The Masks We Wear...

How many of you like wearing masks, dressing up in costumes, and going to themed parties?

I assume a lot of you did nod your heads. Even if you haven’t really gone to such parties, chances are you wouldn’t decline an invitation.?

Now, how many of you like to wear masks in your everyday life? A weird question to ask, isn’t it?

Wearing a mask has different connotations. While we consciously wear them as a disguise - to amuse or frighten others or use them as a protective cover to secure ourselves from injury, pollutants, or infection, there is also an intangible mask that we wear, often unconsciously. Do you know what that is? Our personality mask - whether we label ourselves as introverts or extroverts, shy or reserved, or even not good enough - we generally feel safe in these masks.?

There are a number of other personality masks we tend to wear. These include the victim mask, the overachiever mask, the avoidant mask, the self-bashing mask, the people-pleaser mask, the controller mask, and the conformist mask. Which of these can you relate yourself to? Awareness is often holding the mirror for you.?

While our personality masks most likely stem from some kind of fear: fear of appearing uncool, fear of rejection, fear of embarrassment, or even fear of falling flat on our faces, they also likely come from social pressures, bullying, or abuse.??

Our societies and cultures play a significant role in shaping our personalities. There is a certain set of rules we end up following unquestioningly that eventually form the masks each of us wears. The rules around how we should eat, how we should behave, how we should talk, how we should get good grades in school and college, how we should dress up, how we should love, and how we should get a 9-5 'secure' job are silently dictating our lives and molding our personalities. We have labeled boxes we put ourselves in and we actually feel it’s a comfortable fit inside.?

The reality is that our personality masks keep in a stagnant pattern of “This is who I am.” By hiding behind our personality masks we end up living half-hearted and divided lives. The truth is we are not designed to be perfect. We are designed to make mistakes. We are designed to learn from them. We are designed to try out sh*t. We are designed to evolve.?

Nintendo, a household name in video games, started off in 1889 producing playing cards. They had a failed taxi business and 'Love' motels. Wrigley, the billion-dollar chewing gum company, first started selling soap and baking powder. Children’s popular modeling clay, Play-Doh, was first sold as a cleaner that could remove coal residue from wallpaper in the 1930s. Starbucks only sold coffee beans and expresso-making equipment in the beginning. Google-owned streaming video service YouTube was first started as a dating website. Do you even want to Google the number of failed businesses that Richard Branson had?

These people evolved. They pivoted on the way to their success. There will come a point in your life when you are sick (if you aren’t already) and tired of living according to the mask(s) you’ve adopted. What will you do then? Will you revolt and rebel? Will you have the courage to acknowledge your own limitations, embrace your own vulnerabilities, and seek to chart out your own paths??

What will you do then? Seriously...

#ReinventYourself #YesYouCanChange

This excerpt is adapted from my latest book, Yes You Can Change! The Art of Reclaiming Your Life. If I got you thinking, maybe you'll like reading this book. It's available on Amazon in Kindle and Paperback formats.

Amazon (India): https://amzn.to/3DYbiyQ

Amazon (International): https://amzn.to/3CXi8EA