In my previous life I was felt very associated with what I did for a living, I always felt that I was known for my employment rather than for who I was. This was mostly because I was happy to hide behind any title other than my own name because I felt extremely uncomfortable in any kind of attention. I worked dilligently at building my career, making strategic moves up the corporate ladder so that one day I could have a "successful" career and would finally gain the acceptance of the world I so desperately desired.
I also felt very associated with my weight, it had been my constant companion for so long that I truly had no idea who or what I was once I was free of it. In fact I struggled (and still do to some degree) to discover who I was at my core and accept the realization that I actually had no idea who I was. After being a stranger in my own life for so many years, it took a long time for me to recognize the person looking back in the mirror. For so long I had promised myself that life would be so perfect when I was finally skinny and that all of the broken and missing pieces would somehow find themselves in alignment and the image would become clear.
You can imagine my distraught and confusion when 100lbs lighter my life had not changed in many of the ways that I had imagined and desperately hoped it would. I was still extremely uncomfortable in situations where I had to meet new people. I felt awkward in male attention of any kind, and I was very frustrated however not surprised when I started to receive favorable attention from the opposite sex. All of a sudden I was in a league completely different than any I knew existed, I was being asked out on dates constantly. Men would bring me breakfast, lunch and/or coffee on a daily basis (to be fair I was the only female on the crew working in remote construction locations) and would do just about anything that I could have or would have asked for. I realized how shallow many parts of our society are and that life is in fact easier when you are "one of the pretty people."
I developed an ego of a different form. I became aware of my impression on the people I was surrounded by. I became someone who posted "selfies" on social media and watched how many "likes" or comments it got. I celebrated small victories when people from my childhood who were mean to me or ignored me all of a sudden were paying attention to what I was saying or doing. I was popular and trendy and people wanted to know me. I started getting more confident and being more visible, allowing the attention rather than recoiling from it.
Slowly I came to an awareness that I had plenty of superficial social media relationships that were shallow and lacking content. Based solely on the image of who I was, rather than the content of who I was. I craved attention from people that I hardly knew, or in truth didn't even like (those seemed to be the ones that I was trying to "please" the most as weird as that sounds). Like their approval would be the validation I was looking for to prove I have done OK in this life.
Recently with making a decision to follow my heart and go against the mainstream way of doing business I decided (not lightly) to allow the store to close. I have struggled with many, many aspects of closing since then. Mostly I find myself wondering "what will people say?" or "what will people think" and have heard more than once someone say to me "I am so sorry you closed your shop" and all I can say back is "I'm not". I have long learned that for me it is imperative that I take risks and try the many, many, MANY ideas that I have. However; I have also learned in no uncertain terms the importance of being authentic, and nothing authentic ever came from and ego based decision.
The experience has been so incredible and I really struggled with letting people down, or having people think that I failed. In no way do I feel that I failed because I closed, I feel empowered to have taken a good hard look at my desires and the reality of my situation and made a decision that was based not out of fear but out of love.
Every day since then I have had feelings of inadequacy and disconnect with the community I have grown to love. I attribute this to EGO stepping up wanting to be recognized. As before when I lost my protective shield of my weight, I am faced with the same situation of "who am I without the store?". This business has been (what feels like) my entire identity since we opened and without it I somewhat feel I didn't belong anymore. I let my ego have my power....
Something happened over the past few days that has brought forth the realization that ego can be released, and co-dependency can be replaced with independence. I am choosing to release my ego as it doesn't serve me. I am choosing to live freely and authentically without fear of judgement from others or myself. I am choosing to live my life by design and not by default. Most of all, I am choosing to invest in ME.
I release you ego, you are no longer wanted here!