One of the greatest undoings humans do to themselves is the ability to inculcate a false notion about themselves.
More often than not we tend to believe too much in our abilities and non abilities to the point of creating a cooked-up impression, devoid of true knowledge of self.
The very first step into personal discovery is knowing the difference between who are, what you are and who you wish to be.
Who you are?
A lot has been said by steemians about themselves recently on who they are through the untalented contest. However, does our answers to the question emboldens who we really are?
Who we are entails the personality that makes up man. Our natural abilities, our perception and view of the world. Who we are is well grounded in our ability to distinguish our temperaments, judgments and flaws from that of the other person.
Who we are consist of our weakness and strength, our goals and motivation. Our actions and reactions equally. It is the sum total of the whole self. The you in you. The mind imbibed in the shell of the flesh is who we are.
What are we?
This is the cumulative experience that we have gathered over the years of living. Most times in comes in various position that has been held by a person, thereby giving the needed skill of expertise that distinguishes us from someone who has no such experience as we do.
If who we are is the nature of the person, see what we are as nurture. The nurture principle of what we are places us on a state of a clean slate with no advantage over anybody.
Until life moves you from one form to another, a position to another one, before the necessary schemas are imprinted in the clean slate to make what we have become.
A typical example is a person who tells you that he is a doctor or a lawyer. That does not come from his naturally abilities from birth(that is the who he is), but through constant study and expertise in the field that makes him become what he is today.
Who we wish to be?
This is our fantasies. Our dreams and thoughts of being something in future or being someone else.
What we wish to be could be creative and destructive as well.
How could it be creative?
Cogito ergo sum. I think therefore I am. Descartes
The import of this statement is that we all became that which we think we are. A man is a sum total of what he has as an impression of himself. However, this is quite achievable through defined goals and applied principles. Though the element of hard work and purpose we become that we wish to be over time.
For example a person who wishes to be a musician goes into constant training of the voice and practice of stage performance, over time he comes into that dream he wishes through practised tenacity.
How could it be destructive?
This could happen in when one begins to imitate people in their craft. That is one become less creative in his choice of life and dealings.
The person sees every need to copy that which has been done by someone else. It is the effect of identity crisis. The person is impressed by so many craft that he feels he is capable of doing almost every one of them.
The person lacks direction and definition of who he wishes to become and tries many things at random bases, only to drop and move to another craft when it turned out not to work out for him or her.
The result of this is lack of distinction in what one could do and total clueless ness in marketing what makes one different.
Even more depressing is the fact that when these persons have failed in the art they choose and jumped into another, they claim to be experienced in such craft and many go as much as to update it on their CVs and LinkedIn profiles.
When being called upon to give credence to that which they say that they, it ends up being a pile of disgrace and disappointment.
How to solve this and improve of who you wish to be.
The first thing any person in life ought to understand is that we are all given a specific gift or abilities.
Someone once told me; Find that specific gift or talent you have, improve on it until you become special in the craft.
This points to the fact that we are all gifted in a thing or two. It is your ability to find out such abilities and distinguish yourself in it that sets you apart from the normal things some other persons do.
In other words, feed your strength and focus, to the extent you become an authority in your field or niche.
Secondly, you have to throw yourself to the world, get into it and see that there is a lot to learn from others.
We often hear some people say that they are not in competition with anybody body else but themselves.
How true this may sound, the tendency of you always being in your comfort zone is quite high that you discover you don't push yourself to do the little bit of extra, just because you claim not to be in competition with anybody else.
I always say that, Cristiano Ronaldo will not have attained the level of brilliance he did today if not for the competition of Messi.
Lack of competition is the lazy man's escape to the realities of life.
You could only beat your chest and say you are in competition with only but yourself if you know that you always set the standard of excellence that everyone ought to follow. Now in this situation, the only thing one has to do is to outdo what has already been done by oneself before.
But with that apart, there is need to compete and get better with the healthy race.
We should bear in mind that the who we are, what we are and the who we wish to be are interconnected series that all form the person that exist for the world to see.
A full understanding and distinction of these aspect makes one take informed decision and choices. Eliminating all forms of confusion in the person you are, what you have become and who you wish you become.
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