Transcending Authority: Writing Your Autobiography of Right Now..

I have to remind myself to look up from my book once in a while, to make sure I don't miss my stop. From page one this book got my full attention. On the cover is a quote by Julia Roberts that reads: "It's what I'm giving to all my girlfriends". My sentiments exactly! I only just started reading "Eat, Pray, Love" by Elizabeth Gilbert, but on my commute to work I've already invoked envy on the faces of fellow travellers while I'm reading with a wide-smiled grin on mine. From the corner of my eyes I've seen other women secretly trying to steal a glance at the cover. It has always puzzled me somewhat that we're not "allowed" to be openly curious about a book someone's reading and obviously enjoying when we're commuting. As soon as you look up, people tend to look away. Strange, huh?! But that's another topic altogether. Or is it? I'll let you decide for yourself...

Elizabeth Gilbert writes about her journey - one woman's search for everything. Even though at the age of 31 she had "everything" in the conventional sense of the word - a house, a husband and  trying for a baby - she still cries out when she's hiding out her bathroom at night. Alone in her struggle, it takes a long and painful time to come to terms with her truth. The truth is that she doesn't want all this. Though she doesn't know what it is that she does want. And that's just it: like so many of us, she's been consumed with living the "everything" she learnt to want, that she finds it extremely difficult to figure out what it is that she really wants for herself.

"The greatest danger, that of losing one's own self, may pass off quietly as if it were nothing; every other loss, that of an arm, a leg, five dollars, a wife, etc., is sure to be noticed" -  Soren Kierkegaard

Elizabeth Gilbert is certainly not alone in this, which is probably one of the reasons why her book is a bestseller. Our society just doesn't teach us how to figure out what we truly want. It doesn't teach us how to actualise our unique potentials. Instead, we grow up adhering to rules, regulations. The belief systems, the norms and the values of generations that came before us become our own invisible matrix. We too will eventually start living and putting forth the truths instilled in our culture, without really questioning their logic.

So how come our self passes off quietly, as if it were nothing? Simply because we haven't been taught how to listen to it! It hasn't been given strong and compelling enough meaning. At least not as strong as following convention, and looking to others for approval. I'm sure you can remember what it was like in primary and secondary school. Fitting in meant wearing the right clothes, hanging with the right crowd, and behaving in a certain way. The focus being on belonging to a particular group, being seen, feeling validated. After all, who wants to be an outcast?  

If we want to own our own choices and decisions, we will need to say goodbye to old ideas and belief systems that have been our invisible friends for the longest time. Paving your own path, rather than the many travelled and safe one, comes with its challenges, though. In fact, if you want to self actualise and live your highest potentials, perhaps one of the biggest challenges you face is to own your own authority and transcend conventionality.

Transcending all things conventional is scary. One of the deficiency needs of Maslow's pyramid of self actualisation is the need to belong, to be loved. And isn't conformity the way we have all learnt to fulfil that need? If we don't conform, we risk walking alone. If we're not ok with this "aloneness", we'll only be able to unleash our potentials to the extent that it still conforms to what we believe is expected of us.

Owning your own authority might sometimes mean disappointing loved ones who have certain expectations of us. That means letting go of the responsibility we feel for them and taking on responsibility for our own needs. It also means that at times, we will not "belong" to others in a conventional way. And we might no longer be able to act in line with the roles others have ascribed to us. Our environment, the people around us, could label this as "ego-centric", "selfish", or "individualistic" - because that's what it might look like to those who want you to conform and "do the sensible and right thing".

"They must find it difficult... Those who have taken authority as the truth, rather than the truth as the authority." - Gerald Massey

Developmentally we start out with an external locus of control, meaning that we look to others for knowing how to behave and respond. Yet as we grow into adulthood, that external locus of control should somehow be brought inside so we can determine our own path in life. This is what Elizabeth Gilbert had to do. She had to accept and own her truth, be her own authority. And like her, I have had to learn that myself as well. This has definitely not been an easy process. It has actually been a bumpy ride, in which I've stumbled and fallen quite a few times before I finally got some clarity (and clarity still being a relative concept here).

In my ongoing quest to unleash my highest potentials, I went to a training on self actualisation last December. My focus was to unlearn "being dominated by others" (you can tell from the language that I didn't fully own my authority!). Over the course of three days I explored and discovered the layers of meanings that held my submissive behaviour in place. At one point I heard myself saying: "I don't want to be dominated any longer." That was my first truth.

As I then climbed the layers of my more unconscious truths about this, something happened that left me surprised and had me internally responding with "whoops!". Because if I want to own my own powers and to be fully responsible for myself, it occurred to me that I had to stop controlling others as well.  And all of a sudden I found myself confessing that I had been trying to control and dominate others as much as the other way around! Aahhh, doesn't that just make you smile?

The thing is, there wasn't a big difference between the submissive or the authoritative. Two sides of the same coin. In both cases I had placed my sense of control outside of myself. This meant that I felt the need to "manipulate" my environment because in giving others authority over my choices, I had to wait for them to agree on something I'd want. It's like going for a walk. When you walk with others everywhere you go, you'll have to wait until they're ready.

The trick I had to learn was how to distinguish between self and other, and then own fully and completely what's mine. But what's mine and what's yours? Anatomically it all seems so easy - it's merely a question of nose and toes. Anything beyond your nose and your toes: not yours! Behind it, yours! Yet I have become so used to the focus on other versus self, that I frequently find myself "out there" again. However, I can tell you that being the author of my own biography is compelling enough to stay disciplined and optimistic in my journey!

...As I hop off the train, reluctantly putting my book away, I turn on my iPod for a leisurely walk to the office. Alanis Morissette kicks in with "To All the Boys I've Loved Before" - a tribute to "all those lovely human beings who have influenced me over the years, and supported me in writing all the beautiful songs that I've written". It reminds me to be thankful to all those beautiful people - and not just the boys -  who have travelled in and out my door. Thankful also to those who will enter my door in the future. For it's in relationship with others that we can learn how to author our autobiography of right now...