We all tell stories. We cast them from the magic-8-ball of our minds to help us make sense of the world. These stories are how we interpret our experiences. They are our imagination hard at play.
When I hear my neighbor berating customer service people on the phone, I tell a story about who he is. Why he feels entitled to yell at them is his own story. The difference in how two people perceive a hundred dollar bill has to do with their stories about money. Our collective belief that the bill has any value whatsoever is one of the biggest stories of all. Stories can be beneficial, or simply convenient. I have a few of these that I turn to daily. “I’m a healthy person” takes me to the gym most mornings. “I’m a musician” guides me through daily guitar practice, and keeps me from quitting when I embarrass myself during jazz lessons. “I’m not a handy person” gives me a pass on doing manual work. It tells me to put the screwdriver down. The missing cabinet door in my kitchen is proof.
Other stories can be detrimental. There's the bestseller “Everyone is out to get me.” I’ve authored that one too. In my early days of writing music with others, I didn’t take criticism well. I’d get heated when my ideas were rejected because I was more concerned with the credits than the creation. This story made me take things personally. To retire it from rotation, I had to learn one of the hardest lessons; that it wasn’t about me.
But like an author, we have the ability to edit our narratives.
The tool
Self awareness is the tool we can use to uncover that these stories even exist. Without it, we believe everything we think, and our inner dialogue goes unquestioned .
I imagine self awareness as the slider we use to adjust the brightness on our screens. Our toggle moves left to right as we navigate our surroundings. This makes our levels of consciousness fluctuate and influences the kinds of stories we create.
Dark Mode
With our toggle set all the way to the left, our inner screen is dark. We can’t see ourselves in the mirror. Here, we are blind to our stories. We are easily offended, and unable to apologize. Our limiting beliefs look like concrete reality and we behave based on those assumptions. Dark mode means living in constant conflict.
There are also cultural stories that become so dark they're invisible to us. As a Dominican man, stories of patriarchy were some of the first I heard. “How many girlfriends do you have?” and “Los hombres no lloran” get passed down to men at a young age. Put those two together and it’s no wonder my beloved country has one of the highest rates of femicide in Latin America. It takes a lot of work to dissipate that kind of darkness.
To believe we hold absolute truths and our opinion is law, is to have no self awareness. In this state, we cannot bloom, there is no light.
Maximum brightness
With our toggle set all the way to the right, our screens are blinding. We shine so much light on ourselves that we become self-conscious; like an x-ray, all we see are negatives. We become obsessed with how others perceive our appearance or actions, constantly feeling judged. Excess brightness turns our insecurities into the main characters in our stories.
I frequently hang out on this side too. As I inch closer to 40, the stories I’ve held tight get tested. “I have high self-esteem” is challenged with every new gray in my beard or lost follicle on my head. “I’ve got my shit straight” is put through ruinous comparisons when yet another friend buys a house.
It’s exhausting to shine so much light on ourselves. It drains our batteries.
Understanding that our truths are constructs can be disorienting. All of a sudden the handrails are gone and we’re left wobbling on two feet. We want certainty without room for nuance; to consider anything other than what has gotten us to where we are is frightening. But there’s great power in realizing you can determine the meaning you assign to things, and that you can choose the story that serves you best.
Dancing in the middle
Recently at a coffee shop, I saw the barista get intercepted by a friend as she came out from behind the counter to grab empty cups. The friend removed an earbud and gave it to her, and for half a minute they danced to a song only they could hear. Never-mind the patrons nor the owner standing nearby. Anyone who even noticed seemed happy to wait on their thirty seconds of joy.
Afterward, the barista grabbed the cups and went back to the counter, and the friend sat back down to work on her laptop. I finished my cup and headed for the door, smiling at the insight.
To dance in the middle is to be conscious enough that we don’t trip ourselves or others over, while still being able to get lost in the moment. To be aware of your surroundings but unbothered by who may be watching.
Once outside, I popped in my earbuds and started making my way home. I sang aloud to the song playing in my ears. That’s how we ought to be, I thought; blissfully aware.
