Written by Anthony Meindl
You gain thirty pounds. Your essential nature is the same.
You get dumped. Your essential nature is the same.
You turn 30. Your essential nature is the same.
Your agent drops you. Your essential nature is the same.
Your essential nature – who it is that we all are – transcends our age, social status, accomplishments, physical appearance, successes or failures.
It’s not derived by the cars you drive, the shoes you wear, the zip code you live in.
It’s not affected by the ups and downs of your life. Your challenges or disappointments.
It’s the part of each of us we are born as. You could call it your essence. The truth of who you are.
The essential nature of who you are is child-like. Perfect. Innocent. Expressive. Whole. Not lacking in any way.
It’s the part that can’t be influenced by the prejudices of others. By the things people say or the actions taken against us.
So many of our doubts, insecurities, fears and worries are generated by outside influences that use “compare-and-despair” tactics to make us feel like we’re not good enough. Or that we’re a failure. Or not attractive. Or have nothing to contribute.
Stop letting the influences of Madison Avenue and its marketing campaigns and media images distort your self-image.
Our culture sells dreams. It preys on our insecurity that who we are isn’t enough. That our lives are lacking and unfulfilled in some way until we get married, or have millions of dollars or have our own TV show or get invited to that A-list club or buy these products we “can’t live without.”
Accumulation of things – of stuff – doesn’t make us happy.
Happiness is a state of being. It’s who we already are. It is our essential nature. It’s the creative child within all of us. We don’t lose this essence when we become adults, but we do misplace it. We forget we possess it.
You don’t have to work so hard to “do.” You already are.
You don’t have to push and always make things happen. Simply allow.
You don’t have to control. Be in a let go.
Stop trying to become what you already are.
“Children aren’t bored when they wake up in the morning because they don’t know what’s going to happen to them that day. Adults are bored because we think we do.” ~ Marianne Williamson
Anthony Meindl is an award-winning writer, producer, director and actor whose first feature screenplay, THE WONDER GIRLS, was the Grand Prize Winning Feature Screenplay in the Slamdance Film Festival Screenplay Competition in 2007. Prior to this accomplishment, Meindl was responsible for the production of an array of award-winning projects. His background in acting, training, and performance has afforded him the opportunity to create what has become a thriving artist community in Los Angeles.
