Peer Pressure for Adults

Authenticity. It’s not easy to be authentic. I wonder whether anyone can. Maybe it’s a self-actualizing quest. Maybe it’s a journey, not a destination.

Yet.

An authentic world of transparent events, where fear of oneself no longer exists, has the potential beauty and productivity of any phenomenon nature ever made.

Yet.

As I look back at those who have walked to their calling, or at the tiny ones I taught who knew their own truth, I see they both found some rocky walking as they made their way along their paths. It’s my experience, too, that as I find my feet — as I know which direction is mine and which place to stand — some folks find it a duty to tell me what my role is and to follow the path that they set.

No.

“Choose wisely. Choose wisely, but choose your own path,” my father said. So did my friends. “Choose not for others, but always hold your choice for yourself.”

The choice is the action. The choice is the hope. The choice is the relationship and the place where you’ll go. The choice is the chance to know your head and your heart as they become your life. It is the choice that honors your self and the people you respect and love.

Only you know which is the right choice.

Say, “no.” When they say, “be someone other.”

Say, “no.” When they ask you to do what they won’t.

Say, “no.” Unless your heart and your head say “this is where my feet need to go.”

Authenticity knows how to choose its own path.

Authenticity is having faith in ourselves.

We can change the world — just like that.
–ME “Liz” Strauss