Lost and Found

Do you know who you are?   Seems like a funny question as I was reading "What Happy People Know" by Dan Baker.  You can only be yourself - if you know who you are. " Finding yourself is just the begining", Baker writes, "The important thing is being yourself". 

Self evaluation is a way to "find yourself".  As a self help junkie, I'm continously spending time stepping outside myself and trying to see as others see.  Several years ago, I discovered the Johari methodology and tried to use that for any insight with friends and family.  Yesterday at lunch with T.H. (Vistage Bud), described my personality with the enneagram methodology.  But in both of these cases, the "finding" is elusive and incomplete. 

Baker's view is that your values and individual beliefs are what make you,   you.  "Without them, you -- as an individual -- cease to exist".  So from a list of 39 values he suggests you pick five or six (similar to the Johari exercise).  This is an extremely hard exercise.  Picking values is different than living values.  I think the real test is, after picking a value, to give an example where you have lived the value..... but that is best validated by those around you.

"Who we really are" - From "The Emporer's Club"