What will you give up to be liked? Will you give up your integrity? Will you compromise your values to be accepted? Will you ignore your inner voice to fit someone else’s mold? Well let me be the first to tell you… none of that will work. I’ve had my share of fake identities that I wore around different people, but they never held up for long. Somewhere along the way, they would crumble and prove to be ineffective. I’ve assumed so many personas to be liked, but they never benefited me in the end. To be honest, they left me feeling more incomplete than before. I still was not comfortable in my own skin. So, what’s the meaning of all this? Trying to be something you are not will never give you the results that you truly desire.
See, I’ve learned that every time you disguise yourself as something not true to you, you will always fail. It may not necessarily be a visible failure to the people around you, but it can be experienced as an inner dissatisfaction. Like trying to fill a void but in the end digging an even deeper hole. Trust me, your heart knows when you are not being true to yourself. You may be able to lie to everyone around you, and even to yourself, but your heart sees through the lies. Your heart is very much aware of the masks that you put on to be accepted. You cannot fool your heart into believing your tricks. It knows. And in many cases, your heart will bring you opportunities to see the instability of your behavior. Now before you get afraid and picture your heart as a villain that is out to expose you, let me say this… when it has to break you down and allow you to experience pain, it is in an effort to teach you a greater lesson.
The lesson that imitating someone else is not your job. Becoming what other people like is not your job. Suppressing your deepest aspirations to fit in is not, your, job. But it is to love and accept yourself as you are, and to recognize the unique gift that you bring to the world. And whenever you do compromise your true identity, your heart will give you chance after chance to correct your behavior. See, your heart loves you enough to show you when you are being fake. And the chances you get to redirect your path may not always feel good. Being dumped by the partner you thought the world of might not feel good, but what if it was to show you that they fell in love with a false persona that you put on, and not really with you? Having your best friend betray you and gossip behind your back may not seem like a lesson that you need to learn from, but what if it was to show you that the person they were attracted to wasn’t you in the first place? You have to stop acting like something you are not, because when you do finally start being yourself, you might find out that the people you surround yourself with aren’t really for you.
Nevertheless, you can stand confident in the knowing that you are who you are for a reason, and you are not to be taken for granted. Want to know something else? Your heart will remain in your corner for as long as you live. The amazing thing about your heart is that it will keep it real with you even when you are not keeping it real with yourself. You’ll always get that nudge that you are making a mistake, or that you’d be better off not associating with a certain person. While we may not listen to its messages, it is always speaking. Our intellect thinks it knows everything, but that is so far from the truth! There are things that your heart knows about that your intellect can’t even begin to conceive! But what does this all mean? Why does it matter that your heart is talking to you? Because it knows who you really are. It knows what you really want. And it actually knows how to get you exactly where you want to be. But if you are too busy suppressing your emotions, you will not hear it. If you are so caught up in the opinions of others, your heart’s message can be distorted.
You have to stop abandoning yourself in order to truly connect with your heart. You have to love yourself as a person, and honor the fact that you are different. You have to ignore the negative perceptions that other people have of you, and choose to see yourself as your heart does. And how does it see you? As the divine creation that you really are. Honestly, your heart is just begging for you to be yourself. It is waiting for you to realize the power that only you hold. It is waiting for you to stop compromising yourself to please others. Only then can it lend to you the endless wisdom that it holds. Only when you start to love and express your true self can it take you where you are meant to be. Until then, be prepared for the disappointments that come along with being fake. You cannot expect others to be real with you if you are not real with yourself. There is a treasure in you, waiting to be discovered, but you have to be willing to shed the lies first. And that requires you to be you.