Every person looks the way they do
for a whole host of very complex and important reasons.
But just because a person looks a certain way
doesn't mean that they feel that the way they look
is an accurate representation of who they actually are.
For this reason,
I have a very fun and enlightening exercise
for you to try with your friends and your family.
Disclaimer (pause to read):
The "What I Really Look Like" Game
To do this exercise,
I want you to imagine that you have never seen yourself before.
What I mean by this is you've never seen your own reflection
and you can't just look down
and ascertain what you look like with your own two eyes.
Maybe pretend that you're blind.
And then, draw a self-portrait.
You can choose to draw this self-portrait
from a purely intuitive place,
or you can involve more conscious intention into the task
by considering things like:
do I look human or do I look like something else?
If I look human,
what do I really look like?
If I look like something other than a human,
what do I look like?
How am I shaped and formed?
What features do I have?
What color am I?
What texture am I?
How tall or short am I?
Do I have any tattoos or scars
or any other defining features?
Do I wear clothes or jewelry?
If so, what type of clothes or jewelry do I wear?
And where and how do I wear them?
And relative to each body part that a person possesses,
ask yourself, if you have that body part
and if so,
what does it look like?
For example,
Do I have eyes?
If so, what color are they?
And what do they look like?
And how big or small are they and how are they shaped?
Or for example,
do I have hair?
If so, what color is it?
What texture is it?
How long is it?
And where is it?
So that you can understand more of what this exercise entails,
I am going to invite two of my team members forward
to give you two examples.
So,
this is the picture that I drew
or painted.
I drew this more from intuition,
rather than a conscious intention,
and going through the certain elements
so it just kind of came to me.
From this drawing,
I... the first thing that I notice is that
it doesn't look very human,
so, which shows that I don't really
feel a belonging to the human race,
because of trauma, etc...
Another thing that I notice is
this shield that's surrounding me
it's almost...
when I painted it
the image that came to my mind is that it's very glittery
as well as translucent
and it's something that can retract.
I noticed that there's,
it's like a very beautiful shield
um yet, it's still a shield
which means that I feel very guarded,
is what I notice,
and it even shows in my lack of arms and legs
so I do have arms and legs in this photo
it's just that they're retracted
um, and they can come out at any time
what I've also read into this is that
I keep my defenses hidden
so it's not that I don't have any tools of defense
it's that... um...
I like to appear more innocent than I may be.
Another really interesting element to me
is these leaves that I have on the top of my head and my ears
and when I was feeling into that.
The leaf on my head, kind of resembled
this trying to stay in reality
because everything else about this feels very airy
and not very up there.
Um...
and so the leaves kind of ground me back into reality
and as well as even the leaves for ears
is so that I can perceive reality,
more in like, let's say the third dimension
more easily.
So as far as my hair goes
there's two gold coiled strands
that run on both sides of my face
and...
to me it represents
my feeling into other people,
it's almost like, you know, with an octopus with its tentacles
it has that similar feeling.
Where it can perceive how people feel
and what they think, and...
things outside of, I guess, 3d reality.
As far as my body type goes
I'm very small,
so it's almost about this tall...
um...
and I actually...
actually when I feel into this now
it's like I can actually grow bigger
it's just that there's like a very conscious choice to stay very very small.
Outwardly, this person that I drew
seems very soft and light,
I think because of the pastel like colors,
um where there's like this elegance,
this beauty...
but what I find interesting is this component of the black spirals
that I just felt like drawing,
which I think represents this other side of me
which feels more dark
and more, maybe contains more pain
but that's something that
instead of it being stagnant it's actually very moving.
The energy is moving,
which to me resembles the fact
that I actually pull upon this type of energy to create things.
And such as, creating that shield.
In terms of the skirt when I looked at it
I saw it as the part of me that is my emotional self.
So it's like everything that this being is kind of founded on
is this emotional component of it.
um
and so that's that's why I think blue to me,
because blue is very watery to me.
How do you feel about this exercise?
I feel like this exercise is really interesting
because I thought that I would have a harder time
when I was, kind of assigned to this, of what I would even draw,
but it actually came to me very quickly
and I think it's telling me a lot about myself
in terms of how I feel how I perceive myself,
and it even gives me a better idea
of how I may even come off to other people
based on what I'm drawing.
Or it's showing me also the discrepancy
between how I feel internally,
versus what I present externally.
Hi guys so this is my character,
I guess you could call it,
um, I want to start off by saying
that I felt like I was going to have no drawing skills whatsoever
so I don't want you to let that prevent you from doing this exercise
because it actually ended up being very fun.
So, this is what mine looks like.
I'm gonna describe to you what some of the elements mean to me,
what they represent.
So, it kind of came out to me
as this like, anime character
but if I had to like, give you what it feels like
it feels very physical still.
What this revealed to me is that
I feel very elven in a way,
and it's very strange because you know, in this life
I'm very identified with having blue eyes
but in this portrait it came out with these glowing green eyes
and I was really feeling into why that intuitively came to me,
and what I got was that
it keeps me very connected to the plant kingdom, in a way.
Which I do resonate with quite a bit,
with knowing a lot about herbs and medicines and things like that.
So I really feel like that kind of contains the essence of that
and it shows through my eyes.
My hair in this character is a platinum white/silver color.
Um, the reason I feel like it showed up that way
is because I perceive a lot of information
through, I guess you could say the crown chakra, right?
So it's almost like that hair represents a very clear connection
to the non-physical and to the divine
and receiving information that way.
When it comes to how I look,
I actually feel like my height would be very similar
to what my actual height is now.
So, I'm about six foot, right?
Um, the build though, is more muscular,
so I feel like I have more strength,
but what's really interesting is that the character, you know,
is completely male,
but as you saw, you know,
there's going to be a lot of elements to this appearance
that are a bit more like fluid in terms of, I guess, gender
in a way, in the terms that it expresses itself.
Um, so while it's a male it kind of feels like
there can be different ways of expression
that can also incorporate,
I suppose, more feminine qualities in a way.
So, I also have a green circlet
that goes over my forehead
and I really feel like that represents coming from some kind of royal lineage
or being a part of a royal family
where I feel like I have a really important role.
And it feels like the armor that I'm wearing
is a bit of a high-ranking armor,
so it feels like people that wear that
really have a high status in some way.
Um, you'll see that I had a blade,
and what was really interesting about it
is that, I'm not sure if you could see it from the photo
but it's got a glow to it
and the reason that it's like that, it's got this like purple red glow to it,
that has to do with me adding poison to it.
So, for me being connected to the plant kingdom
I'm well aware of what kind of plants and herbs I can use
to give myself an edge on my sword, so to speak.
Also, you'll see that I have a shield.
So, this shield actually looks like it's gonna be a weak shield
that you can penetrate through,
but it's actually an unbreakable wood that comes from the elven kingdom.
And I believe that I represent a warrior in this life in some way.
So, I feel like I really have this sword and the shield
because I need these tools in order to persevere
with whatever odds I have thrown at me,
whatever comes my way,
to be able to get through it, no matter what.
And you'll also see that there were no tattoos
or no piercings or anything like that
which is interesting because I have piercings and I have tattoos
but it felt like when I was doing this intuitively
that I didn't need anything additional on my body that way.
It's almost like I came into this life with everything that I needed.
How do you feel about this exercise?
And what I found to be super interesting
doing this exercise,
was that if you were to have asked me
to draw how I would have portrayed myself
in terms of how I represent myself
in terms of my actual appearance to other people,
I feel like it would have been a completely different drawing.
I feel like I would have had
a lot more of a skewed idea of what I actually look like
and how I actually appear to people, maybe, than I actually do.
So, I almost feel like by doing this exercise
it almost shows me a bit more of what my essence actually is
and what it actually feels like when I'm more in alignment,
versus, you know, looking at things
through the lens of pain or the lens of trauma,
or, you know, things just being morphed in such a way
that I'm not seeing myself very clearly.
So, what was really cool about this is I actually feel like I'm tuning in
and also tapping into my essence
in a more clear and direct way
than I normally would in my day-to-day life.
Remember that the sky is the limit as far as creativity goes.
So once you have made this drawing,
I want you to consider why you have drawn yourself in this way.
I want you to consider what all of these different features
that make up the way you think you really look
mean to you.
What does it mean about you and about your life?
Have a good week.
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I wanna thank you personally
for the bravery that you have to step into awareness.
I'll see you in the next video.
Subtitles by: Tanya Duarte www.tanyaduarte.com