There isn’t anything that you can’t be or do or have.
~~Abraham Hicks
In our society here in Canada, and many others, there is such a emphasis on the external. What your job is, how you talk, where you live, what degree you have. I think that one of the main reasons we focus so much on things like this is that these are the things that others can easily see, judge, evaluate, and compare.
Because we are using these surface-level traits to judge others we of course know that we are being judged similarly, so we spend a lot of time making sure that our external selves give the impression that we want to give.
But that way of living places an extremely low value, if any value at all, on things that others can’t see or measure. We focus on making sure that people have the impression that we are the type of person we want to be instead of actually looking within and becoming it. We want to give the illusion of confidence even if we have none, the illusion of happiness even if we aren’t, the illusion of knowing even if we don’t.
I think another reason that we focus more on seeming the way we want to be instead of actually becoming the way we want to be is that we have the belief that we can’t actually be the way we want to be. We’re afraid that our ideal version of ourselves – compassionate, spontaneous, wise, adventurous – is unattainable for some reason. That we are flawed and that’s just the way it is.
The only thing worse than the idea that we will never be the human beings we want to be is the thought that others will see our shortcomings and judge us harshly. The fear that they’ll see that we aren’t smart, secure, or generous and look down on us.
But we can truly be the way we want to be. The only thing standing between us and the version of ourselves that we want to be is the silly belief that we can’t change. That somehow our personalities are locked in stone some time in our teens or early twenties, if not earlier, and that that’s what we’re stuck with for the rest of our lives.
If we spend even a short period of time thinking about this, we see that this just isn’t true. Our external selves, our bodies, are constantly changing, so why would our internal selves be static?
Life is flowing. Everything is shifting and evolving. Even the planet is changing. The continents today look nothing like they did 300 million years ago. If the Earth’s landmass can change it seems almost arrogant to believe that we humans cannot.
There are lots of ways that we can achieve these inner changes (Check out the Resources page for some good websites) and I’ll write about some that have worked for me in some future posts, but none of them will work easily and smoothly if we don’t let go of the common false belief that people don’t change – that you can’t teach an old dog new tricks.