I Am

I’m searching for the perfect, authentic life for me. For several years, I was a part of a 12-step Alanon group meeting weekly. At the end of the meeting, after either taking turns talking about the selected topic or to review what was happening in our lives, we would stand in a circle and hold hands to recite the Serenity Prayer. Before we did, we would all chant: “I am not perfect!” in an effort to take away our shame at not being picture perfect human beings. I can be perfectly me and that’s all I can be. I look at TV, movie, magazine, and Internet models of lifestyles and I have to remind myself that I have to create my own model; no matter how hard I mimic others behaviors or buy products to look and live like others, in the final analysis I have to be me. With all my faults, my memories, my personal experiences and perceptions … I can only be me. And isn’t it wonderful? To totally be me, to dig deep inside and feel myself experience life authentically, to have enough self-confidence to be happy being me. To like myself – that is the key! For so many years I mirrored others – behavior, style, choices … and now, at 55, I find myself being a blend of all that came before, being the sum of all I have experienced and been influenced by. I seem to feel truly full and content within my own skin. For perhaps the first time in my life. Every day I am still learning about life and love and how to grasp the here and now. No longer filled with so much angst … that feeling has been replaced I think by a curiosity, a wondering – what now? How do I live, how do I love, now? So much of my life has been an exercise in sleepwalking … am I awakening too late to achieve my full potential as a living being? I love the quest, I pick up the thrown gauntlet that has been tossed at my feet. I am.