Today’s Brilliance from Kim Bady

One of the most fundamental questions we’ve all asked at some time in our lives is: who am I?

Unfortunately, so often we look on the outside to find the answer and our self definition, instead of within. The problem with this is that life will inevitably change. Then we are back to the same question: who am I?

With changes in our economy, many people have been asking this big question. Some have had to change careers, some have lost homes, and some have found themselves in a desperate financial crisis. If we define ourselves in terms of what we have, our degrees, our social status and how much money we have in the bank, we are not only devastated with transition, we also lose a sense of self.

So how do we discover who we truly are?

In order to discover who we are, we must remove all the layers and the labels of things that we use to define us. This is done by understanding who we are not. We are not our jobs, our education, our marital status, our money, or our lack of money for that matter.

For the mother who defines herself as mom, what happens to her when the child gets older and the relationship changes from hands on nurturing to hands off nurturing? Does she still matter? Is she still useful? What about the retiree who has left a job that gave him significance and meaning, who is he now?

And what about the person like me, going through a divorce and downsizing from a beautiful, palatial home, to a two bedroom apartment that was the size of my master bedroom suite. Who am I now?

The person who has been unable to find work in their field and has to temporarily work in a fast food restaurant to make ends meet for their family should realize this situation doesn’t define them.

So as we peel back the layers of rich, poor, gender, race, employment status, education, etc., and we understand that these things don’t define us, we can start to get a glimpse of who we truly are. It is then that we start to connect with our Authentic Essence, the place inside that has absolutely nothing to do with what we do for a living, how we wear our hair, or what we have or don’t have. The more you are identified with your authentic essence, the less you will be identified with form and the false self that we create for the sake of our image.

Our authentic essence is our Spirit nature, our Divine nature. We are more than what meets the eye and if we don’t know this or if we choose not to live from this place, then we will always find ourselves miserable when life disappoints us. But when you live from Spirit you are not moved, because not only have you discovered your Authentic Self, you’ve discovered God, for He is within.