Continuing with my discussion spawned by Rachel Hollis‘s book, “Girl, Stop Apologizing”. How am I choosing to be me?
What if I was just me, I ponder. What if I were simply to allow myself to do as I please without worrying about the lives of others and how they will be impacted? Well, there is one way this could go, which is to say badly. Then again, it’s possible it could go quite well.
The Christian says to the Atheist, ‘what will keep you from doing horrible things’. And that immediately comes to mind when considering whether or not to just be as I am, unvarnished. Truthfully, nothing except my general understanding of my own humanity. Just because I don’t have some greater morality telling me how to behave, or in this case the censure of others, doesn’t mean I will automatically go off the deep end toward the most depraved sorts of behavior against my fellow man. Therefore, what if?
Choosing to be me is a recurring choice.
What if I did the things I wanted to do without worrying about how it looked? Choosing to be me is important. I’m a serial business owner at this point, willing to do what it takes to see success on my terms. What if I took what I know and applied it to helping others? I sort of do. Currently, I work as a trainer for my night job, a position I got specifically because I volunteered. I volunteered what little expertise I had to lighten the workload of others. This allowed me to move into a position of some authority. Not ultimate authority as I still work under the auspices of another, but some authority nonetheless.
So maybe I don’t need to worry about ‘what if’. Maybe I need to go, as Picard would say, “make it so”. I do it anyway. I see things before me and I decide I’m going to chase that. It’s how I published my first book. How I got up on stage the first time and performed in front of a crowd. Why I do karaoke sober. I make the choice to make it so. I choose to do things which cause me to have to break out of my comfort zone and be me as loudly as possible. So worrying about ‘what if’ isn’t what I need to do. I need to figure out how to put myself in more situations where ‘make it so’ is ‘get it done’.
Perhaps that is how choosing to be me is really done. Going from ‘what if’ to ‘get it done’.