I often looked at an authentic version of me as a person fixed, fixed in the past or fixed in the future, this I now believe to be totally wrong way to think about myself or indeed anyone else.

Being fixed in a mould so to speak, means we don’t adapt.  Yet I have adapted and still, I am just as authentic today as I was yesterday or fifty years ago.  I have grown, adapted and changed to life, society, my age, and circumstances you name it.  I am the one that pigeonholes me tightly into one spot, mainly due to the fact that I am afraid, afraid of how I am perceived by other people.  Will they like me, will I meet their needs, will I be rejected again just as was when I was given up for adoption?

I had no choice as a baby but to get on with it, I stopped being the baby I was gestated to be and started becoming the child I grew up to be. I didn’t change the authentic version of me it was simply an adaptation.  Besides all that just because I may once have been destined to remain with my birth mother, then my whole life took a different path it  doesn’t mean I am any less of the me I should have been if my start had been different.

I suppose we clutch on to the positive views we have of ourselves from the past, when I was this old I did this and I was successful, when I looked this way I was more attractive, etc etc.  The simple truth is that’s recycling the past and trying to dovetail it into the present or the future.  I once wasn’t toilet trained but much more cute when I was a few months old, but that version of me can’t live like I do today.  Similarly me from the mid 80’s couldn’t even get close to living in this life in the 2020’s, I didn’t have the skills then that I have today or even the concept that I needed the skills at all.

The trouble is I think is simply my fear of rejection above all else drives me to sit stock ridged clutching on to the fragments of a version of me I have remembered from the past. A version of me I have conjured up from the good bits whilst neglecting the bad.

Bare naked courage.

I have often said that I am more confident and comfortable about myself when I am naked, I know that some people are the total opposite.  For me though being naked I cannot be questioned, its obvious I am a natal male with a penis, a have a bust just like some females, in addition, I also have a male pattern bald head, go figure.   I see it, I get it, I have context as to how I got where I was.  My shoulders are broad because of the swimming I did and many hours of javelin training, not to mention pole vault, my legs and butt strong because of the sprinting and rugby league I played, I still carry scars from my past and yet my body is slowly degrading as age takes its toll.  Irrespective I accept it, more the point I accept the skills I have learned have become more finely tuned more proficient as I have learned, I can type, write, design, do woodwork you name it I have adapted so many times.

Do I stop being the me I see when I am naked or if I wear a dress or monkey suit?

It takes courage to be authentically you

I am learning as the many many years on this journey roll on that to be the authentic version of you takes courage, courage that many simply do not have the time or guts to muster.  It’s the courage to do stuff simply because it resonates with you.  I have often used the word congruent and the two words go hand in glove almost, doing things, being the person you are naturally resonates not only with you as the person you present but as the person you are.  So many people today wear a mask to present to the world, a mask of the brands they wear, the car they drive the job they do, a mask that protects them from people actually seeing the soul deep inside.  The soul that is vulnerable, the child within each us, as life entwines around innocent vulnerability to be replaced by cynical masks that fit only who we want to be perceived as, maybe that’s why people escape into drink and drugs.

But sit as I have sat for many hours and listen deeply to yourself with what resonates with you really, often the things we did when we were younger are the things that resonate with us today.  The things that gave you that sense of flow when time simply flew by, when you and your soul resonated with the activity we were doing.  It comes as no surprise to me in this day and age of Instagram etc that people seem to be suffering more from mental health problems than ever before, psychiatrist apportion this and that syndrome or otherwise.  I question though isn’t it just a case of people being lost and lacking harmony with their true soul.

The vulnerable person is still you, is still me, it’s the root of where we started the root of how we grew to be the person we are today, our child-like self matters more than we know.  It takes courage to listen enough to what truly resonates with your soul, it takes courage to live as a more authentic version of you.

Steps forward …

I realise now that many of us live for other people more than we know, tow the line out of fear, fit in because it feels better than fitting out, becoming a reflection of the things we see around us each and every second, swept up in a maelstrom of imagery, marketing, sales and opinions.  In more ways than one it’s second only to banging on a piano trying to get a sonnata out of it, it won’t ever work.

To be authentically ourselves we need to learn, listen and hear if what we do truly resonates with our soul.  It’s greater than who we are, deeper than gender, sexuality, job, friends, even family, just as you learn to play the piano one key at a time, it takes practice to keep listening to be mindful of the harmony, if its flat or sharp, if it truly resonates with you.

Each and every one of us have the capacity to create our own unique sonatta be our own great musician of ourself, each and everyone one of us playing a unique tune a unique way to a unique tempo.  I hope there are enough of us human beings on the planet that one day we will hear the tune of others than harmonises with ourselves.  If we don’t then at least we know we are making sweet resonante soulful music based on our one and only life on earth.