The World Needs You to Be You

The World Needs You to Be You

When you gaze into a wood or a meadow or a forest, you're taking in hundreds if not thousands of different grasses, bushes, plants and trees (not to mention the animals, birds and insects). Each tree, each stalk of grass, each bush is unique, its own expression of its nature.

The same goes for people, except we like to complicate things. We spend so much energy creating versions of who we know ourselves to be, masks that require unbelievable effort to upload and maintain. Not only can that be exhausting, these 'known' selves limit our experience of the world, as they shut us off from what is really here, now.

In truth, there's no one out there more you than you.

And there's a funny paradox. The more I surrender my sense of 'who' I know myself to be, the more me I am. My being is revealed in each moment, illuminated by the world around me, the people around me, the wind in the trees, the stream rushing past me, the cold air on my ungloved hand as i write this, all of it is part of who I am in this moment.

That process of surrender of my known self hasn't always been a gentle one  – sometimes it's felt more like wrestling an alligator. It has felt confusing – 'who am I now?' – but even the darkness and the confusion bring me more in connection with who I am in this moment.