Reconnecting with your Authentic Self
By Cynthia Morin
Your Authentic Self - what it is and how do you reconnects with it?
The Authentic Self is the core of my practice as a personal life coach and of course my own spiritual practice….to live with passion and follow my bliss, listening to and expressing as best I can that Authentic Self. The Rumi quotes below represent the closest thing I have found to explain this mystic aspect of life.
“Let yourself be silently drawn by the stronger pull of what you really love. ” ~ Rumi
“Let the beauty you seek be what you do.” ~ Rumi
Finding your Authentic Self is more than discovering your life purpose or passion or forgotten dreams. But that could be a good start.
Sarah Ban Breathnach (author of Simple Abundance) has written a very good book called Something More: Excavating Your Authentic Self in which she explores the process of digging into the soul for that elusive ’something else’. That sense that something is missing, that surely there is more to life, is an early clue that the Authentic Self wants to come out and play. During this process of exploration and ‘excavation’, one won’t necessarily change jobs or careers or spouses or homes, though any or all of those are possible.
What seems more important than finding a new job, new spouse or new house, is to learn to discover and uncover in small ways every day what being genuinely ‘you’ would be like. And then to begin to ‘be’ just that. To get on with your desired life rather than become resigned to something elusive out there in some distant future.
Every one of us has had that thought as some point…well, when the kids are grown or when I finally lose this weight or once I pay off these debts…and on it goes. For those that have experienced coaching you know that uncovering the authentic self is a ‘process’ and requires getting into action. You will want to try some new things and also allow your memories to bring up some forgotten joys to explore. And baby steps are ok, it IS a journey in the desired direction.
I’ll offer some suggestions to get you started, some questions for you - you can write a list or journal your answers.
I have found that there are two approaches to getting unstuck and as an individual you may resonate with one more than the other…
Suggestions - pick one or two below that seem pretty easy and then another 1 or 2 that bring up some resistance to work on!
Group 1: Moving away from being ’stuck’ or feeling you’ve lost something (authenticity)
1. What do I resent? What do I regret?
2. What have I been unwilling to change?
3. Where am I in denial? What have I been overlooking?
4. Where am I too comfortable?
5. Where have I denied myself?
6. Where do I stop short? Where am I holding back?
7. What decision have I been avoiding?
8. Where am I taking my foot off the gas?
9. What am I stepping over?
10.What am I settling for? What am I unwilling to risk?
Group 2: Moving toward authenticity, plotting a course of action
1. What am I most grateful for?
2. What makes me laugh? makes me smile?
3. What thrills me? What is fun?
4. How am I generous with myself?
5. What is fulfilling, what feels good?
6. How could I go softly into life? How can I have this be easy?
7. What can I give myself permission to do today?
8. How can I double my vitality? recharge my batteries?
9. What acknowledgment can I give myself today?
10 What awes me?
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