You Are What You Believe You Are

Originally published September 21, 2015

“You are what you believe you are. Your thoughts create your reality.” We’ve all heard or read this by now. But it takes a certain willingness or environment for me to honestly examine what this mind of mine is producing. The looking part is essential or phrases like those can quickly become cliche.

What DO I believe about myself, about my world, about other people, about God? Why am I here? Who am I? Have you ever stopped long enough to ask yourself “Who am I?” It’s so easy to assume I know who I am, because I live in this body with myself and think these thoughts. I am… me. But who is me? What makes me up and why is that important to know?

I recently read an article about Jennifer Lopez and she was describing (I’m paraphrasing) her “stop” moment. After three marriages, numerous boyfriends and becoming a superstar she said she needed to stop and look. What she found was that she was terrified to be alone, but what she also found was she didn’t know who she was. She said something along the lines of, “After I put my kids to sleep and wasn’t working, I didn’t know what to do with ‘myself.’ What do I like? What do I value? Who am I?”

There it is again: WHO AM I??? This question is essentially, at some level, chasing all of us. I can get another husband or another career or another house or more money or… to fill the space, but as the Buddha taught, if there isn’t peace inside my heart, the wheel of chasing these things will keep me spinning. Buddha named this samsara: the wheel of suffering.

The Awareness Institute offers a space, an environment, to examine “Who is ‘me’?” To step back from all of my conditioning and patterning structures and see who’s home. Who’s steering this ship? I get to stop and look deeply into how I’m living my life. And for “me” and my life, it’s gotten a lot more real, honest, present and loving.

Annie

Annie is a team volunteer for the Awareness Institute.