For the longest time, I have lived with the underlying notion that there is something fundamentally wrong with me and have to hide myself from everyone.  This has led to a great deal of isolation and feeling inadequate around other people.  This sense of self has also led me to constantly look for other things to get involved in that will complete my perceived inadequate self, which always led to more feelings of not being enough and that I am need to work and try harder at whatever I am doing.  This has been particularly evident in my spiritual search thus far in my life where I have looked for spiritual practices or techniques to get 'more enlightened and awake', only to constantly feel that there is so much more I have to do.

What I am beginning to realize now is this:  The more I try to fix or escape from that feeling of inadequacy, the more I reinforce it as my sense of identity.  It has been easy for me in the past to know that fact on an intellectual level, but subtly still try to escape from it or fix it whenever is has arised in the moment.  Now I am learning to just be present with that feeling and gently recognize that is not who I am.  Even if I get caught up in believing in that false sense of identity, which I still frequently do, thats not a further confirmation that is there is actually something wrong with me.  In this moment, what if that feeling is just not true?

Thanks to those who commented on my first blog entry.  I appreciate your input.  I also wanted to share that about a week and a half ago I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, which was surprising at first but does explain a lot of the emotional difficulties I have dealt with.  Since the revelation, I have been feeling much more compassion for myself and not being as hard on myself about things, but I am also a bit worried about the possibility that I will identify with having bipolar and hiding behind that sense of identity to avoid taking true responsibility for myself.  I also started taking a mood stabilizer and worry a bit about whether I will use it as a crutch once it starts to take effect in a few weeks.

However, in moments of presence, I can realize that to worry about this is pointless, because if I try to stop myself from identifying with this, then I will just reinforce it.  Its the same thing as trying to stop myself from feeling that there is something wrong with me.  Its just the ego trying to stop itself from being a resistant ego, which is just more ego and can only lead to more resistance.  So, in the moment I can just allow all of this to be there without trying to get rid of it.  We will see how this goes....