Marching to the Beat of Your Own Drum

By Christine Kloser

For most of my life I’ve been conditioned to march to the beat of a familiar drum… the drum that says, “fall into line, don’t break the mold, do what everyone else is doing, follow the pack, don’t make waves, fit in with the crowd, etc.” The beat of this drum had become so familiar to me that I didn’t even notice it was beating in the background of my life.

In all honesty, that familiar beat had been running my life. Yes, I stepped out of the usual nine-to-five corporate mold that society teaches us is what success looks like. But, I stepped into an entrepreneurial mold that had a similar beat… “Do what everyone else is doing.” And, so I did – for several years – until I realized that I didn’t want to be marching to the beat of that drum anymore.

And, so the quest began to march to the beat of my own drum… to do the deep inner work to discover what is true and right for me. I have made much progress on my quest. I’ve discovered so much more certainty within myself, while also feeling less certainty on the external level. The beauty is that I’m finding comfort in the “I don’t know.” Because what I DO know, is that I’m beginning to march to the beat of my own drum. And, with certainty like that, it makes any external uncertainty a non-issue.

So, what does it take to march to the beat of your own drum?

Opening Your Eyes
First, you’ve got to open your eyes to the truth of what is happening within you and around you. You must raise your level of consciousness and become keenly aware of your own thoughts, feelings, motivations, etc. It’s only when you begin to open your eyes to the truth (and allow yourself to see it and feel it) that you can begin to shift what isn’t working. For many years I had an inner inkling that something wasn’t quite right with a part of my business. And, it wasn’t until I looked into those dark corners that I could see for the first time what I wanted to shift, how I wanted to shift and what had been holding me back from a life of total freedom. And, it had nothing to do with my business, but everything to do with ME!

So, step one is to take a look and see if there’s anything you’ve been staying blind to that it’s time for you to see.

Compassion
Please, please, please… have compassion for yourself on this journey. I used to think that every time I saw something unpleasant about myself, my life or my business that I was “supposed” to use it to beat myself up. Nothing could be further from the truth. When you open your eyes and begin to see things… you must learn to have compassion for yourself as you become more conscious and free yourself at a deeper level. Marching to the beat of your own drum requires that you LOVE yourself forward (that’s a fabulous phrase I got from my spiritual teacher), not that you beat yourself up. So, as you do the work to find YOUR unique rhythm, have compassion for yourself and who you have been up until now. You have always only done the best you could with what you knew at the time.

So, step two is to allow yourself to see something that isn’t working for you and have compassion for yourself as you see it.

Commitment
I love the word commitment! I learned many years ago, at the very first personal development program I attended in 1995, that commitment equals freedom! At first, I thought the trainer was crazy, but the more I thought about it the more I saw the truth in this. When you are totally committed to something (in this case, your authentic expression in the world) you don’t have any other options. Your choices of being “less than your best authentic self” get taken away. And, that’s a good thing! Why would you want to be committed to anything less than pursuing your authentic expression in the world 100%?! It makes no sense. So, if you’re going to walk on this journey of marching to the beat of your own drum… COMMIT to it! And, let it take you where you’re meant to go.

So, step three is to make a commitment to yourself right now that you will do whatever it takes to release the “should’s” from your life and learn to march to the beat of your own drum!

© 2010 Christine Kloser

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