Finding Yourself or Realizing You’re Right There
It seems that for many people the purpose of life is finding yourself. People always say that you need to “find yourself” in order to be happy, but no one tells you how to do it. And how do you know when you have found yourself? At a time where many people feel more lost than ever, I seek to find the answer to this question, if there even is one.
There are countless movies, books, and stories that all depict how someone finds themselves and there is so much importance placed on this. I believe that finding yourself means finding some sort of inner peace. It means being okay with whatever circumstances you encounter and being able to rely on a set of beliefs that come together to provide the perfect formula for navigating through any obstacle that falls into your path. I think it also means finding joy. But how does one really find themself? Is there a specific sure fire way to find yourself? And once you find yourself can you lose yourself? All of these questions flood into my brain when I think about finding myself and the subject can be overwhelming. I also worry that focusing on finding yourself is selfish. There are so many other things going on in the world that are much more important than any single person and I feel like focusing on simply finding myself makes me feel like I do not care about helping others. However one thing I have discovered is that you cannot help others until you help yourself. This is something most people think to be true but I have never really believed it until I felt it. What I mean by this is that if you are not happy first and do not know who you are, it makes it impossible to even find the motivation to help others let alone actually do any good.
For me, the first thing that pops into my mind when I think of someone finding themselves is Julia Roberts traveling around the world in “Eat Pray Love,” cheesy I know, but I think there are some insightful takeaways that we can all learn from this movie. As cliche as I may sound, “Eat Pray Love” truly depicts the journey of a woman finding herself and how lost she had to be in order to start this journey. She travels around the world alone which is one aspect I think is very important. I think that so many people try to find their identity in others and this will not help you find yourself. It will only help you lose yourself. Denying conformity and spending time alone is the first step in finding yourself in my opinion. Realizing that what you’re doing clearly is not working for you. I think finding yourself means abandoning the things that make you unhappy regardless of how comfortable you are in your ways. It requires listening to your soul and this is something that I took away from the movie “Eat, Pray, Love.” In the movie, Julia is married and successful in the beginning but realizes that she is unhappy and embarks on a journey around the world. She first goes to Italy where she learns to love her own company and be on her own. She eats good food and learns how to enjoy pleasure. Then she goes to India to a meditation retreat and learns the art of meditation and how to forgive herself. She makes peace with her mistakes and with her past. Making peace with your past is such an important part of the journey of finding yourself.
I have had a difficult past emotionally and this caused a ton of anger in me. Built up resentment and sadness about some of the relationships I had became overwhelming so instead of facing these issues, I suppressed them. I ignored them completely and for a while this worked. But I now realize that I was putting a bandaid on a bullet wound. Now I am going through a time where I am reflecting on my past and the issues that arose. I am figuring out why they happened and accepting them. I am also learning that my past does not define me, it only makes me stronger. With that being said, doing this is very emotional. The past few weeks I have been in and out of a feeling of depression and loneliness that I had previously been a stranger to. I have pushed through every day. I am making peace with my family and using love to heal. I have also learned through these times that love is the strongest power of all. When I suppressed my emotions because they were too painful to feel, I was also suppressing love. Suppressing your emotions is not strong, in fact it is the opposite. Suppressing your emotions means that you are coming from a place of fear and only once I mustered up the courage to face my emotions did I find strength through the power of love. I am still learning to do this, but I can truly say that I have found a strength I never knew.
Upon further research into my quest for self actualization, I found a fascinating article written by Kenneth Bozeman and music professor at Lawrence University called, “Voice the Muscle of the Soul: Finding Yourself Through Finding Your Voice.” To summarize, this article is about the connection your voice has to your soul and how important your voice is in finding your identity. Since we were born, we used our voices to communicate, to evoke empathy from our mothers and we knew the sound of our mothers voice as well. From our mothers voice we found comfort and safety if we were lucky. Interestingly and Bozeman writes,
“The process of developing your voice’s ability to express more fully and completely who you are and what your feelings and convictions are then is very much a process of self-discovery, even of self- formation. In order to speak or sing well, you must in fact have something to say, and know clearly what you want to say. Finding and developing that is a crucial step toward finding yourself.”
I had never truly comprehended the power of my voice before reading this article, however it did make me understand why people sing. I believe that everyone sings whether they know it or not, in order to connect with our souls. Personally, if I am going through difficulties I sing. I make up songs about the pain and the people who I believe have done me wrong because when I cannot convey my emotion through words I turn to song and this is a very useful coping mechanism for me. After reading this article I realized that our voices are our identities, and developing our voices is so important for realizing who we really are.
The third thing I would like to point out that will help anyone who believes they have ont found themselves is the power of meditation. In order to find yourself I think that it is pretty much essential to meditate. Because we cannot let our brains control us, we must control our brains. Which is possible. It is important to reorganize the mind and create space for positivity and love. Even ten minutes a day will significantly improve your life in so many ways and help you realign with your true self. According to an article on meditation published by the EOC Institute,
On the level of daily consciousness, you are not your true self, but a reflection of the greater society: You are restrained from the understanding of your true self by the expectations of others, and by your own fears and doubts. In order to get beyond your idea of yourself and discover who you truly are, you need to go beyond everyday consciousness and into the deeper levels of consciousness available when you focus your mind in meditation.
When you meditate you access deeper levels of your consciousness that you are able to throughout the day. Continuously doing this will result in significant changes in your outlook on life and your mental health. Additionally, meditating allows you to escape your surroundings and find peace within yourself which is where peace truly lies. It allows you to forget the distractions of social media, work, school, and other trivial earthly things that can be damaging to our mental health.
The final ingredient that I think is essential to finding yourself is realizing you are right there. When I think about my mentality as a young girl, I had never once thought about ‘finding myself’ I was always focused on the present moment, never worried about the future or the past. And I believe that when we are young we are purely happy, at least for most of us. We have not yet stumbled across pain or complicated situations. We are more focused on having fun than anything. And maybe this is the key. Letting go of all the things that society has conditioned us to be and reverting back to simpler ways. Of course we should be thoughtful and kind and disciplined, which we probably weren’t as young children. But we should just look at who we are underneath who the expectations of others have molded us to be. Stop listening to other people and realize that you are the only guidance you need. Realize what is important for you and focus on those things. Laugh and have fun and enjoy life. Spend time alone and meditate. Be light and loving and spend time focusing on all of the positive amazing things you have to be grateful for in life. But most importantly, think back to when you were six years old and try to harness the little boy or girl that was so purely joyful and stress free.
When I began writing this paper I completely believed that I was going to discover the perfect recipe for finding your true self. I found articles that seemed to outline perfectly what it means to find yourself, however many of them contradicted each other. I believe that I took away three very important things that will help you find yourself or at least know yourself. The first is to make peace with your past and grow from it. Take a step back and realize that other people’s actions from your childhood do not define you in any way. The second is to realize that you do not need to go looking for yourself, because you are right there. You must simply look within yourself (as cheesy as this sounds), get quiet, and listen to what your mind is telling you. And finally, the third is to meditate and pray (at least for me), because I have a relationship with God which is very important to me and when I meditate I like to focus on God and what I am grateful for. Meditating and praying go hand in hand in my opinion.
And there is one more thing that I think is very important, and that is to have fun. Laugh and enjoy life as much as you can. Strive to reach your goals and develop meaningful relationships. And whenever you feel lost, always remember you are right there.