Impression Management - "Meditations For People Who Do..."

Trying to be what others want us to be is a form of slow torture and will lead to spiritual certain death. We can not get all the definitions of our being from outside and still maintain our spiritual integrity. This reading from "Meditations For People Who Do Too Much" (Oct. 26) teaches us that Impression Management is a form of that illusion of control we do not have to hold onto for our lifetime. We can let it go and define ourselves from the inside of our being.

Transcript

Meditations for people who do too much.

Impression management.

Our concern must be to live while we're alive.

To release our inner selves from the spiritual death that comes with living behind a facade designed to conform to external definitions of who and what we are.

From Elizabeth Kubler-Ross.

Trying to be what others want us to be is a form of slow torture and certain spiritual death.

It is not possible to get all our definitions from outside and maintain our spiritual integrity.

We cannot look to others to tell us who we are,

Give us our validity,

Give us our meaning,

And still have any idea of who we are.

When we look to others for our identity,

We spend most of our time and energy trying to be who they want us to be.

And we are so fearful of being found out.

We truly believe that it is possible to make others see what we want them to see.

And we exhaust ourselves in the process.

Impression management is a form of illusion of control.

And I know that my illusion of control will kill me.