who vs. what

Don't you wish that our minds developed like our bodies? I mean one day your legs are perfectly smooth and then the next you need to shave. One day you have that squeaky helium tinged voice of childhood, and the next your voice begins to lower. All of it is just a matter of time and the changes of adulthood take us over without any thought on our part.

Unfortunately, it isn't quite so easy mentally. There seems to be no rhyme or reason as to when we learn things. Some people learn important things quite young, and others don't learn them until they are in their twilight years. It isn't like life lessons are marked "Age 5", "Age 10", etc. like the books you buy for kids to learn their alphabet and math. The frustrating part is that often when you do learn a lesson you think, "well heck, why didn't I understand that before?"

Such it has been recently for me as I came to a realization that has truly changed my life. As most of you know, I am a firm believer in goal setting. However, many goals are not so much things to accomplish as things to be. When I came to understand that there truly is a distinction, it shifted my entire thinking about how we pursue our future. That realization was that WHO you are is not the same as WHAT you are.

WHO you are is the essence of your life. Who you are, in large part, determines what you do. If you are a person of integrity, then you take responsibility for your life and your actions. People can say that they have integrity, but if they don't really have integrity when they are really tested, they cannot fake it.

WHO you are is made up of your core beliefs and ideals. Tony Robbins says that our core beliefs tend to come out as global statements such as "People are", "I am", etc. These are not simply affirmations that we say and do not really believe; these are the true beliefs that we have about ourselves and others. For example, if you have a belief that people will try to take advantage of you, you will likely subconsciously take actions to try to protect yourself from that. These beliefs direct our day-to-day actions like autopilot on an airplane.

WHAT you are is what you do. You might be a lawyer, a writer, or an artist. You might be mom, sister, child, friend, and helper. You might, be all of those things. What you are can change on a daily basis. It is simply a title or a goal towards something to DO.

WHO you are, however, affects WHAT you become. Oprah Winfrey says that what you focus on expands - meaning that the more time you give to something the bigger and more important it becomes for you. For that reason, she warns against concentrating on the negative aspects of life. That does not mean that we have to deny when bills need to be paid, or when we have to deal with a difficult person. It is more like a glass half full vs. half empty scenario. When bills need to be paid we can concentrate on the fear of not being able to pay the bills, or we can focus on what we can do to bring money in, and how we can take control of the situation.

I have begun to realize that working on "who you are" is more important than concentrating on "what you are" in the long run. We do need to make goals and work toward the "what" - that is what pays the bills and sometimes helps us focus on the "who". But in the end, the "who" we become is what makes us happy.

I was in the airport during yet another flight delay and was watching biographies of television and music stars that were on an airport TV. They showed story after story of actors and musicians that reached the pinnacle of their professional lives and yet were miserable. The majority of them self-destructed into drugs or abusive behavior because they did not feel "worthy" of the attention and money they were getting, or simply did not know how to handle the fame and pressure.

The few times they profiled stars who stayed successful and did not self destruct, those people were described as "grounded", "loving", and well-liked. It is a cop-out to think that if you achieve your goals you are automatically going to be happy. The difference between those who enjoy success and those who self-destruct is WHO they were when they achieved that success.

So, who are you?

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