Monday Mindfulness Minute: Whose Story Are You Trying to Live?

"Be yourself; everybody else is already taken." -Oscar Wilde

What does it mean to live your own story? How would one achieve that in a world where we crave and depend on belonging to a group for our identity and survival?

When we consider the stories that the history books remember — those of bravery over fear, courage over doubt, and innovation over stagnation — one aspect remains consistent: they lived a life of their own. Sure, they stood on the shoulders of those who came before, and worked together with others, but their greatness was found in their courage to live their unique story.

Martin Luther King Jr. was one of those brave souls whose story continues to echo and percolate long after his final words from the pulpit. In his last sermon before he was assassinated, he taught that we must redefine our definition of greatness and mature beyond the simple definition of greatness as merely acquiring what society deems necessary for happiness. As MLK Jr. said in his speech when talking of Jesus, "He did none of the usual things that the world associates with greatness. He had no credentials but himself."

So what are credentials? They are a system of identification that must be approved by someone else to gain entry or acceptance. The room we spend our days laboring to enter is one where society is the boucer and says we can only enter if we have x, if we do y, or if we hang out with z.

I had these exact credentials at one time in my life and entered "the room" that society is selling us as a panacea for our suffering. Unfortunately, as you likely have discovered, it doesn't contain the happiness and fulfillment that society claims. It's a stale room filled with artificial replicas of life. It's sort of like being crammed in an overcrowded waiting room, picture the DMV, filled with others who are also waiting to start living.

This type of replica and artificial life is exactly what the baker lived in The Alchemist. The baker was someone who loved to travel from an early age and wanted more than anything to see the world. Instead of following his dreams and living his unique path, he prioritized a life of stability, and the daily grind of owning his bakery drowned any opportunity for him to realize his "personal legend." Unfortunately, and as the wise old man in The Alchemist recounted, "In the long run, what people think about shepards and bakers becomes more important for them than their own personal legends."

This exact reason, caring what other people think and trying to get a credential from them so we can start living, is why it feels like a piece of us is always missing. The piece that is missing is us. Our unique, 1 of 8.2 billion life. As Carl Jung said, "The privilege of a lifetime is to become who you truly are."

One way to start living our own story is by adopting the advice that Rick Ruben gives to the musical artists he advises: "the audience comes last." I'm sure we can count the many ways each day we put the audience, society, and what everyone thinks first. Can we remember a time we have put them anywhere but first?

What would our life be if we stopped putting the thoughts of others before our deepest desires and beliefs? It would be our own life. A unique and fantastic life filled with its own set of twists and turns. But it would be completely yours. Once we realize we've had the credentials to enter our own life all along, we can enter our own story, and there we will find adventure, peace, and fulfillment.