Aware of your awareness

© JKS 2020 Image used with permission.

Do you know what, you know? Are you aware of your awareness? Is there a way for you to see you and to know you much more than what somebody else tells you about yourself? Beyond the surface deep, within, core to who you are as a person in this world. Do you know what you know? Are you aware of your awareness? Are you in a place within you where you can see you?

This is not a cryptic message. It is blunt and to the point for you are responsible for you. Your actions, your thoughts, your way of being are within your control within who you be every single moment of every day. Yet in saying that there may be a perspective that some will impose on you of perfection. There may be an expectation shared with you either informally or formally. You will need to consider how you respond to that, how you choose to engage with that, be that, learn from that, whatever.

Imagine yourself as if you were naked, not in a perverted way, please don't go there. But just see yourself as completely free of anything describing who you are on the outside. Now, imagine that you have chosen to put your clothes on and you have chosen a certain way to look and appear to others. How many items of clothing did you choose to put on? What kind of clothing did you put on? How much did you put on? What is the nature of what you are wearing? Are you wearing clothes that you have had for a long time, or are you in a new outfit? What is your style? What is your impression that you give people as they come and they see you?

So keep taking this analogy and look at you as the unclothed, pure you, the original you before anything shapes and changes you to look like someone else. Then look at how you layer on top of that, the ways you present yourself in this world. This is like who we are on a spiritual level, on a soul level - when we describe who we are at the core of our essence, in this way of being who we are. It is the unmarked, unchanged and natural self. It is who we are before we prepare ourselves to engage with others.

Maybe this is too challenging an analogy for you because you do not want to imagine yourself ‘naked’. But for now, remember that at the most basic level, without clothing, how do you know, the difference between you and me other than shape and size? Not much. It's only when we add some extras to our appearance, that we define a bit more of who we are. And yes, hairstyle could come into that. Whether you paint your nails or not.

But let's look at the very basic aspect of this analogy. You have what you wear or not wear as an example of how we might layer ourself with ways to present and separate ourselves from others. One way of looking will be a signal to others that you fit into this group and not that group. That is just before you open your mouth. That is the way you look in your appearance, just the way you seem to somebody - a choice of expression of who you are. Now what happens in response to that is inside of our heads we will see that person with their clothing on and make a judgement. We will pass judgement based on how we see the other looking and assume a lot from that.

Already now you can see the exchange is happening in our head about judgement and sorting of people into place. Right?

Now let's go to another level and say, add language to it. Add expression to it. Add the words that you say or not say. Add how you choose to speak or not speak with others. What do you say? How do you speak? What do you share? What is the tone. What is the language? Do you engage with others in a way that is related to the way you dress or not? Are you adding another layer to who you are that perhaps increases the sorting out of who you are?

This presenting of you becomes a lifelong journey that is in parallel to who you are on the inside. That person you are on the inside is always evolving, growing, adapting and changing in a sense. If you are working on yourself then you are growing and expanding yourself. You are becoming more aware and more conscious of the person you are. Your expression externally will match that. Or it may not.

Inside you may be a completely different person than what others see on the outside. This is the example of transformation. For transformation often emerges inside out, not outside in. You could put an outfit on and pretend to be somebody that you are not. It would quickly come undone as people realised that you are not matching that presentation.

I will not go through the examples of that. You do not need that. It is self-evident. What is interesting though, is what goes on inside of you for you to present a certain way. What motivates you to say, 'Oh, I'm going to come out in the world and be this for now, because that is what I want to be.' What is it about that? Where is it coming from? That is worthwhile journey - to question and contemplate 'why am I presenting myself this way to others, when I'm actually feeling another way inside of me?'.

Pick an example of growing up. Imagine you are in your family and you were born in a family that may or may not seem to relate to the way you think. Or maybe you have changed and grown over time. How many of you have gone through change as you have grown into who you are and notice that you are different than perhaps your parents or other family members, or you are different than your siblings and so forth? Just see how that evolves.

Isn't that an interesting observation to note as well. Look back again at the internal side of you and see how that transpired. When did you notice the inside part of you saying, 'I don't know if that's who I am. I'm being told this is who I am, but I don't feel that inside of me.' That is transformation as well.

It starts a journey of discovery. It starts a journey of learning about yourself and awareness and awakening that is both exciting and scary at the same time. For when we begin to feel the difference within the disconnect between our internal and our outside or external, then we know we need to do something to bring that back into equilibrium. Often because it is a struggle, change and a challenge, we keep trying to impose the external on the internal and squash that. How many times in your life can you recall feeling inside of you a way that is desperate to be expressed that really wants to come out? Notice that. Many of us have.

Now think of a time in your life when you actually felt congruent with the person you are on the outside and the person you are on the inside. Look at the difference between the two stages. Was it something that you did overnight or did it change? There are lots of journeys that we go on. We come from stages in our life when we are completely free to ones where we are not free at all. And vice versa. Often as a child, we will be freer because we are not aware of the social constructs around us that create expectation. Then over time, some of those social constructs will begin to be made known by various people in our world, and then we adapt to those either unconsciously or consciously. Some of us will adapt in a compliant way and some will do that in a non-compliant way. If there is congruence, then we won't worry about it at all.

No matter what your situation is, what is interesting is that this journey of finding equilibrium within ourself and outside of ourself always continues as we grow and evolve. It can be in multiple ways. It can be in a sense of our role of who we are. It can be in a life stage as we age. It can be in a significant shift because of other events in the world that bring that up to our awareness. Multiple reasons exist for why we notice these incongruent times. The less we pay attention, the more it begins to get louder and louder. Or you will start to feel something uneasy within you. Or you will be in conversations with people where you're going 'this isn't right for me anymore, I can't do this. I can't be this person.'

With so many examples to explore let’s just pick one common experience - career or work. You will often join a company or an organisation in a role that suits exactly where you are at in your professional, personal, academic, skill, trade and development. You will be in a place which is commensurate to who you are in that point in life. You align with the other and you join up. Then you come together and there is this time where the external you is reflecting the internal you. Then over time, your internal may be developing at a different rate as the external. You may learn the skills on the job that keep you functioning in the capacity of doing your job. But inside maybe things shift within you, such as your values, interests or desires. There is a disconnect now. And as you experience that, you might feel that you can not tell other people because you are still learning for yourself.

But the disconnect will show up. It will show up in ways that are not obvious. At first, it might be where you have disagreements in ways things should be done. Or you might feel internal resentment for decisions made by others. You might make efforts to do work the way you feel it can be done in congruence with yourself, but encounter blocks, because it's not going down the way others want in the organisation. Over time if you are no longer congruent with the external you, the one you have been presenting at that job, you will get to a point where you need to make a decision about whether you adjust who you are to continue to stay in that place, or you go somewhere else. That is a discomforting unpleasant place to be. It is a knowing that change is inevitable or necessary. Then of course you also are encountering uncertainty. So what happens here again is this need to sense who you are, know who you are, be aware of who you are and really come together internally. Then what you do is express the evolved you externally.

It is a process, not a one day this then tomorrow that. It is a transformation and an expansion. It is a time-based shift, not a cataclysmic change, though sometimes triggering events may feel as such.

You see. The thread holding all of you together is your own awareness of you. The more you connect the more you are able to hold your whole self form within and be comfortable on the outside. Clarity to a sense of our self is iterative not an end in itself. So take this opportunity to look at yourself for real with inquisitiveness and curiosity. Then commit to the aspiration of being clearer and consistent in the way that is authentic to you. You will know when it is right. You will know when it is not quite there. Either way you will know because only you know the true whole you.