“The privilege of a lifetime is being who you are.” Joseph Campbell
This one is dedicated to all of us who have struggled to fit in, who’ve tried to be someone we thought would be accepted, to all of us who have struggled with identity.
“Why fit in when you were born to stand out!” Dr. Seuss
You are unique. Like no one else. You have an innate, singular advantage for being exactly who you were born to be, and while the rest of the world is trying to look, talk, and act like someone else, you are free to be the one who stands out from the crowd of imposters.
When people realize this, they can lay down the act of being inauthentic and begin to embrace who they were born to be.
There’s a common idea in acting. You must prepare, prepare, prepare, and be willing to throw it all away. This means prepare for your scene until you can rehearse it in your sleep, and when you arrive on set to film, be ready to throw it all away and become the character, or a piece of the ensemble, that’s being co-created with the rest of the team.
Why? To tell the truth. A good storyteller should have a primary aim of telling the truth. But why? Because phonies are easily spotted.
The truly authentic person asks the most important question, life’s sine qua non, “Who am I?”
And then finds a way to answer that question.
This means learning to be okay with who you are. It means being courageous enough to turn away from what everyone else is doing, saying, thinking, and embracing the truest version of yourself.
When we think about who we are, what do we gravitate toward? Sameness or uniqueness?
When we spend our life trying to fit in, we shackle our creativity, our unique perspective, and most importantly, our uniqueness, which is our offering to the world.
That artist, or actor, or singer, who you admire because of that ‘thing’ you can’t quite put your finger on, but you know exists, that’s their true self. Ask yourself, “What are they doing?” I would suggest they are throwing it all away and being who they are.
This is impossible to do when worried about what everyone else might think.
So today, begin to embrace ‘you.’ There’s freedom in it. There’s joy, too. But more importantly, you have something the world needs: a gift or talent or way of thinking.
Use that thing only you can offer to add a little bit more light to the world.
And remember, the privilege of a lifetime is being who you are.
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