Parker Palmer captures it very well in this quote, "Vocation does not come from a voice ‘out there’ calling me to become something I am not. It comes from a voice ‘in here ‘calling me to be the person I was born to be, to fulfill the original selfhood given me at birth by God."

It is a strange gift this birthright of self. Accepting it turns out to be even more demanding than attempting to become someone else! I have sometimes responded to that demand by ignoring the gift, or hiding it, or fleeing from it, or squandering it-and I think I am not alone. There is a Hasidic tale that reveals, with amazing brevity, both the universal tendency to want to be someone else and the ultimate importance of becoming one’s self: Rabbi Zuysa, when he was an old man, said, "in the coming world, they will not ask me: ‘why were you not Moses?' They will ask me; ‘why were you not Zuysa?’”

Question: There are two present at all times in your life: You and God! He will be him, will you be the you he made?

Meditation: Are you thankful for you! Or do you fight God’s original design? As a Christian, becoming more like Jesus also releases more of what God has intended us to be and wired us to be. Put a Simpler way, Jesus makes you a better you! That is why when you surrender you, you find you!

Scripture:

'You made all the delicate, inner parts of my body and knit me together in my mother’s womb. Thank you for making me so wonderfully complex! Your workmanship is marvelous—how well I know it. You watched me as I was being formed in utter seclusion, as I was woven together in the dark of the womb. You saw me before I was born. Every day of my life was recorded in your book. Every moment was laid out before a single day had passed.'

- Psalms 139:13-16 (NLT)