atreesvoice

We do not need to fix ourselves; so much as we need to know ourselves.

As a lifelong participant of the personal improvement era and healing community, I have recently become tired of searching for problems to solve within myself. Instead, it feels important to know who I am under all those supposed problems. This morning I contemplated how to do that. How do we as a species experience who we are underneath all the mind labels? I started a list with solitude as number one. Then I realized the subsequent points were actually all sub actions of solitude. So, I reworked it. This is not a process or a linear method. Rather this is a commitment to experiencing self as itself. From there you can make any changes you desire with this essence at your core. Is self nature or nurture? I say it’s both. We need to know our nature in order to nurture expansion, growth, improvement and change.

Here are my five suggestions to get to know your self.

1. Spend time alone EVERY DAY. This is the greatest commitment to you. It can be for as little as 15 minutes, so long as it is intentionally alone with the focus on you. This means that it does not count if you have children and they happen to be outside of the house, leaving you alone while you cook their meals. Again, this time is spent intentionally.

2. During that time do whatever allows you to feel the most intimate with your inner world. Writing, meditating, walking, sitting by a tree, and dancing to name a few of my ideas. Whatever works for you. There is no cookie cutter right or wrong. It can change on a daily basis as well. I would recommend staying with around 5 different choices, however. If changed too often, we lose the sense of self we are seeking and get caught up in the newness of the activity. This may be useful in the future, but not so much when beginning to know our own vibration.

3. During this time alone, drop any sense of improving upon yourself or your skills. If writing, just write. Do not work on creating a final draft during this time. If walking, don’t compare your distance to another person’s or a different day. Just be in the moment intimately with your self as is.

4. Engage your senses during this time. We spend a lot of time THINKING and analyzing. Take time off from these responses and explore other areas such as sensing the energy that animates your body. As in point #3, do not pay attention in order to find problems (that is the mind). Simply feel your body as it expresses, notice if it has tension or pain and allow for that. Listen with your cells. Or perhaps pay attention to the atmosphere that you are sitting in. Or allow the emotions that are sitting inside to rise up, experience their presence without judgment or desiring to fix them. Don’t analyze anything away. Notice it. Experience it.

5. Last but not least, continue to come back to this energy you get to know as you. When out and about in the world and around others in everyday life experiences, flash back to your time alone and bring up that same feeling. The one you know as your personal frequency. As human beings we are integrations of a variety of facets; soul, spirit, body, ego, thoughts, etc…. That energy you are “dating” during your alone time is a collaboration of all these facets. They can work together, or go off in many different directions leaving us fragmented. Your self is an individuated recipe of these facets. It is not fixed and I’d recommend allowing for the ingredients to swirl around with some getting more attention and flavor at different times. However, it is itself

Through knowing your true self, you will begin to recognize that the labels you may use to describe yourself, are just descriptions for roles you play during a lifetime. Language and words are by nature limiting, defining. Your essence is immeasurable. Go forth and express YOU.