The Necessity and Magic of Asking ‘What am I?’
The story of the eagle in the chicken coop shows why we need to ask this question and how to find an answer
In 2005, my life felt thoroughly boring — despite a successful international career as a scientist and entrepreneur. I longed to do something new, but I was at the forefront of an international movement. If I stopped what I was doing, many people would be affected. So, I did not have the courage to do what I knew I should do. But things turned out so favorably for me that I could end my career in 2009 gently. I started a new career as a mindset coach. But that didn’t really satisfy me either, and I was quickly bored again. Providence struck once more, and in 2011 I heard a woman talk about her experience exploring the question ‘What am I?‘. I was electrified — and hooked. From that day on, I wanted to find out what I am.
The question ‘Who am I?’ is about finding out what kind of human I am among all humans. The question ‘What am I?’ goes much deeper. It is about finding out what it means to be a human; what the full potential of a human is. With this question, I am not only questioning myself, but all of humankind. The following story illustrates what I mean.
One day, an eagle laid an egg in a chicken coop. The egg hatched and the newborn eagle learned from its peers how to live like a chicken. Life was OK — except for a yearning that made it seek. But none of what it found truly satisfied its yearning.
Would it help if someone told the eagle that it is not a chicken, but an eagle? No, this would not help. The eagle has learned to “be” a chicken; it carries a “chicken program” that tells it how to behave under which circumstances. It feels safe and comfortable “being” a chicken — except for the yearning.
Would it help if the eagle attended an eagle seminar in order to learn to be an eagle? No, this would not help either. Learning to be an eagle would install an eagle program that would overlay the chicken program. Then it would be an eagle who believes it is a chicken who has learned to behave like an eagle. This would be even more confusing than continuing to live as a chicken.
The only way for the eagle to be what it truly is, is to free itself from the chicken program.
But: Why did the eagle’s mother lay her egg in a chicken coop in the first place? Because she also lives in the chicken coop and believes that she is a chicken. In fact, ALL birds in the chicken coop are eagles who believe that they are chickens — and this has been so for thousands upon thousands of years.
This story is obviously a metaphor for humankind. We are like the eagle in the chicken coop. We, too, copy the way of life of our parents and peers. We carry a human chicken program that tells us how to behave in what situation. This leads us to live a limited life, in which we develop only a fraction of our potential.
This is not about a valuation between eagles and chickens. Eagles are no better than chickens. They are different. This is about ending up in the wrong life because we grow up among those who have ended up in the wrong life in the same way. And it is about how to find our true life, our true nature.
What is our true nature? What is our eagleness? For an answer, let’s look at those who are closest to the true nature of humans: children. Children are constantly asking ‘Why?’ and ‘Why not?’ with all their senses and listening for answers in countless ways. As a result, they grow physically and mentally at an enormous pace. As a result, they enjoy life to the fullest. There is nothing more beautiful than watching a child explore the world. So, children whose biological needs such as food, water, warmth, etc are met are role models for a truly fulfilling life.
Growing from curiously exploring the world is our true nature. It is our eagleness.
But the deeply fulfilling life we had when we were little ended when we grew up. It ended because we copied our parents’ way of life. We live our parents’ lives — with slight modifications. Our parents live (or lived) their parents’ lives — with slight modifications. And so on. This goes back to the beginning of humankind.
What happened back then? Biologically, we are apes. But we are more than apes, or we would still live in forests and climb trees. Our specifically human characteristic is that we can behave in ways other than follow our behavioral programs. A long time ago, we started to use this ability. We behaved slightly differently than apes. Each new generation copied the behavior of the previous generation and behaved slightly differently again. Thus, we moved further and further away from the life of an ape. After thousands upon thousands of years, the way of life we have today emerged.
One could argue that there are many ways of life on this planet. A Japanese person lives differently from a US-American person. You live differently from your neighbor. But these differences are superficial. Common to all human ways of life is an idea, developed over tens of thousands of years, of what a human is, what the human potential is, and how to live as a human. Cultural, religious, national, regional, familial, and individual peculiarities augment this idea. Taken together, this makes up the box that mentally imprisons a person. I call it the human box. It comprises countless programs.
The human box is nothing but the human chicken program.
The necessity of asking ‘What am I?’ is that it is the only way to fulfill the longing that is within you, and that is rooted in your childhood experience of having lived your true nature as a child. As in the case of the eagle in the chicken coop, nothing you have learned to seek can really satisfy that longing. Just as the eagle must free itself from the chicken program, you too must free yourself from the human chicken program — the human box. This will fulfill your longing.
The simple formula is that if you remove what you are not, what remains is what you are. I started doing this in 2011 — and I’m still working on it, because freeing yourself from tens of thousands of years of human programming is a life’s work. I have had the experience that once you choose this path from the bottom of your heart, magic happens, just as Goethe expressed it:
“Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness… the moment one definitely commits oneself, then Providence moves, too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise have occurred… boldness has genius, power, and magic in it. Begin it now.” (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)
Therefore, all it takes to find out what you really are is for you to want to know — and commit to wanting to know. Then start listening — and let the magic of what’s happening carry you forward. After over ten years, I’m still riding the magic wave that began for me in 2011. In my article “Why I Isolated Myself Socially for 3.5 Years — and What Came Out of It,” I talk about the beginnings and early years of my exploration of the question ‘What am I?’. In my article “The 7-Step Method to Become What You Truly Are,” I give an overview of what I‘ve done over the last decade, summarized as a method.
Exercises
To begin, it is also helpful to tune into your true nature. Below are three exercises that will therefore help you embark on an exciting voyage to become what you truly are and what is guaranteed to satisfy your longing:
Exercise 1: Think back to your childhood — before you started school. How did you spend a typical day? What did you enjoy doing the most? What changed when you started school? Make a list of the plans and dreams you have had as a child.
Exercise 2: Consider your life now. Compare it to the lives of your parents. What is the same, what is similar, what is different? Which of the plans and dreams you had as a child have you fulfilled? Make a list of the plans and dreams you have today.
Exercise 3: Take the two lists from the previous exercises: your plans and dreams as a child and your plans and dreams today. For each item on these lists, think about how you could make it happen.
You can find a plethora of exercises in my book “Being Free : Get Out of the Box — The Method With 99 Exercises.”
Further (supplementary) readings:
Article “Why I Isolated Myself Socially for 3.5 Years — and What Came Out of It”
Article “The 7-Step Method to Become What You Truly Are”
Book “Being Free : Get Out of the Box — The Method With 99 Exercises”
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