[Music] many of us are wandering the earth accomplished in many ways capable of fulfillment at many points but with a fundamental wound that stops us from becoming who we truly might be we don't quite know who we are it isn't of course that we can't remember the basics of our biographies we're unsure around two things in particular firstly we don't have a stable sense of what we're worth and secondly we don't have a secure hold on our own values or judgments without knowing who we are we tend to have particular trouble coping with either denigration or adulation if other people decide that we are worthless or bad there will be nothing inside us to prevent us from swallowing their verdicts in their entirety however wrong-headed extreme or unkind these might be we'll be helpless before the court of public opinion we'll always be asking other people what we deserve before seeking inside for an answer lacking an independent verdict we also stand to be unnaturally hungry for external praise the clapping of an audience will matter to us far more than would ever be wise we'll be pray to rushing towards whatever idea or activity the crowd happens to love we'll laugh at jokes that aren't funny uncritically accept undeserving concepts that are in vogue and neglect our truer talents for easy popular wins will trail public opinion slavishly constantly checking the world's whims rather than consulting an inner barometer in order to know what we should want feel and value we need to be kind on ourselves no one is born with an independent ability to know who they are we learn to have an identity because if we're blessed in our early years someone else takes the trouble to study us with immense fairness attention and kindness and then plays us back to us in a way that makes sense and that we can later emulate they give us the beginning of a true portrait of our identity which we can then take on and enrich over the years and use as a defense against the distorting verdicts from hurried or ill-intentioned others knowing who one is is really the legacy of having been known properly by somebody else at the start this early identity building tends to unfold with apparently innocuous but life-saving small steps oh that must really have hurt a parent might say in response to an upset thereby validating an infant's own feelings or it's okay not to feel happy on your birthday the parent might say at another point delicately upholding an infant's less typical response to certain events ideally the child isn't just known he or she is also interpreted as likable a good parent offers generous interpretations they're on the side of the child and are always ready to put the best possible gloss on moments of ill-temper or a failure which forms the basis upon which resilient self-esteem can then later emerge now that's the ideal but it can of course go very wrong and often does a parent may offer mirroring that is out of sync with the reality of the child look who's such a happy little boy or girl a parent might insist when actually the opposite is clearly the case thereby badly scrambling the child's ability to connect with their own emotions or the parent might only lend the child a very harsh punitive way of interpreting itself repeatedly suggesting that the child is ill-intentioned or no good or the parent may simply not show very much interest in the child focusing themselves elsewhere so that the child grows up with a feeling that not only is it not worth cherishing but also because it hasn't been adequately seen and mirrored that it doesn't even quite exist a feeling of unreality is the direct consequence of emotional neglect realizing that we lack a stable identity is a sobering realization but we can with a fair wind start to correct the problem at any point we need to seek out the help of a wise and kindly other person perhaps a good psychotherapist someone who can study us closely mirror us properly and then validate what they see through their eyes we can learn to study perhaps for the first time how we really feel and take seriously what we actually want we can by being witness generously more often learn to take our own sides and feel increasingly solid inside trusting ourselves more than we trust the crowd feeling that we might be able to say no not always swaying in the wind and feeling that we are in possession of some of the ultimate important truths about us having come to know ourselves like this we will be a little less hungry for praise a little less worried by opposition and a lot more original in our thinking we will have learned the vital art of both knowing and befriending who we really are our know yourself cards can help us to better understand the deepest most elusive aspects of ourselves follow the link now to learn more you