An integrated life
A life that isn’t integrated is a life without integrity.
I’ve been thinking about this for several months now. Am I one person living one life or someone with many personas living multiple lives?
I am increasingly convinced that wholeness stems from living one, integrated life.
Do I have a compartmentalised life where different compartments come out based on who I’m with? Or am I the same, whole, person no matter who I am with?
Is there a work me, a friends me, a family me, and a private me? Or is there just one me who permeates my whole life no matter who I’m with or what I’m doing?
Don’t get me wrong, different environments will demand different things of us and bring out aspects of our personality and talents that don’t come out in other environments. That’s normal. But the question is whether we are someone totally different. Someone we might be ashamed of if people in other groups saw us like that.
Are we spending half our lives creating a persona, keeping up appearances? Are we pretending to be something or someone we’re not? In other words, are we actors or, more accurately, hypocrites?
The problem with living life this way is that it is draining. Spending our whole life acting is hard work!
Freedom comes from being so comfortable with who we are that we no longer feel the need to pretend or impress. We can be ourselves. We are whole. We have an integrated life which oozes integrity and breeds trust.
To be honest, I’m wary of people I’m not convinced I’m seeing the real them. Religious people are the worst for this. If Hollywood ever runs out of actors, they could just start going to churches and quickly identify some of the best actors the world has ever seen! It’s like the pressure of religion compels them to pretend. They cannot be themselves. They create a church persona and say all the right things. It stinks. Seems like Jesus thought so too.
Tags: Integration, Integrity, Life, Religion