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Reach your Potential – Be yourself and push the boundaries

Guest post by: Iris Barrow

Article Overview: Do you have the courage to be yourself, or do you find that you are constantly trying to fit in with others’ expectations? There is a real danger in trying to present the ‘right front’ to a group or person. It’s extremely stressful and you risk losing your identity. If, however, you are true to yourself and willing to extend those self-imposed boundaries, you will be surprised at the rewards. This article explains the benefits of being your true self and suggests ways you can achieve it.

Reach your Potential – Be yourself and push the boundaries



Have the courage to be yourself

We can choose to live fully, or to live within a framework of what is familiar and safe. If we choose the latter we will be limiting ourselves by our past experience.

There is always risk involved in living fully, and thereby choosing to be more alive and joyful human beings, but it is the way that leads to ‘wholeness’.

Doing so involves breaking down the bars of our own self-imposed cage and daring to be more fully us, with all that this entails. It means getting out of our comfort zone and embracing what is outside of our present realm of experience though always within a framework of wisdom and balance. Experiencing new things, interacting with people outside of those who are known and familiar to us, reading books which challenge us and extend our thinking, exploring what was previously unknown, are all a part of this pathway. At whatever age or circumstance, our life’s journey should involve ongoing growth and lead us towards reaching our potential.

Those who choose to push their boundaries, will almost certainly experience more depths and heights, but they will feel more enriched as a result of living more fully. Ultimately they will also come to know, understand and accept themselves. The rewards of breaking out of that self-imposed cage far outweigh the risks involved.

The dangers of conforming to others’ expectations

There is enormous stress in not feeling free to be ourselves. If we are constantly trying to conform to others’ expectations of us, the pressure will eventually get to us.

People become inwardly fragmented when they are continually trying to present the ‘right front’ to this group, or that person. In the end they can feel as if they have lost their own identity. This has the effect of creating inner conflict and confusion.

It takes a lot of energy to conform when it doesn’t come naturally to do so. Are you familiar with the idiom, ‘to be a round peg in a square hole’? Having to constantly strive to fit in with a crowd or into a situation that doesn’t align with our character and our views, can affect our mental health. Ultimately we have to be ourselves, in order to sustain good mental health.

Of course the onus is on us to be our ‘better’ rather than our ‘baser’ self, to function at the top level rather than at the bottom. The latter reflects emotional immaturity, irresponsibility and self-indulgence. The former, a journeying towards growth and wholeness.

Self-growth equals striving to reach your potential

Think of yourself as an iceberg, only the tip is showing – your used potential – the rest of the iceberg, that vast unseen area beneath the surface of the water – is your unused potential. It lies there, waiting to be recognized, accepted and realised.

The interesting thing about potential is that it grows as you use it.

Using it, that is, extending beyond your comfort zone, acts as a catalyst.

It is important that we do not act in a self-limiting way.

When you think about it, you are probably achieving things today that you could not conceive of five years ago. Similarly, you will be able to achieve things in the future that you cannot visualise today. We never fully realise our potential, because each time we move towards doing so, it increases. This is what ongoing growth is all about.

Be true to yourself – never compare yourself to others

When we compare ourselves with other people, we risk putting ourselves down.

It is negative in the extreme to do so; it is also illogical.

You are a unique human being with genetic factors, conditioning, attitudes and perceptions that reflect your uniqueness. Add to this your talents, skills, abilities, strengths, inner resources and experiences, plus the sense you make of your life experiences, and you begin to get some idea of how intrinsically ‘different’ you are. There never has been and never will be another human being who reacts and responds to life as you do. Therefore, how can you possibly compare yourself to other people?

You can be the best pear possible, but if you are a pear you can only be an inferior apple or banana. Or to put it another way, you see things through green tinted glasses, I see them through purple ones and somebody else sees them through yellow, therefore my perception of how life is coloured must be different from yours, or theirs.

The only true comparison, and indeed the only one we should make, is to compare ourselves against our potential. The question we should ask ourselves is, how far have we moved at this present time, towards realising it?

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Article Tags: boundaries, courage, potential, rewards, selfgrowth, true self



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