MOTIVATION - Be True to Yourself

MOTIVATION – Be True to Yourself


By Nikki Viljoen of N Viljoen Consulting CC – April 2009

It is said that until you respect yourself, you cannot respect others.

It is said that until you love yourself, you cannot love others.

It is said that until you are honest with yourself, you cannot be honest to others.

It is said that until you are true to yourself, you cannot be true to others.

You need to understand that you are the centre of your own universe.  It is your life and you are the only one that should be ‘living’ it.

My friend, colleague and mentor Vanessa, always tells me “This life of yours – it is your movie.  You have to write the script, you have the lead role, you are the director and the producer and you own the rights to the movie.”

How true is that?  So why on earth would I give the starring role to someone else?

The bottom line is that it is my life, I need to own it.  No-one else can live it for me and at the end of it, I am the only one that will be accountable for the manner in which I have lived it.

Here’s the thing though – many of us give up our own power, by allowing others to use and abuse us or live out the fantasies of their lives by dictating how we should live our lives.  That’s just crazy!  We need to take back what is ours – we need to own our power and we need to reclaim our lives.

We need to find our own passions.

We need to get excited about our own dreams.

Once we own our own power and we are passionate about our lives, we will begin to realize our dreams and in so doing, we will live our own lives with integrity and dignity.

Once we have learnt how to respect ourselves, we will recognize and respect the fact that everyone has the right to be doing the same in their lives.

Don’t be fooled though into thinking that you now have the right to be selfish and think only of yourself to the exclusion of all others.  That too is just crazy and it is also very destructive.

Yes we are all unique.

Yes we need to be true to ourselves

Yes we need to respect ourselves, but we also need to treat others with the same respect that we give ourselves and we also need to expect others to treat us with respect as well.

It’s a great big loop tape and grows ever wider and stronger the more we ‘buy into’ it.  So respect yourself and you will be true to yourself.

Nikki is an Internal Auditor and Business Administration Specialist who can be contacted on 083 702 8849 or nikki@viljoenconsulting.co.za or http://www.viljoenconsulting.co.za