Be You for You, Not for Them
You should be you for you and not for them.
It is perfectly acceptable to put yourself and your paths in life first.
When you are striving to find, create, and live a life of your own choosing, be sure that you are doing it for YOU, and not for someone else’s belief in who you are or who you should be. It is not a bad thing, nor selfish, to put yourself first in your own life.
Yet you are frequently inundated with messages to the contrary. This is selfish, that is selfish, and you need to put everyone and everything else before you. However, this is simply not the truth.
How many lives do you get to live? Sure, that might be a metaphorical (or metaphysical) question, but the answer is ONE. At least, this one is all of its own. This life, running around this world in that meat popsicle you call your body is the only one this consciousness has.
What does that even mean? It means that you are the only you that there is. Is there anyone else in your head with you? Even if there is, they are still just an aspect of the one and only you.
What it all comes down to is this: to really live this life as it will most light you up, excite you, and engage you, you need to be you for you, not for anyone else.
Expectations are limiting
When you were a child, in all likelihood your parents expected things of you. Under their roof, you abided by their rules. You had a bedtime, were expected to eat, perform daily rituals like bathing and brushing your teeth, and maybe some household chores, homework, and so forth. There was a level of expectation that you would do these things…or suffer the consequences.
The consequences were variable for everyone. Maybe you were sent your room, grounded and kept from playing outside, having your allowance taken away, or electronics and screen-time eliminated. You may also have been put in time-out, spanked, or made to stand in a corner to think about what you did (or didn’t) do.
Expectations were set, and if unmet consequences occurred. All of this shifted as you got older…but so, too, did the expectations.
Parental expectations met and in some cases gave way to societal expectations. Go to college, get a job, get married, start a family, send the kids to college, retire somewhere warm and watch the cycle repeat. This is the general societal expectations of people today.
These expectations leave little to no room for variation. It is any wonder that there are so many people who suffer depression and anxiety when driven to meet unmeetable expectations?
This is why expectations are limiting. They will cause you not to be for you, but to be for them. Live up to the expectations or stand against the standard. Facing this, it’s not hard to see why so many people tend to be disempowered.
If meeting the expectations of others is not letting you be you, isn’t it time to be you for you and not for them?
Now is the time
Time and reality are both illusions and constructs of the human race. As Douglas Adams quipped in The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy:
“Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.”
Albert Einstein said:
“Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one.”
Though one source is fiction and the other a scientist, together these pretty much cover life. The reality you accept as real is an illusion of your own perception. That’s why, despite the collective consciousness and the shared aspects of the world we all live in, perception of the world is so incredibly variable.
How else can you explain how two people can see the same movie and have polar opposite opinions of it? One thinks it’s the most incredible piece of cinema ever created, the other thinks it’s the worst garbage to have wasted two hours of their life on.
Time is a measure of reality. Thus, time is just as illusionary. Ever notice how a minute can both fly by and drag on? This is dependent on what you are doing during that minute. This is why the now, this moment, is the only real time that exists.
The reason I am pointing all of this out and going on about it is that if you are not going to be you for you now, then when? The past has passed and cannot be undone or redone, and the future is not yet written. Or to quote Yoda:
“Always in motion is the future.”
If you are living your life for someone other than yourself, when will you live it for you? What if there is no tomorrow? Do you want to reach the end and regret everything you didn’t do…or recall an incredible experience and stories of a life lived to the fullest?
To be for you is not selfish
I have been going on about allowing expectations to dictate your life and living in the now versus the past or tomorrow to make this point: Be you for you, not for them. Today. Now.
If you are waiting for some happening, tangible or intangible, why? Is there any reason to not live your life, for you, now?
That’s not to say that this isn’t a challenge. I’ve been more-or-less living the life I desire to live for the past eight months or so. I am only just beginning to see means to make this earn me a living wage, and I am terrified about failing at this. My wife is counting on me to provide my share of the income for our household. I desire to be able to do that and more.
There are expectations here, most of which I am placing on myself. They are directly related to me being me for me. Not for them. Yet people close to me have expressed concerns that I am being unrealistic. What I am doing may not work and is putting undue stress on my wife.
It may appear that I am being selfish in striving to live my dream in the here-and-now. Maybe it is. However, I believe this is what I’m meant to do, and apart from the ever-present concerns about my relationship with money I have been happy living like this.
I feel that by being me for me I have more to give. It makes me more capable of greater kindness and empathy for others. I have the support of my wife in this pursuit, and nothing I am doing is denying anyone else’s empowerment.
If it’s not selfish for me to be for me, neither is it for you to be for you.
You are one-of-a-kind
There is only one you. You are a one-of-a-kind, singular being, and you are amazing. The potential to live an amazing life is entirely with you, and you can choose to do what you can to experience it.
Consciousness creates reality. Practice mindfulness and become aware of your thoughts, feelings, and the intent of your actions. Do what you do for you, not for them, because whose life is it anyhow? Unless what you are doing hoarding tangibles or intangibles, or takes away someone else’s potential or rights and freedoms, this is not selfish.
It is perfectly acceptable to put yourself and your paths in life first.
What will you do to be for you and not for them today?
This is the four-hundred and tenth entry in my series. These weekly posts are ideas for, and my personal experiences with, walking along the path of life to consciously create reality. I share this journey as part of my desire to make a difference in this world along the way. I also desire to empower myself and my readers with conscious reality creation.
Thank you for joining me. Feel free to re-blog and share this.
The first year of Pathwalking, including some expanded ideas, is available here. My additional writing works, both fiction and non-fiction, are available here.
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