What You Actually Do Matters Most of All...

Since your self, reputation, name, and identity are stories you and others tell about you, what you actually do matters.

What you actually do, your actions, matter more than your appearance, beliefs, opinions, education, IQ, career, income, or anything else.

What you do changes things. It affects others. It affects the world, the entire universe. 

Others remember what you do. That’s what they tell stories about. You are the story you and others tell about what you actually do. 

Your Identity, Part 2: Your Reputation

Your reputation is central to your identity. It’s the combination of two things:

1.    The story of your outstanding deeds

2.    Opinions formed about your outstanding deeds

First, your reputation is what others repeat about you. Others talk about you. They tell stories of your outstanding deeds. 

Some stories they tell about you, they witnessed. Others they heard others tell about you. Either way, they do not repeat your entire life-story. They can’t. They only tell the stories that made an impression on them.

They made an impression because they were interesting to them. The deeds a person picks to tell others say as much about the person who picks them as you.

More important than what others say about you is what you actually do and tell others about yourself. You are the author of your reputation. No one knows better than you what you did that was outstanding.

You were there. You did the deeds. You live with the consequences of your deeds.

Secondly, there are opinions of your outstanding deeds. Whether others are witnesses of or gossipers about your outstanding deeds, they form opinions about them. They judge them in either favorable or unfavorable ways. 

Their opinions of your outstanding deeds are their opinions of you. They are your public reputation.

More important than other’s opinions of your deeds, is your opinion.

Always interpret your outstanding deeds in the most favorable light. Be truthful and honest; that is, tell the truth about what you did in a way that honors you.

Give yourself an honorable reputation. Share it with others so they have favorable stories about you to tell.

Ego as Story

In Life Therapy your self, your ego, is not an abstract psychological concept. It’s not your psyche. Neither is it your soul or a metaphysical Higher Self. Most important of all, your ego is not a bad thing. It’s not a problem to eliminate. 

Your ego is a narrative. It’s your life-story. You don’t have a life-story. You are a life-story. You have no invisible self apart from your life-story.

You are “live and in progress” right now. You are creating your self, your life-story, with every action you take.

You’re making your self up as you go. Like a musician improvising music never played before or again, you’re improvising your life. Like improvised music, you’re a once-in-forever, here-and-gone, creation in time. 

From this point forward, be aware of your self-as-story.