Okay all you football fans.
When one of America’s most popular football players talks about “being in the present” and observing how children play; which is all about playing in the moment, we know we’ve turned a corner on the Art & Science of Presence.
Science calls it being in the flow. Sociologist Abraham Maslow calls it being in the zone. Tom Brady and friends call it being one’s “authentic self.”
That term is used a lot nowadays. From Oprah to Deepak to teenage girls sipping lattes at the Glendale Galleria, and it seems, even to football players.
But what is one’s authentic self?
Perhaps it’s best to understand it through what it (and you) are not.
You are not your job. Your title. The amount of money you earn. The kind of car you drive. Your age. Your weight. The zip code you live in. The shoes you wear. The wrinkles on your face. Your moods. Your likes. Your dislikes. Your judgments. Your problems. Your fears. Your resume credits. Your popularity. Achievements. Victories. Failures.
When you perceive someone (in physical terms) as being more successful, or more beautiful, or more wealthy, or more powerful — you don’t see yourself at an equal level. You forget the real level in which all human beings actually meet one another: pure human authentic vulnerability.
Instead (through fear, comparison, separation, judgments) you see people from the prism of how Ego fears people. You suddenly defer your power to a misperceived label of how you define that person beyond their authenticity. You seek their approval, their love, their acceptance, their permission because they’re wrongly perceived as someone who holds the key to your success, your happiness, your fulfillment, your future.
When we do that we no longer meet people on the same playing field of simply being.
Here’s another sports analogy. Diana Nyad successfully swam from Cuba to the Florida Keys a couple weeks ago without a shark cage. The first to do so. It was her 5th attempt and she’s 64 years old. She said that you just have to “find a way.”
She wore a protective jellyfish mask that protected her from those toxic stings.
In life we put on masks too. As a defense mechanism and as a means of self-preservation. Sadly, we forget we’re wearing them and we then begin to see other people through these distorted lenses from behind our masks. So we end up seeing them — and ourselves — inaccurately.
What if you just took off your mask? You will get stung. But it’s worth it. It’s worth living out in the world that way. Some people are not going to get you. Some people will be threatened by your honesty. Some people will try to thwart you or yes, even figuratively sting you. But that’s really what we’re all here to do — meet ourselves and other people out in the world without wearing a mask.
That’s our authentic self.