“Be yourself; everyone else is already taken”
– Oscar Wilde
Don’t waste your time and energy being someone else, be yourself.
In the 1960s Frank Abagnale is reported to have assumed at least eight identities, including, lawyer, teacher, doctor and airline pilot. His infamy turned to fame when Leonardo DiCaprio played him in the movie Catch Me If You Can.
Abagnale served five years in prison for being someone else. Wilde served two years in prison for being himself.
Abagnale found peace only when he became himself. Wilde’s peace came from being himself.
As Oscar wrote, “It is only by realising what I am that I have found comfort of any kind… To regret one’s own experiences is to arrest one’s own development. To deny one’s own experiences is to put a lie into the lips of one’s own life.”