“Are you living your highest self?” she asked.
The question didn’t hurt, but it really scared the shit out of me.
My sweetheart had asked me a question I knew the answer to, an answer that I really didn’t like and had been avoiding. I mean really, why can’t I just take a breather and coast for a little while? Why do I always have to be working on SOMETHING, always GROWING? Can’t I just be content in what I have?
The deeper truth is that I’m NOT content with what I have. Oh, I can coast along and pretend that it’s true, and I can always put on the “Mask of J” and play the part of the enlightened one, the inspiring one, the brilliant one, the entertaining one, the one people want to be around… Underneath the mask, I’m still just me. I DON’T have answers, I just know what to say to appear like I do. The thing is, I really WANT to be what the mask appears to be – I don’t want to play the role, I want to BE that man.
But that requires living my highest self, and that’s scary. What if the mask is a better version of me than the truth?
Right now, whether I like it or not, I am the leader of a group of six people. These six individuals have been entrusted with the work of inspiring and coaching a group of 22 people to take on the relationships in their lives and make huge changes to the way they view the world and live their lives – inspiring these 22 people to live their highest self. I’ve been entrusted with the work of inspiring, challenging and coaching the 6 people leading them to do the same. What I know for sure is that if I’m not living my highest self, I can’t expect my coaches to live theirs, and they can’t expect their trainees to do any differently.
So it comes to this. Living my highest self is not just about me. We’re all connected somehow.
Here goes…
January 18th, 2010 at 1:20 pm
The masked J could not be better then J being his highest self. Those 6 people are lucky to have you to inspire them, and you are lucky to have a reminder to grace the world with you being who you are. love you.
January 18th, 2010 at 1:36 pm
Thank you J. This came at the perfect time. I am grateful for you in my life!
January 18th, 2010 at 4:54 pm
J, here is my 2 cents…
We are always our higher self! We do not have to DO anything to be our higher self.
We are all born perfect it is the masks that we put on, the things we THINK we need to do, things that are external, that we let trick ourselves into believing that we are not our higher selfs.
Lack is a mater of perspective, if I am not my higher self then I am lacking?
If I am not my higher self where does he go when I am in my shit?
Every moment is a new moment and your higher self is always a breath away.
You make a difference in others lives even when you are in your shit (or just coasting).
No this is not an excuse to do nothing it is an excuse to have nothing be something.
To know that even as you decide to sit still you teach the man who never does that it is okay.
As you voice your frustration you inspire the person who has never spoken his mind to speak.
Saying that I am not living my higher self is, for me, nothing more then side stepping accountability.
If I accept all of me (as you have said before) then might all of me (even the less then inspiring parts) be part of my higher self?
as a wise woman said to me before “you have the ability to make a difference even when you are in your shit”.
However I do admire your stand as you work on connecting with your higher self
January 18th, 2010 at 10:23 pm
Hmmm…I’m emailing you.
January 18th, 2010 at 10:41 pm
John, I love you. I get the spirit of where you are coming from but, for me, I disagree – I am not always my higher self. I may not have to DO anything to be my higher self but I still get to BE it and there are very clearly times when that is not who I choose to be. In those moments it’s very clearly a “take” from myself and those around me.
Being willing to acknowledge those times and those choices when I’m not being my higher self is the first step in my accountability and my path to a more peaceful, abundant and joyful self.
Powerful people have powerful shit. And, I am blessed to have many powerful people in my life and see a lot of their shit and learn from them both in their brilliance and their stuff. When in my own crap, I know that there are times when I can still be in that place and teach, inspire, or make a difference. At the end of the day it’s not that I negate what good may have come from it but I get to be honest enough to look at what more I could have done had I chosen to be and live greater…and in that moment, and each moment after, make the choice to stay where I am or to take a breath and make a different choice.