What It Means To Know Yourself

I am not the girl that people think I am. I should not be dealt with or spoken to as someone who has a disability or a severe mental disorder. I might be a little off at times, but let's get one thing straight, I am not crazy or psychotic. I will not accept false narratives of myself and allow people to tell me what kind of person I am because the only person who knows who I am is me, myself, and I.

I will not sit back and let anyone try to defy my character and make everything that I do a problem for them when all they want to do is try to bring me down when they claim that they are trying to lift me. Always keep in mind that nobody else can know who you are except you. No one can tell you are because they are not in your mind, body, and soul. I can tell you exactly who I am. My name is Janay Ealey, and I am an empathic person who may have flaws as an individual but makes people laugh whenever she can. A girl who sees people live their best lives and who will always be there for someone during their darkest times.

When you know yourself as a person, it makes you independent of the opinions of others. Having a clear understanding of your character and what you stand for in life can help give you a strong sense of self-confidence. If you know yourself, the good, bad and ugly, you can begin to accept who you are. It can sometimes be challenging to deal with aspects of your character that you don't perceive as positive, such as laziness. Knowing yourself also means knowing your purpose in life. To know yourself means to understand your strengths and weaknesses, your passions and fears, your desires and dreams.

It also means being aware of your eccentricities and idiosyncrasies, your likes and dislikes, and your tolerances and limitations. Once you know yourself, you have found your purpose in life and leads you to the start of wisdom. That's why I believe that mirrors are the best representation of what knowing yourself means. Mirrors are the reflection of self-truth. In a psychological sense, mirrors symbolize the threshold between the conscious mind and the unconscious mind. Let me introduce you to this acronym called VITALS. There are six elements of self-knowledge one found in the acronym. Each letter stands for Values, Interests, Temperaments, Activities, Life Mission, and Strengths.

While knowing one's VITALS can help a person feel freer and stronger, people constantly change and society often conflicts with one's values. Values are guides to decision-making and motivators for goals. Interests are your passions, hobbies, and anything that draws your attention over a sustained period. Temperament describes your inborn preferences. Activities (around the clock) refer to when you like to do things. Life Mission (Meaningful Goals) is what have been the most meaningful events of your life? Strengths can include not only abilities, skills, and talents, but also character strengths such as loyalty, respect for others, love of learning, emotional intelligence, fairness, and more.

Knowing your strengths is one of the foundations of self-confidence; not being able to acknowledge your superpowers could put you on the path to low self-esteem. The benefits of self-knowledge are happiness, less inner conflict, better decision making, self-control, resistance to social pressure, tolerance, understanding of others, and vitality and pleasure. The message of this story is to ensure you have an understanding of what it means to know yourself and why it is important to have self-reflection. No one can know you better than yourself!