#158: I Am Who You Want Me To Be.
Am I Swiss or actually from Liechtenstein? The answer is simple and straight forward.
«I am who you want me to be.»
What difference does it make anyway?
When given the choice between the familiar and anything new, we tend to go with the familiar. It gives us that cozy and warm feeling of knowing what to expect. Not that we really knew, but we can tell ourselves that we believe to know.
Familiarity is a story well told.
Why not change that narrative?
«There’s a common belief among anthropologists that you must immerse yourself in an unfamiliar world in order to truly understand your own.»
By Annie Braddock in The Nanny Diaries
What if you were in someone else’s shoes?
What if you were a grain of sand?
What if your assistant actually owned the company?
What if I just imagined…
I like the idea of not knowing. It opens up a world of possibility. Interestingly, imagination isn’t limitless. What holds us back is our experience. There is ample evidence that we struggle to imagine anything we have never experienced.
The formula is simple. In order expand your imagination, you just have to experience something new. Oh, so that is what it takes!
There is nothing wrong with pretending to be someone else, to come from another country, to have another profession, thus trying to experience what it would be like.
When asked whether I am Swiss or Liechtensteiner, I normally reply that I am Swiss when it serves me well. On all other occasions, I feel and behave like and therefore am a proper Liechtensteiner… whatever that means to someone else?
Can you imagine?
