All the Flavors of Me

Lately, I’ve been thinking about personality.

If you are like me, you may spend time noticing and judging your traits, tendencies, patterns, and quirks—and feeling like you need to work on and eradicate them all.

But what if personality isn’t something we are meant to tamp down or transcend?

What if it is a gift?

We come into this life with a particular collection of qualities, sensitivities, strengths, and challenges. They shape how we experience the world and give us a unique way to bring our gifts into it. It’s like a spice rack, and we each bring our own unique combination of flavors.

Even the traits we sometimes wish we could eliminate may have something to teach us.

Perhaps personality is part of life’s curriculum, each trait an opportunity for curiosity—and something we can choose to draw upon when appropriate.

The trouble may begin when we confuse what we have with who we are.

There is a difference between:

I am impatient.
and
I experience impatience.

I am independent.
and
I have a tendency toward independence.

The first turns a trait into an identity that we allow to take up residence. The second is fluid, something we can choose when it is appropriate.

And perhaps that movement is the point.

What if we could simply enjoy our personalities?

What if we could be stubborn, sensitive, funny, serious, independent, passionate, quirky—without needing any of those things to define us?

We can be strong without always needing to be strong.

We can be independent and still receive help.

We can be sensitive without being fragile.

We can have an opinion without needing to be right.

We can even notice our less-loved traits without immediately deciding they need to be fixed.

There is freedom in remembering that a trait is something we experience, not something we are.

Which brings me to I AM.

The personality says:

I am this.

The deeper Self says:

I AM.

Everything else is something we experience, express, learn through, and perhaps eventually let go of.

Maybe the goal isn’t to become someone without personality.

Maybe it is to become someone who can hold personality lightly.

To allow whatever quality is useful in the moment to arise, learn from it, enjoy it—and let it move.

Because underneath all the things we think we are is something much simpler.

Something that doesn’t need to be perfected.

I AM.

With love and resonance,