When you don’t feel equal, when you don’t feel safe, it’s easy to hide your feelings, to hide behind a veneer and play a role that’s not who you really are. You might for example play small…or… self important. You might play the role of being a caretaker, someone who wants to control, someone who is a know-it-all, an entertainer, a maverick, the list is endless. You create an identity because you want to look a certain way, it’s what you want to become, and its a way of telling yourself that you deserve a certain way of life. It’s your protection…and your prison.
When you don’t feel equal, that’s when you become critical; and being critical is a trait most of us have to some extent. The downside of being critical is the tendency to take things at face value and sometimes to make up a story about people and situations. It can limit your capacity to understand people and be open to new ideas, you convince yourself you know best. There’s not a lot of joy in criticism.
It becomes a positive trait when you look more deeply, when you learn to evaluate and be discerning and see the significance…that each of us is born equal, sometimes not in equal circumstances. Life isn’t fair, we’re all in it together, it’s what you make of it, and every setback, failure, disappointment carries invaluable lessons. The opportunity is to accept and find peace … and compassion…to value others.
Any identity you create allows you to experience different ways of being; the lesson is to let go of them all, to be yourself, and when you do the wonderful thing is you let go of judgement.
Imagine if…we create a world of joy, a world free from judgement?