Who are you?

“Well, figure it out, then just be yourself.”

This is the most annoying advice anyone struggling with their brand can get.

What if I told you that finding YOU doesn’t matter and that focusing on YOU is the last thing you need to do right now.

Throw it all out the window.

Focusing on the YOU that is made up of your past will never get you to where you want to be in life or business. You’re not there yet because there are parts of that old YOU that leave you stuck.

YOU is made up of things that aren’t you – right now. As Don Miguel Ruiz says in his book Four Agreements, “You didn’t choose your religion or your moral values, they were chosen for you before you were born.” This means your parents’ beliefs, your culture’s beliefs, and the media chose the YOU you are today. There are thousands of voices in your head telling you what to do and how to be.

Who you are is complex; it’s made up of millions of influences and agreements you made with yourself so that you could  get your basic needs and be accepted. Most of us have sold our souls to be loved and to fit in with society.

Even as we grew up, we forgot to let go of other people’s agendas.  We never really realized we had a choice. Most of the world is driven by fake values. They’re all around you and you may not even have noticed. Those fake beliefs “bind and blind us,” as author and social psychologist Jonathan Haidt says.

To liberate yourself so you can be the real YOU, you need to wipe the slate clean. Like an artist who paints on a blank canvas, who do you want to paint?

It’s liberating, but change is also hard. Deep inside, we all want this freedom—this self built by ourselves, but somehow we revert back to the old US. The YOU you’re used to feels safe. You’re hard wired with an operating system that seems to hold you back from where you’re meant to go.

Fake it until you are it.

 Act the part, talk the talk, until it becomes you. Let your body take over. If you ever want a big change to last, you have to fake the change until it becomes natural, a part of your everyday life.

Yes, I said fake it. But does that mean I’m not authentic? And that you shouldn’t be authentic?

Most people confuse authenticity with transparency. If I were completely transparent all the time, I’d say some pretty irrational and offensive things. Just think about what goes through your mind sometimes!

The kind of authenticity that people are looking for is your presence. It’s showing someone respect by being completely present in their words because they are worth your full attention.

The word “authentic” comes from the root word author. So authenticity according to its Latin root means to author your own path. To me, that means to create something new and forge your own path.  Are you the author of your own destiny?

The best way to be the master of your own success is to evolve to the Future You. If you delete all of your past programming, who will you be? How will your story unfold?

You may agree with all the beliefs that have been passed down to you.  That’s great. You may also have an opportunity to discover new beliefs and new ways of being.

My mission is to help people live a life in alignment with their soul’s purpose so they don’t wake up one day realizing they’ve lived their life on auto-pilot – a life based on someone else’s set of values.

Looking at your core values gives you a glimpse into your soul. Your soul’s purpose is to live in alignment with those values.

  • What are the values that drive your actions?
  • How do those values compare with the values you admire?
  • Does your life reflect what you believe in?

At the end of life, people remember how they felt along the way, not what they said or did in life. How do you make people feel? Your soul’s purpose is to give people a fantastic, positive moment-to-moment experience in your presence.

Work backwards from the future until the presence you want becomes you.