Discovering Me

I have recently surprised myself by doing things I never thought I could do. My recent discoveries were made simply because I was put into situations which encouraged my talents and gifts to bud and to bloom. I am in my early forties, so I pretty much thought I knew what my talents and gifts were. I also had a list of things neatly filed under ‘do not attempt’, because they were not my strengths.

In society, we are taught over and over again the importance of knowing yourself; your strengths and weaknesses. I am part of those that have held workshops on knowing ourselves. However, I am now inclined to replace the word ‘know’ with the word ‘discover’. Life is a journey that is full of lessons and discovery and one of the subjects covered is ‘self’. I have a friend who explains it this way ‘you cannot really know someone fully because we are always changing, we struggle to know ourselves due to our changes.’ (Paraphrased.)

So, for me, ‘discovering me’ is interesting right now. I will give you an example. I grew up in a musical household, everyone in our household sings and/or plays an instrument, so it was no surprise that I could ‘hold a note’ and ‘carry a tune’. All I had to do was to work on developing that talent, so even though I was always nervous, I would still be confident at the same time when it came to singing in public. On the other hand, speaking in public was a different matter entirely. The thought of addressing more than one person at the same time in public, was terrifying. I could not find the words and even when I did, I did not believe I made any sense, except to myself. People often assumed that because I could get up and sing in front of an audience, I would have no problem with speaking. In fact, if anyone reading this heard me sing 15, 10, 5 years ago and has also heard me sing recently, you may have noticed that I talk a lot more now before I sing.

I believe that talents and gifts are God given. However, going back to my earlier statement, ‘my recent discoveries were made simply because I was put into situations which encouraged my talents and gifts to bud and bloom’, the opportunities for me to discover me, were provided by: my previous job in the NHS, my Pastor and my Mentor.

Generally we discover what we are good at early on in life and so we focus on those things and nurture those talents. Occasionally, we discover a talent later in life due to our circumstance. Whichever stage you are at and regardless of your current age, do not close the chapter on who you are. Keep it open and keep discovering your God given talents and realising your potential. If need be, look for someone to help you to discover more of you. Look for a mentor.

As usual, please leave a comment, I would like to hear from you.

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