Part of discovering who we really are is discovering how we came to be, who we currently are.

Different people taught us different things. Some were good, some were bad.

What your opinion is, and what you believe, is how you react to life. It is your “character” developed by society and what people taught you.

Remember that children are greatly influenced by adults, especially adults that the child loves, and who the child wants to be respected by and to receive love from.

When you see that father hit his wife, and then a week later you see the son hit a girl at school, it is so easy to condemn the child and say “Like father, like son!” and then walk away.

That child is a product of his upbringing, and those who were his examples, and who taught him.

If a child grows up in a gang home then that is all that the child knows for some years. When older, the child will want the parents approval and that can only become a reality of the child does things that the parents approve of.

So if the parents are dishonest, cruel, steal, drink heavily, abuse drugs, etc then obviously the child must take part in those activities to get the parents approval.

Even if the child has doubts about those activities, a desperate need to be loved by those who don’t know how to give love overpowers any guilt or second-thoughts.

If the parents are rich, ignore the poor and suffering, condemn the poor for being lazy etc. The children must grow up mimicking this and defending their family lifestyle to get their parents approval, and to hide any feelings of doubt or shame.

If your life is in a struggle in some area please consider where the struggles came from.
For example if you are struggling with being the woman that you are today, and are shocked that you care too much for money, status, makeup and getting your nails and hair done, ask yourself who taught you how to be a woman? Was it your mother? An Aunt? A few people?

One of the reasons we do strange things, or unnatural things is that we want approval, and to get that we do things that are out of character.

Sometimes we don’t have a parent as an example so the crowd becomes a foster parent, and to gain their approval we do things that are out of character to satisfy the crowd and by doing this we become popular – the math is simple and obvious, but self destructive if we are following the crowd.

As we grow older these unnatural things that we do are what other people assume is who we really are, but that is very far from the truth.

Sometimes we become so consumed in trying to be accepted, that we believe that the strange things that we do are who we really are. We accept the public acceptance and we promote it and are encouraged to be more like what the crowd and society want us to be.

Part of “finding ourself” is finding out “who taught us what?” so that we can understand why we have behaved as we have over the years. Once we understand that the behaviour is not our natural behaviour we can cast it away or do something about it and rediscover ourself in a positive manner.

Who taught you and gave you examples about sex, your sexuality, your beliefs about gender, and the roles of the genders?
Who taught you how to sing, to love, or what love is?
Who gave you the example of parenting that you follow today?
Who influenced your political views the most. Looking back, do you think that they were right?
How have these people influenced your life and attitudes?
Without those people in your life wonder to yourself about who you could have been.

Great positive change comes to our lives as we discover who made us who we turned out to be, and who we really are.

Please consider yourself on an amazing journey of self-improvement designed to throw out old baggage, and to bring back hope, love, respect and happiness to your life again.

So please do your homework and consider the positive and negative influences and strong characters in your life.