “unlimit” yourself by trying to access your personality through estimating, and evaluating who you are. When you do this, you will be able to know your strengths and weaknesses and in some instances your limitations.
For you to evolve, you need to overcome your limitations and have it within you that no human being has been able to exploit all his innate abilities. This means that every one of us has got potentials that we do not think we had because we have not faced situations that bring such potentials out. It means you achieve what you want to achieve because you believe it is what you want to achieve. You cannot, if you think you cannot and you can if you feel you can. When you limit yourself, you are unable to move forward. Always strive to break the unnecessary limit, which society, associations, family, culture, gender and others have set for you or those you have set for yourself by your thoughts and imagination. The following anecdote graphically explains the problem of limiting oneself. A man embarked on a journey to a distant town. As the journey progresses, he started thinking of the things he is expected to achieve in the other town. His concentration was on his actions in the town when he perceived a big tree on the road. Without reaching the tree, he turned his car and went to take a longer road, which delayed him and made him not to achieve his aims. Another man was also on the road, he perceived the tree as the other man did but he decided to reach the tree before taking a decision. As he reached the point where the tree is, he found out that it was a big tree beside the road that casts its shadow on the road making it look as if the tree had fallen across the road. He went on and achieved his aims faster than the one who turned back. This story clearly points out to us that our limitations are just our own imaginary fears. If we are able to overcome our inner fears and have faith then we will achieve our aims in life, and be a better person.
assert your uniqueness i.e. be yourself
Every individual is a unique being. You should ask yourself who you are? What are your strengths? Know that you are made differently from others. Assert those things that satisfy you and leave those things that do not satisfy you. When you start making yourself known, people begin to know you. You have to make yourself stand up for something. Be your self and not somebody else’s image. By the time you start doing this, you will be building your own self-image. Sometimes, you need to get your inner self out for people to know. The person that created you had a reason for creating you the way he created you. When someone says you are something negative, do not just accept it, but find out the truth by yourself. When you want to do is right, you do not need to fear or conform because everybody conforms. By becoming known for a stand or a way of doing things people respect you for your views though they may disagree with you. Sitting on the fence does not reflect a positive self-concept though ability to compromise in some cases (where necessary) shows positive aspect of self- image.
Try to understand that you are different from every other person and that what fits you does not fit another person. What you are able to do, others may not and cannot do them. If this is accepted, you must then begin to assess yourself differently. The inability to love one self leads to the inability to accept oneself. The question, however is; if you do not love your self who will then love you? If you do not accept yourself, who will accept you? If you do not study yourself who will study you and finally if you do not know yourself how will you know other people? How will you give out what you do not know of yourself or that you do not know you have of yourself to others? Ignorance in self-knowledge is not bliss; rather it is a stumbling block in forming long lasting relationships and self-actualization
An individual with a low self-esteem will not be able to share with others or maintain interpersonal relationships. This means an individual with a negative self-concept will not be able to maintain a lasting and enhancing relationship. A person with an over developed self concept will also have problems in maintaining a relationship because he feels he is more important than others or is better than they are. This determines how he reacts to issue and people. So in asserting your uniqueness, you must take into consideration the nature and uniqueness of others that you are involved with. Your right to uniqueness stops where other people’s rights to uniqueness starts.
AFTER BEING YOURSELF AND PROJECTING YOUR REAL SELF, WHAT NEXT?
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