Knowing Yourself

MORE FROM THE DESK OF DOCTOR B. D. SEPTIVE: The Self-Helpiest of all Self-Help gurus

                    "Who are you if you are not Hugh?"
                                                                          Grant Jackman

     Before you can know what to do you must get to know yourself.  Set up a date with yourself.  But no speed dating. Don't go someplace with six tables where six of your selves are sitting. You'll be charming and inquisitive, but at the end of the evening you will cross yourself off your list of potential dates.  And don't join an online dating service seeking yourself.   You will only waste time reading all of your own profiles and sending out countless emails to your selves.  Then you will wait for months while none of them respond except those without a picture.

     You must not be afraid to ask yourself personal questions. The answers may be buried so far down, deep inside yourself that they will never come out, even for a double hot fudge sundae.  But you must ask.  Ask yourself questions about topics you have never talked about with anyone.  Ask yourself questions about things that don't even exist.  If you can do that you can do anything.  Except for the New York Times Sunday crossword puzzle.  But that's okay, nobody has ever finished one of those, anyway.

     Don't be afraid of asking yourself for help from yourself.  Who is better qualified to help you than you?  If you need extra money, I'm sure you would be more than happy to go to the ATM and make a withdrawal.  If you need a ride somewhere, who better to call on than you.  If you need Super Bowl tickets, get me some, too.

     You can't really go anywhere unless you know how to get there.  If you don't know how to get to the theater how will you be able to see Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie?  Okay, that's a bad example.  You can always see them at the grocery checkout counter along with bat boy and that guy who wears a beard made of bees.  But listen, if you don't know the way, you will never get to the final destination of your destiny.  You will never find the happiness of being happily happy.  The exit ramp will be calling but you won't see the sign.  The next thing you know your car will have a flat tire in Moosehead and all of your thoughts and feelings will have been stomped to a bloody pulp by Bullwinkle.

     It is also true that you can't go anywhere unless you know where you are going.  Are you going to the inner reaches of your mind to find true truthfulness?  Are you going to the spirituality of your spirit to find pure peacefulness?  Are you going to Houston?  It matters not where you are going just as long as someone has directions.

     Are you going someplace you really want to go?  Or are you going somewhere else on the way to where you want to go?  Each destination, when you get there, will lead you to another.  If your most important destination is the couch, you have a lot of work to do.

NEXT TIME:  Body Language