Have you ever look down upon someone and said ‘Oh, he/she worked in Walmart as a cashier’ yourself or witnessed someone say words of such nature?
Are you less now just because you once were?
Personally, I know this from work. There is a bankster who works in the Application Management department. I was once told in a very narcissistic and down-looking-on-others way from one of the workers that that now-bankster used to drive a cab for a living. Erm, yes. Okay. So, what? Is he somehow less qualified to be a bankster just because he had a job before that wasn’t a bankster, or a job that’s somewhat looked down upon by society?
I don’t think so. Why bother and define the man by his past. By his job in the past? It’s actually quite interesting. It opened up a very specific design that we, as humans, have accepted and allowed to exist and govern us.
We do the exact same thing towards ourselves
Have a look: Do we not do the same in our mind towards ourselves that the worker did about the bankster? Defining him by his past and looking down upon him based on his past? Who he was in the past? Don’t we define ourselves based on our past? Don’t we look down upon us, judge us and keep us stuck in who we were in our past? Not moving on. Not moving forward. Not creating a better version of ourselves. Not living our utmost potential. Not even seeing what is Here, right now, in the present real-time moments of our everyday life. Who am I right here, right now - in this very moment in this very day? Isn’t what Is more important than what Was? I surely would argue for that.
We do this all the time to ourselves. In. Our. Own. Minds. We define ourselves by our past. We make what was and ‘Who I was’ waaaaay more important than ‘Who I am’ right now, in the present here moment. Be it in a negative or positive way. We do it. Period.
Stuck in self-definitions of the past
Stuck in positive self-definitions
Have a look: We either look back at times in our life where we were more disciplined, motivated, eager, had dreams, followed up on our dreams, were energetic and lived life much more than now. We then feel the positive energy of our memories of what once was. We get stuck in those past moments of who we once were. We start praising the positive past and our characteristics back then that we lived, but no longer do. Maybe now you are more lazy, lethargic, let yourself go. You sit most of the time in front of a TV, the computer and don’t move much. Maybe you don’t live or show much of discipline or eagerness anymore when it comes to living life and creating yourself, your world, your future. It’s mostly like we don’t even see what is here, right now in the present realtime moment. Who we are here, now, presently. Maybe we do, but surely we suppress it a lot - otherwise we’d have quite a different relationship to self-definition. We wouldn’t keep our self-definition stuck based on who we were in the past, but focus on continually creating and expanding our definition of ourselves. Always improving self. Always creating. We then end up likely not seeing that in the here present time we have the opportunity to once again create and live such things, such words as ourselves and in our life. We can create and live discipline, eagerness, joy, etc. again. It doesn’t have to stay in the past, of what we once were and were living.
Stuck in negative self-definitions
Then, we have the other opposite of that where we get stuck in defining ourselves based on negative memories, negative times of our life. Where maybe we have a personal history of depression, feeling powerless, being lazy, having given up on ourselves and on life, etc. We then tend to totally miss the here, the ‘Who I am’ in the present realtime moments of everyday life. We don’t even see that in the here present moment of everyday life we have the choice, ability and power to make a decision to change us, to forgive our past and the things we hold against ourselves that stunt our self-growth and don’t let us move forward in our life to create more of what we can be instead of only getting stuck in what we have been. So, we stay stuck in the self-definition of laziness, lethargy, depression, fear, anxiety, lack of motivation, self-judgement, seeing ourselves as unskilled in something, and so on. We continue living that limiting and compromising self-definition. Maybe I do have a history of showing lack of motivation, being depressed and afraid of thing in life, but Hey! I don’t need to continue existing in them! For, in every present here moment I have the ability, choice and power to make a stand inside me and change that. To take that decision inside me to draw a line, stating ‘Till Here No Further’ with this depression, fear and lack of motivation and instead see where and how I can create and live motivation in my life, where and how can I support me to release and change the fear and depression inside me and in my life.
What is Here is always more important
It doesn’t count what one WAS - but who one IS. The ‘was’ is past, it’s gone. Why do you bother with it so much? ‘Is’ is present, now, here. That’s your most current reflection of who you are. Not the past. Not the future. Always only the Here.
It shouldn’t be a prison sentence
Memories, the past should not serve as prison sentences for our self-definition. It should rather serve as learning lessons. As points of time recorded that we can revisit inside us and have a look at what happened, who was involved, all variables involved in that time period and moment, who I was and then see where and what we can learn from the memory, from that time in our life about ourselves. Learn where and how we can change, improve and expand ourselves in ‘Who I am’ and ‘What I accept and allow to exist in and as myself’. Creating a better self and life.
I was reminded by a friend that such information is simple to learn as knowledge and understanding but when it comes to actually applying and living it practically in ourselves and our lives: It is a complete different story. I found help and practical tools here in this free online course.
Thank you,
Unlock yourself from past self-definitions. What Is is far more important than what Was.
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Till then,
Steem-On,
Nebi :)