Watching someone pretending to be someone else for everyone else’s sake. Just think about that… have you ever done this?
I remember years ago hearing my mum putting on a posh voice when we were at the doctors or the optician. Almost as a bleak attempt to have the doctor or optician hear her as something she was not, simply by the way she spoke.
I then started to do this myself, only I would do it through story telling. Making up tales concocted in my imagination to somehow convince others I was interesting, funny and someone worthy of their time.
As a young adult I found myself using this strategy that I had been shown time and time again, a long time ago. Without much benefit I might add. People buy into people, whether that is in your business, professional or personal life.
Growing up I watched my mum do this on many occasions. From how she spoke, what she wore, how she conducted herself and got others to engage with her. This strategy, in some way, enabled her to feel a sense of significance within her own head, by pretending to be someone else she could escape from who she believed she was.
Ultimately, we are all seeking significance.
For my first 30 years on this planet, I had this belief that no-one would be interested in me and that I had to pretend to be something or someone else to gain approval, acceptance, and love. This led to huge problems for me in connecting with myself. Having a solid sense of who I was, was less important that impressing others. This is the pattern I had been taught by and the programming I allowed to run in my mind.
My mum was an amazing woman. Kind, funny compassionate but unfortunately let the feeling of failure, of pain, of insignificance haunt her every day. She could not see that by just being herself she was wonderful, and people warmed to her because of who she was not who others thought she might be.
I pondered on this for a few years as I was taking the leap of blind faith in my own journey of authenticity. I started to wonder. Who am I REALLY underneath all of these layers? What are the strengths and insights that I have that are utterly unique to me? How can I use these for good while staying true to me and showing others to do the same?
I soon realised the pain and fear that had been driving my mum’s behaviours were driving mine. The things she tried to hide and run away from were the same things I had been avoiding and running from. I began to connect to me and learnt what I was capable of and the strengths I have within my own mind.
I am writing this blog and releasing it today, what the media have deemed Blue Monday. The theory is, this is the day that people feel cold, broke, and utterly miserable. It’s when the Christmas bills are starting to come in and the New Year resolutions are a distant memory.
But here’s the thing. What if you were totally at cause? And by that, I mean. What if you only spent what you could afford at Christmas? What if the only resolution you made was to be more like you. To live life honouring your strengths and weaknesses and to live your life working with these, rather than against them. Wouldn’t life be just fab?
Knowing and understanding yourself is the best gift you can ever give yourself. On this Blue Monday why not have a little look inside. Use compassion and kindness with yourself to tease out the things you genuinely want from life then make decisions around how to achieve them.
To be true to who you are, show others what they want to see and not what you think they want to see. Through all of this just take today as a great day to celebrate everything that you are, instead of everything you are not.
And always always remember… The magic is within you.
Happy Blue Monday xShop for Floats
