Learning to be yourself

It’s a little bit like playing dress up.

You try things out, see what works and feels most like you. You keep those things that feel best and put the rest aside.

People can end up going decades without knowing what it’s like to be themselves because their sense of self and what it means to be themselves has been determined by other people.

You might find that an aspect of yourself that seems to be so deeply ingrained in your personality and who you are, is actually just leftover residue from somebody else that you can clear up and move on from.

Sometimes learning to be yourself is as simple as returning to who you were as a child. But other times it’s a little more complex, it might require you to ask yourself questions and come up with answers, it might require trial and error or be a process of unlearning as you strip away all that you thought you were.

And the fun part is that being yourself isn’t rigid, it changes. It’s more about living your life without being so deeply dictated by the restrictions, thoughts and opinions of other people.