Master the Art of Being Yourself

IN MY LIFETIME, I have read an immense number of self-help books, and I have come across the sensible advice again and again to "be yourself." It's the only way you're ever going to be happy, it's the only way you can really find your way in the world, it's more honest, it has more integrity, it will help you be more creative and successful, it will give you more energy, your relationships will work a lot better, and it will rid you of a lot of stress.

But I've never seen anywhere any instructions on how to be yourself. And if you and I were in a conversation, and I asked you to "be yourself," would you know what to do? What if I gave you ten thousand dollars if you could really be yourself for the next three hours? Would you know how to do it?

Do you know why it's so difficult to instruct someone in the art of being themselves? Because it's not something you can do with action. It's not something you can do by trying. It's not something you can do by restraining yourself. You can't do it with any effort.

In fact, if you are forcing yourself or restraining yourself, you are not being yourself. If you are trying, you are not being yourself. Even if you are trying to be yourself, you're not being yourself. And if you try harder, you're really not being yourself.

Being yourself is the absence of something, not the presence of something. It is the absence of forcing and restraining yourself. If you force yourself to smile when you don't feel like smiling, you're not being yourself. If you restrain yourself from crying when you feel like crying, you're not being yourself.

You are not being yourself if you're trying. Trying is forcing or restraining.

So how can you "be yourself?" You actually have to learn how. You've been urged, coerced, prodded, and punished for being yourself your whole life. The world has trained you to avoid being yourself, so it's not going to be easy. And yet, in many ways it's the easiest thing there is, because it is a total lack of trying.

So how do you learn? By catching yourself forcing yourself and restraining yourself. By noticing when you're trying. And then let it go. Be on the lookout for that feeling of forcing and the feeling of restraining. Tune yourself into that feeling. Watch for it. And when you notice yourself forcing or restraining yourself, ease up on the forcing or restraining.

It is a subtle process, but a very concrete one. The feeling of trying (forcing or restraining) is a specific, easily-identifiable feeling. Once you're got your reticular activator set for it, you'll begin to notice it happening all the time.

And when you notice it, resist the temptation to try. Resist your habitual urge to force yourself or restrain yourself.

Step by step you will become more and more "just yourself." You will become more natural, more at ease, more relaxed, more open, more honest. Your relationships will become a lot more enjoyable. Your whole life will become more enjoyable.

I'd like to add something to this rosy picture, however. There are places and times when it is not a good idea to be yourself. For example, you're at work, you work for customer service and a customer has just made you mad. It is a good idea in those circumstances to restrain yourself from doing what you want. Your employer is paying you to do a job. Forcing and restraining yourself is work, and in this case, it is one of the things you are paid to do.

You can work out the details for your own situations, but I wanted to point out that it is entirely fitting and appropriate to not be yourself in some situations. Figure out what those are and explore being yourself in every other area of your life.

So let me summarize. This is how you can follow the excellent advice to "be yourself:" Catch yourself trying. You can't "be yourself" by an act. Rather, you detect forcing and restraining and stop doing it. The feeling of forcing and restraining is the feeling of not being yourself.

You can't try to be yourself. As soon as you're trying, you're not yourself. Being yourself is not an effort. It can't by done by trying. And especially not by trying harder. It is more like resisting temptation. Remember that, and you're well on your way to learning how to be yourself.

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When You've Tried And Failed Again And Again And You Feel Like Giving Up Because You Think Your Goal Can Never Happen, Read This

PAUL ROKICH is my hero. When Paul was a boy growing up in Utah, he happened to live near an old copper smelter, and the sulfur dioxide that poured out of the refinery had made a desolate wasteland out of what used to be a beautiful forest.

When a young visitor one day looked at this wasteland and saw that there was nothing living there — no animals, no trees, no grass, no bushes, no birds...nothing but fourteen thousand acres of black and barren land that even smelled bad — well, this kid looked at the land and said, “This place is crummy.” Paul knocked him down. He felt insulted. But he looked around him and something happened inside him. He made a decision: Paul Rokich vowed that some day he would bring back the life to this land.

Many years later Paul was in the area, and he went to the smelter office. He asked if they had any plans to bring the trees back. The answer was “No.” He asked if they would let him try to bring the trees back. Again, the answer was “No.” They didn’t want him on their land. He realized he needed to be more knowledgeable before anyone would listen to him, so he went to college to study botany.

At the college he met a professor who was an expert in Utah’s ecology. Unfortunately, this expert told Paul that the wasteland he wanted to bring back was beyond hope. He was told that his goal was foolish because even if he planted trees, and even if they grew, the wind would only blow the seeds forty feet per year, and that’s all you’d get because there weren’t any birds or squirrels to spread the seeds, and the seeds from those trees would need another thirty years before they started producing seeds of their own. Therefore, it would take approximately twenty thousand years to revegetate that six-square-mile piece of earth. His teachers told him it would be a waste of his life to try to do it. It just couldn’t be done.

So he tried to go on with his life. He got a job operating heavy equipment, got married, and had some kids. But his dream would not die. He kept studying up on the subject, and he kept thinking about it. And then one night he got up and took some action. He did what he could with what he had. This was an important turning point. As Samuel Johnson wrote, “It is common to overlook what is near by keeping the eye fixed on something remote. In the same manner, present opportunities are neglected and attainable good is slighted by minds busied in extensive ranges.” Paul stopped busying his mind in extensive ranges and looked at what opportunities for attainable good were right in front of him. Under the cover of darkness, he sneaked out into the wasteland with a backpack full of seedlings and started planting. For seven hours he planted seedlings. He did it again a week later.

And every week, he made his secret journey into the wasteland and planted trees and shrubs and grass. But most of it died.

For fifteen years he did this. When a whole valley of his fir seedlings burned to the ground because of a careless sheep-herder, Paul broke down and wept. Then he got up and kept planting.

Freezing winds and blistering heat, landslides and floods and fires destroyed his work time and time again. But he kept planting. One night he found a highway crew had come and taken tons of dirt for a road grade, and all the plants he had painstakingly planted in that area were gone. But he just kept planting.

Week after week, year after year he kept at it, against the opinion of the authorities, against the trespassing laws, against the devastation of road crews, against the wind and rain and heat...even against plain common sense. He just kept planting.

Slowly, very slowly, things began to take root. Then gophers appeared. Then rabbits. Then porcupines.

The old copper smelter eventually gave him permission, and later, as times were changing and there was political pressure to clean up the environment, the company actually hired Paul to do what he was already doing, and they provided him with machinery and crews to work with. Progress accelerated. Now the place is fourteen thousand acres of trees and grass and bushes, rich with elk and eagles, and Paul Rokich has received almost every environmental award Utah has.

He says, “I thought that if I got this started, when I was dead and gone people would come and see it. I never thought I’d live to see it myself!”

It took him until his hair turned white, but he managed to keep that impossible vow he made to himself as a child.

What was it you wanted to do that you thought was impossible? Paul’s story sure gives a perspective on things, doesn’t it?

The way you get something accomplished in this world is to just keep planting. Just keep working. Just keep plugging away at it one day at a time for a long time, no matter who criticizes you, no matter how long it takes, no matter how many times you fall. Get back up again. And just keep planting.

This is a chapter from the book, Self-Help Stuff That Works.

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Put Yourself Out Of Your Misery

THE ANCIENT HINDUS used the same technique as modern cognitive science to end human misery. Want to know what it is?

There isn't much to it: Just give up desires. Of course, you can't possibly do that permanently, but you can do it right now. Ask yourself, "What do I want right now?" You almost always want something. And the state of wanting is a state of discontent.

Whatever you want right now, just give it up. Say to yourself, "I don't want that." Decide you don't want it.

Don't worry, it'll come back. But for right now, you'll gain yourself a peace-of-mind break. This is not difficult, and you can do it.

Notice what you want right now, and let it go. Give it up. Then notice what else you want and let that one go too. You'll notice a relaxing feeling of contentment come over you.

If you don't notice that contentment, and you want to feel it, give up that desire too.

Learn more about this: The How of Tao.

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