Who vs What

What questions do you ask yourself when it comes to your life and future? It does not matter which part of your life, but if you had to become still and think about it, what would those questions look like?

As I am writing this I am going through aspects in my life where I am asking quite a few questions regarding my future and what I want it to look like. What is it I want to achieve in my career? What do I want to be in 3 years? What car will I drive? What house would I be living in? And the list goes on. 

In this materialistic world, we have allowed the questions we ask ourselves to change. We have allowed these questions to focus more on the acquisition of items and accolades rather than on who it is we want to be and how we feel about our life.

Someone challenged me recently to not ask what I want to do with my life but who it is that I want to be or become. This had me at a sticking point as I have not looked at my life through the lens of who is it that I want to be. I realised that the question had me focus more on my identity rather than the accumulation of things and titles.

Who is it that I want to be?

For me, some things that came to mind were…I want to be a present father and husband. I want to be a man of honour and integrity. I want to feel enthusiastic, alive, and energetic in whatever I take on and do for a living. 

I do not want to be the father not having the time for his daughter and not being able to be there for her when she needs it. I do not want to be the husband that only speaks about work and is never there to truly listing to his wife when she needs it, and I do not want to be the man that is unhappy, uninspired, and depressed to get up in the morning to go to a job that does not provide fulfilment.

WHO it is we want to be, speaks to the core of who we are, it speaks to our inner happiness.

Asking our WHAT questions, are not wrong, they are necessary. But maybe before we ask our WHAT questions, we should start with WHO it is we want to be and then ask WHAT it is that we need to do and establish to become that person.

I recently had a conversation with a wise man, my dad, and the question we pondered was “what is enough?”. We came to realise that the question only allows for the materialistic aspects of our lives and that a different question to be considered, as it includes an element of emotion to it, is “what is it that makes you happy?”.

Who is it that I want to be? Who is it that You want to be? What is it that makes you genuinely happy?

I challenge you, as I do myself, to start with WHO it is you want to be and then build the WHAT that is needed to enable you to be that version of yourself. Become fearless and life will become limitless.