Sounds cold and reptilian doesn’t it . . . ?
Well it was. That was me. I had built my life around being the perfect fit-in chameleon. It was like I could smell how people felt and what they needed and wanted, and I would adapt myself to fit that picture. I did it with different groups of friends and in relationships I would mould myself as the perfect girlfriend and fit to what I thought was needed.
I would use this talent in bed as well, to make sex amazing for my partners, as I instinctively knew what they liked. However, I would then be left feeling the emptiness of the lack of connection and then resent my partner and the relationship.
My relationships would only last about 3 to 6 months. I would get over playing the role and I would start to feel that something was missing here: I was missing just being me! All the “I love you’s” I had said and the care I had shown was empty, as it was never really me. I had been living with that emptiness within my relationships for so long, with partners and in friendships alike.
I didn’t know who I was anymore: I was interchanging so much I had no memory of me and what it was like to just be me.
Through a friend I met an amazing woman, Natalie Benhayon, who has continued to be a true role model for me. I began attending healing sessions with Natalie and found working with her was supporting me to come back to re-connecting with myself after all these years. I was receiving bodywork regularly, but even just simply talking honestly about how I was feeling as a woman helped me discover more of who I really am . . . beneath the Chameleon.
As I have learnt to build trust in myself and to open up and share not only with Natalie but with many other close friends on a deep level, I have developed and grown to be my own woman, something I had long left behind.
Now I have been re-finding me, getting to know myself deeply, not in the fluffy spiritual sense, but in a simple ways, like:
- Taking myself on lots of first dates
- Finding out what I like to eat
- Discovering what places I like to go to
- Exploring what perfumes I like to wear
- Learning what music I really like
- Discovering how I laugh and smile for me, not for everyone else.
Just being me is like finding the rainbow complete with the pot of gold at the end. I have found the Holy Grail . . . the familiar feeling of running into an old friend, Me!! I now have a sense of not needing to look outside of me anymore to make myself feel loved.
I am enjoying the imperfect and sometimes wobbly process of my rebuilding, looking back at where I was and where I am now and where I will be. I cannot help but smile when I look at how far I have come. I am looking forward to the next steps – like a gardener who keeps adding to and maintaining the beautiful space that has been created.
The beautiful, tender, delicate and super scrumptious woman I am has been hidden under that yucky self-made reptilian chameleon coat for too long. Inspired by Natalie Benhayon’s example, I have realised that I can uncover the real me by simply re-connecting deeply with myself and the woman I truly am.
I have found enjoyment in the small things, like asking myself what I want to eat and cooking yummy foods, taking time in the mornings and not rushing out the door, spending those small moments appreciating who is looking back at me in the mirror. This has been a world of discovery, seeing my beautiful playful face in the mirror and enjoying me.
It has really been great to meet people when I am feeling so amazing and to have them light up when they spend time with me, as me . . . My relationships with others have changed, I am more open to enjoying another person’s company with ease as I now have the confidence to just be me.
Over the past few years Natalie Benhayon has been a true inspiration and role model of how to be a real woman. Her strength and powerful emanation of a woman is something I know I also have equally, but over the years had forgotten. The more I connect to the true me, the more I can feel the old falling away and the true me beaming through. As I live from this I can see all women have the same innate tenderness, power and strength; it has just been forgotten and buried under the ideals of what we believe society wants us to be.
By Nicole Wise, Student, Northern Rivers
Further Reading:
What Happens When You Meet Natalie Benhayon?
What Defines a True Woman? – Returning to Be-You-Ty
629 Comments
Let’s face it until we know ourselves deeply and truly, we are all chameleons
Reading your blog today Nicole, has reminded me how far I have come in the past five years as a student, in the past I was always giving myself away to the needs of others, I, like you didn’t know what I really liked or really thought, so it has been a rediscovery of me little by little and in this I am learning to love and appreciate me, for I know there is much more to uncover and appreciate.
I used to be a bit of a chameleon too and would almost pride my self by the fact that I had different friends according to the different aspects of my life. At the time I thought this was great, but when I tried to bring them together it wasn’t so great. What I realise now is that we are all the same on the inside, and by accepting everyone for who they are it matters not one iota what another does. It makes for true and harmonious relationships with everyone.
Thank you Nicole, it shows us that we are part of a greater whole, yet have and bring our unique flavor to it. We yet have to get to know ourselves in full, so that we can let all that previous shaping into a chameleon go.
Indeed, Natalie is inspiring as she doesn’t live to any pictures and roles but is just herself in all that she does. She knows her depth, her quality and is very confident in this and this is very inspiring.
Just a little bit of time in the morning to appreciate ourselves and feel how delicate and beautiful we are can make such a difference to the day and what choices we make.
“I have found the Holy Grail . . . the familiar feeling of running into an old friend, Me!” So many of us, me included have spent so much time looking to the answer to the burning question – who am I? – outside of ourselves and as we did we moved further and further away from the true answer. The crazy thing we have always had this answer, all we had to do is stop and turn our gaze inward.
Fitting in is so simple and a game of protection most of us play and could this be a love-less exercise that keeps us from the loving beings we all naturally are? The truth is we need no protection or fitting in as a chameleon, and if we think we do then it becomes impossible to reconnect to the love that is within our inner-heart.
The game you share here Greg has become so subtle in how it can have us ‘thinking’ we are on track but sooner or later we get to feel that what we thought was true is far from what is felt to be true when we connect to being real and honest about life.
Thank you for this blog – I lit up when I saw it again because I am also working on my tendency to be like a chameleon but for me I feel it is less calculated and more like a defence mechanism. In life instead of being myself, I choose to blend in, to take on behaviours outside of myself to remain a part of the background and defend myself by losing myself and fitting in. Either way, it is slowing rebuilding connection to the body and to who I am – living that – that is important.
I recognise the chameleon who changed to be accommodating for everyone, and sadly I was under the illusion that this was a good thing. It is only through people like Natalie Benhayon that I have learnt that how far from the truth this is and how harming it is to knowing who I truly am.
The innate power which we hide so clever by all not loving patterns but we all know that we need to open up and live our truth once again.
This is a pattern I am very familiar with. A chameleon that adapts to whatever is needed without a consideration for what it is that actually supports me and others – with no commitment to me being who I truly am. This blog exposes the games we play and the act we put on to be what we think others want, but this leaves us with no true sense of ourselves.
I used to be a chameleon as well- I came a loooong way with that…As it is not that obvious anymore, I observe myself / am being aware of very precisely where I don’t stay in my authority with all that I am, realise and emanate when I am with someone. As it does give a strong reflection, which makes people possibly react, it is about not shying away from that- even though I could sense the reaction before. It is uncomfortable because you won´t be everybody´s darling but it is the only way to reflect the truth in full.
Loved reading your blog Nicole it’s Gold! It does not seem a ‘big thing’ but it is truly profound having the confidence and ease to be all of you and en-joy yourself while in relationships. “My relationships with others have changed, I am more open to enjoying another person’s company with ease as I now have the confidence to just be me.” How many can truly say that they are all of them in relationships?.. this is the beauty of Universal Medicine and all that it offers.
This sentence jumped out… we can spend a lifetime trying to please others and then a revelation – “I have found the Holy Grail . . . the familiar feeling of running into an old friend, Me!!” The day I found this in me, life simplified, it got deep and wide like a river and the effort of always pushing upstream trying to be something I am not is dropping away.
I love this sharing and can so relate to it. I am learning to give myself space in each situation and to learn how I feel about things. Learning to express myself and what I like or what would work for me, it is freeing for all when you do this as it allows them to do the same.
Nicole, I love this; ‘Taking myself on lots of first dates, Finding out what I like to eat, Discovering what places I like to go to, Exploring what perfumes I like to wear, Learning what music I really like, Discovering how I laugh and smile for me, not for everyone else.’ This is very gorgeous and makes me realise how often we compromise to please others and how we often put others first.
Realising that I have acted like a pretzel most of my life was huge – it was an amazing and freeing feeling to recognise how I had learnt to bend and twist myself to fit in with people and situations, because then i could begin to change this behaviour and begin to be more of who I really am in life
“Just being me is like finding the rainbow complete with the pot of gold at the end. I have found the Holy Grail” Ah so true and its free!
One of the most revealing places where we are a chameleon, as you say, is in the way we speak. We are so used to changing our expression according to our environment that, if observed from afar the average person would be exhibiting signs of split personality at the drop of a hat. The thing is once we discover who we are our true voice will never change, and we ourselves can just be who we truly are
What a celebration this blog is – to now appreciating and enjoying your face and the depth in your eyes reflected back at you in the mirror Nicole.
“This has been a world of discovery, seeing my beautiful playful face in the mirror and enjoying me.”
Being a chameleon is such a hard and exhausting job, and one with no job satisfaction. Trying to be a different person with everyone you meet is actually an impossible job because as soon as there are two people with you, who do you choose to be? Far simpler just to be you.
It is much simpler- absolutely agree- but also more comfortable to stay in the pleasing role everyone needs or does not rock the boat too much. So the decision is: comfort versus responsibility.
Oh the release of the shackles!! I have been a chameleon, an adaptable human being…making sure I cover every base with everyone so that not a single person has an opportunity or excuse to not like me. I’ve changed my ways for the better, and whilst at times I get caught out by my old tricks, for the most part, I’m a lot more comfortable presenting myself as me and I’m less attached to how people might respond.
When we discard the false protection of the cloak of many colours we discover the truth of who we naturally are is there within us and we can have fun “appreciating who is looking back at me in the mirror”.
This is the journey of getting to know YOU. How many people say, “I don´t know who I am deep inside”. Allowing and having the courage to peel off the layers we consciously put on, will show you the real you again. And I can say out of experience even my face changed immensely letting go of all the cloak of colours I chose to wear out of protection and comfort.
One of the most liberating experience there is is to simply be able to be ourselves in all environments and with everyone equally
‘The more I connect to the true me, the more I can feel the old falling away and the true me beaming through’. Beautifully said Nicole.
Really there is no greater price then the love we find that was there all along.
Reading this has confirmed and clarified for me something I have felt for a while. I do feel very open and I want to be with people when I am myself. The only time I don’t want to be with people is when I believe that I have to be something I am not. So simple and it feels pretty cool to have what was once so confusing now clarified.
ˇseeing my beautiful playful face in the mirror and enjoying me.” yes you are very playful and its always a joy to meet you. Thank you for sharing.
Hey Nicole, this is an amazing description of how it feels like to fall in love with yourself – you’ve really captured the magic that is possible. I completely understand when you say you love the imperfect moments, and all the small moments of rebuilding – and I love how you describe all the different ways you got to know you. The relationship we have with ourselves is one billion percent worth building and developing all the time.
Thank you Nicole – you have shared what I am sure many of us have experienced growing up and also in life in general. I know I certainly did but often thought at the time, I was alone in feeling this. The roles we play to be accepted, recognised and feel a sense of belonging, all of which in the end, when we are with ourselves leave us feeling at a loss of who we truly are. Like you I also have discovered that there is no greater confirmation of who we are than being who we are. You have summed it up beautifully how enriching it is to live in connection to who we are – ‘As I live from this I can see all women have the same innate tenderness, power and strength; it has just been forgotten and buried under the ideals of what we believe society wants us to be.’
For years I perfected my chameleon act and then felt short-changed that others seemed not to ‘get’ me! It has been so revealing to peel off the layers and let go of the need to fit in and for me the joy I am finding in exploring my relationship with myself is reflected in the deeper connections that are emerging with others.
For starters I love the pics with this article !! And yes until we know ourselves we cannot help BUT be a chameleon… because the only way not to be IS to know who we are
The moment we stop looking outside of ourselves to be loved is the moment we finally take responsibility for our own lives. When we love ourselves we have everything we could possibly want.
“As I have learnt to build trust in myself and to open up and share not only with Natalie but with many other close friends on a deep level, I have developed and grown to be my own woman, something I had long left behind.” It is so important to start to share who we are with not just the ones we trust but with everyone. I often find how I am myself with people close to me and who know me, but can hide a whole part of myself with people I am not so close with, and try to make them like me instead of being real and truthful without fear of them thinking I am awkward. Thinking about it, it is so strange how we can most parts of our lives not be ourselves! And then wondering why we don’t feel the full joy of living…
If we are not ourselves in life, eventually things come unstuck. I was very much a chameleon too Nicole but through the inspiration of Natalie and Miranda Benhayon in particular, have learnt to be and to value myself and the flavour I bring to people and life as unique and important. It is so much more enjoyable and easy to live this way.
Someone I knew some time back, used to say all the time when they saw me, your such a chameleon, and I used to think that was a good thing and that it meant I was changing all of the time. But I think what was really happening there is that I was changing myself to fit in to different circumstances, or trying to find the real me within life.
I wonder how many women (and men!) could say the same or similar about the inspiration and life changing interactions they have with Natalie Benhayon? My guess is in the 1000’s. The thing is, Natalie Benhayon is not special – the difference is that she has committed and dedicated herself to living and expressing who she is at all times and that’s the reflection that changes so many lives around her. We can all do the same.
I agree Natalie is not special but she is extraordinary and she is showing us all that we too are extraordinary, all we have to do is chuck out the game playing and work on being our true selves until we can consistently live that.