How many times in your life have you been in a position where you didn’t know what to do, which decision to make or how to handle a situation and someone told you to ‘Just be yourself!’? It is rightfully the most common advice /quote of our decade. But just like many things it is more easily said than done. First of all what exactly does it mean to ‘Just be yourself?’ How do you reach that point in your life where you know exactly who you are and make that the means that will help you see the manifestation of your dreams right before your own eyes? It all starts with a decision. The decision to take the first step of a long, revealing, amazing and ultimately most rewarding journey. The journey of self-realisation. And it may be a very personal journey but it will affect all the dimensions and relationships of your life. Most importantly the relationship you have with yourself and the one you share with others. Be yourself for yourself! To be yourself is to have your own, unique, strong, independent voice regardless of all conditions and criteria. To be able to have reached the core of your personality as a human being; to have identified your fundamental needs, desires, strengths, weaknesses and express them to the world. To be yourself is to not feel shame or any kind of inferiority due to your gender, beliefs, race, sexual orientation, social or financial background. To be yourself is not being defined by the above rather than rightfully claiming and finding your place in the society. Most importantly it is the feeling that you deserve to be loved because of and for all these reasons.

After all, why do you ever do anything if not for love? Because receiving and sharing love equals happiness; and happy people function well, happy people offer, happy people understand that they need to take care of themselves in order to be able to take care of others, happy people care about the well-being of the human race, the animals and the environment. Happy people evolve and aspire for the whole world to evolve because they embrace change. Happy people don’t envy, don’t greed. They are simply free. When you know who you are, you accept the world and it’s beings. Genuine acceptance is something that naturally occurs when you let others be ; not to be confused with loud declarations about tolerance feeding your personal self-image or ego in order to feel superior. When you know who you are you embrace all aspects of yourself . Not only your happy-go-lucky side but also your darkness and vulnerability. You observe yourself as a whole and do not try to numb any of the feelings because this only results is suppressed negative feelings, fear and desensitization. You are a whole and you allow yourself to experience and observe all the human feelings in the spectrum. This is what makes you feel the most alive. I mentioned a word earlier, vulnerability. If only more people understood the value and power of vulnerability. To be vulnerable is to feel uncertainty and to be emotionally exposed. I bet the second one hits a nerve. But think about it. No courageous act would have ever been possible if it hadn’t been for vulnerability. To be vulnerable takes a lot of courage and ultimately makes us braver. The only things that are holding us back is fear and shame. Fear and shame that we will fail. And if we try and fail we won’t be able to say that we weren’t even trying; that’s why many people choose not to try at all. We make a choice every day. We can choose to stay hidden and unheard in our comfort zone or to be vulnerable and open to wonderful things by showing our vulnerable, perfectly human side. Finally, to be yourself is realizing that happiness is related to who you are and not what you own. Overconsumption, social media, and fashion trends tend to blur our self-image and make us go after things that we think we need. To know yourself is to be able to say confidently: I am… I want… I love... Be yourself and others Let’s assume that you have reached the core of yourself and have mastered a level of self acknowledgement, you feel self-assured, confident, you know what makes you happy and what not. This does not make it necessary for other people to share that same level as you. In fact they may have not even started their own journey of self discovery yet, making the communication between you two difficult. Mind that this does not make either one of you right or wrong. People, often times, will struggle to understand you, and that is if you are lucky. You might be considered light headed for living on a pink cloud or selfish for caring only for yourself. Even people commited to discover themselves sometimes may not be able to coexist because they are working towards very different visions and images of the world and themselves. If both of you share values such as kindness and genuity then you will most probably share a beautiful connection but at any point when arguments occur you need to be able to identify and understand that the other person’s views come from their own background, experiences and understanding of themselves. How we understand ourselves defines how we understand the world. Often times this gap between two people can cause break of communication, confusion, disappointment and discouragement. What is often left is the torturing question ‘What am I doing wrong?’. I have news for you, you may be doing nothing wrong. You may be doing everything right. You may be kind, genuine, honest and ready to take the next step in your life. Now, wouldn’t it be easier for someone to take that step with you if they were standing next to you and not a few miles back? Think how strenuous and unsure their leap would be for them. Will I make it? Will I disappoint? I don’t want to disappoint. Only if I were on their level. Are only some of the thoughts crossing their mind. Such a situation can be stressful for the self assured person as well. Especially when you can see and most importantly feel the connection with them. That person will also experience feelings of self doubt. It is important to highlight as I just said that this effect is possible when feelings exist towards that person, friend or partner, otherwise if it were simply some acquaintance, their opinion would be of little or no importance. But a person of true interest can even make someone doubt their path and assets. After all, love is the strongest power. It beats both fear and logic. When you find yourself in the heat of the moment and too emotionally involved you feel powerless. As if you have lost all control. Well, it is ok if you feel like that. As long as you recognize the situation and yourself in the situation then you just need to give it some time. Time to remember what a long way you have come, what personal struggles you have overcome to stand where you are and how proud of yourself you are. Once you are reminded of all that, you will re-evaluate your position and regain control of yourself. What I am saying is that we can perfectly live with people from all walks of life regardless of what level of self-acknowledgement they are on as long as you share the same values. However, this may not always be the case. Sometimes you will not be able to share the same vision of life with someone and this, too, is ok. You will lose a few people who will not understand you or your way of thinking. Communication may be hard and no matter how close to them you feel, coexistence will feel impossible. This is no reason to feel discouraged or doubt about your own path. Because your path is a path free of guilt and shame, a path of assurance and handmade happiness. If you are loyal to yourself and beliefs then you will always be the receiver of the biggest reward ever known to humanity, inner peace.