Understanding Who I Am, Now

If ever there was a phoenix out of the ashes story—the last three years of my life have been just that: a burning, ashes, and a vibrant. rebirth. I suppose I’ve made some semblance of peace over my past because I have no desire to comb through it, I am much more interested in discovering who I am being and becoming right now in real time.

A bit of honesty? well first…it would be good for me to describe something that I explain to clients all the time which is the I am vs. Anything that can come after… e.g. I am | A Woman, or I am | A Father. The roles, relationships and responsibilities that form our identities are all ego self. We think these things are who we are because some of them, like race or gender or sexuality, are so salient (at the forefront) that we cannot imagine ourselves separate from it. However, most and arguably all of those identities can be taken away. The fragility of them is what causes our ego to be in constant management of how to protect them and keep them safe because the ego, falsely, believes that those things, those identities, and thus itself—the ego—is the entirety of our beings.

By contrast…

I am—the divinity that dwells within us as us? Is who we truly are. It is the part that Knows. It is the part that you might know as intuition, your “gut” feelings. It is the part that is the same as everyone, in that, all possibilities lie within it. I am, I like to joke, does not argue and go back and forth with you, I am is the “Okay, girl.” I am is sure and certain. When people say “I See You” they speak to seeing your I am, seeing past all the things that bind you to the material world and instead seeing the reverent sacredness of your very existence.

I discovered my I am when I lost all the things I believed I was. I had a full time job with one of the best university systems in the world before I graduated. I had to leave that job. I worked at a highly grant funded and thus high profile leadership center at a liberal arts college. I had to leave that job. I was a 30 something with a PhD working for $11/hour part time and in debt to nearly everyone around me. It felt like in the course of 365 days I lost my financial independence. My professional identity. Not to mention much of the catalyst for my those losses was, a need that I felt to be there in a specific way for my family while my dad was sick and dying. On the other side of it, now, I have absolutely no regrets but I don’t think I was some martyr. I actually find myself deeply grateful to have lost so many of the things I thought mattered at a time when I was learning what actually does.

I have honestly never been at such a place of peace with who I am. Even in my moments of anxiety and panic, which are still present, or in new moments of intense grief—an emotion I’m still learning how to process and move through—I find myself surrendering. I find myself asking for what I need and honoring those needs as fully as I can. I find myself out from under the weight of shame around so many more things than before.

Further—

I find myself leaning into the work of intentionally dismantling shame and shaming behaviors that I’ve internalized. It has been absolutely revolutionary to love yourself gracefully and without condition. Without pretense or exception. Not just parts of the day in good light, but all day no matter what. It is powerful to put a smile on your own face. Do you know how good that feels? I hope you do.

Before, I would be so caught up in the story. See, the ego self makes up narratives that fit the world we need to believe exists so that we continue to make sense in the ways in which we’ve constructed ourselves. That sentence was a lot, but every word was intentional so read it again if you need to. The ego says, I am all these things, and the world is like this, and because the world is like this and I am all these things, this is right and logical. But as soon as either the world changes or an identity changes, the ego begins to grapple for a narrative to make sense of it all. Because our world sells sense of self everyday through products, we outsource the work of finding new equilibrium in an attempt, again, to find logic or not even logic but more like a true north.

Meanwhile the I am just waits for the ego to exhaust itself enough to trust it. Because the I am knows, even when the world changes and even when I change, I am. When I am in pain, when the world brings pain to my doorstep, I am. When I can’t understand how I am going to make it to my next paycheck, I am. I am is breath. It is that thing that so many search for in meditation; that switch of surrender to allow the deepest flowing of truth that there is, I am that I am.

When I can access my breath and allow it to fill me and flow through me fully? I am. And you know what taught me that? Having a fucking panic attack. Over and over and over again. And having a therapist ask me, “what do you think your anxiety is trying to tell you?” I’d never considered that my body was attempting to communicate with me, but of course it was, as it is always. Since then, it was like the gates opened for me to begin exploring the conversations between my body and mind, mind and spirit and truthfully, body and spirit as well.

I give myself permission to be both sure and in progress

I give myself permission to be curious

I also give myself permission to Know

Most of all though, I give myself permission to be surprised

There is nothing like being knocked off balance to teach you everything you need to know about your Self and your life. I could not and would have never predicted the last three years of my life. But they gave me everything I needed to be able to live in my Now and I know that moving forward, I’ll find that I never lost anything. And that everything I will be, I am.