Re-invention and Revolution
The life that is meant for you, a life worth reinventing yourself for, wants you to be at peace with who you are. It wants you to love yourself first, as a prerequisite to learning what you need for who you are today. Sometimes, the answers are supported and bringing them forward happens with ease. At other times, you might have to challenge cultural norms, hyper morality, and release those who are not able to understand you. Honesty with yourself is required, but when you know that you are making changes that might make others look at themselves before they are ready, and might make others face their own hypocrisies, then cherish and hold close your own truth. Don’t let anyone taint it.
Will you make the right changes? Will you go the right way? If it resonates with you, you cannot make a wrong choice. Your path might not be what you expect, and it might lead you to see all kinds of aspects of yourself that shock you and make you say, “Is this really me?” Yes, it is you, in that moment, and you can always reinvent yourself from wherever you are.
There are some basic questions to ask yourself, right now, that can begin the process gently.
- Am I happy?

Happy girl holding bunch of colorful air balloons at the beach
This is the most important of all questions. Happiness doesn’t mean your life is easy. It doesn’t mean that there are not challenges or contemplations. It does mean that something within feels right. As if you know that this is the work you are meant to do right now. What does happiness and success mean to you? Are you, at the very least, on that path? One of the most important steps towards a reinvention that leads you to the best of you, is trusting what you feel and being willing to contemplate what happiness is to you.
- Am I safe?
This is possibly the most important question, because without an inner sense of security, we might never approach these questions at all. Feeling at home is sometimes about where you live, but often it has to do with a state of spirit. To start feeling safe, affirm that you are. And if, even after saying it, something in you says, “no,” then ask what needs to change for a feeling of safety to take root.
- What do I feel?
There is an immediate, physical answer to this question. Then there is a more contemplative one – beyond that, comes the more existential one. In order to get to the third, the first two must be addressed first. But sometimes, it is not knowing the answers to the first two, that leads to the deeper, more philosophical considerations. What do you really feel about yourself, your place in the world, and about your life?
- What needs to change?
This is one of the more scary questions we might ask ourselves. Sometimes it involves the loss of friendships and circumstances we thought would always be there. Sometimes the change is much smaller on the surface, more personal, but over time has the farthest-reaching consequences. The realization that your self-talk is not valuing the love and respect you deserve, and the simple step of resolving to observe and actively replace any thoughts that do not make you feel good about yourself, will lead to diligence well rewarded.
Reinvention is a constant process. Even when everything falls to pieces, if you trust your soul and yourself, then it is part of what’s moving you in the right direction, a direction created uniquely for you.
Gloria Steinem’s Famous work, “Revolution Within,” states that the revolution is to live life on your own terms. To love yourself and know that what really matters in life, you can give to yourself. It is to insist on a life based on your own choices, and not someone else’s. This is the true path of the revolutionary. A path that looks within and insists on being the person you were created to be, not who others would have you to be. It is not a lonely road, far from it, but it is a road of true rebellion. It is a road that leads you further and further to a version of yourself that you will love very much.