From “Am I?” to “I Am”

On the questions we carry, the approval we seek, and beginning from enoughness.

My wife recently took the step to begin her own practice as a spiritual director. As she moves through these beginning stages, the questions she is holding remind me so much of how my own journey into building the Movement Makers practice began almost three years ago.

Last week, coming back from our standing Sunday coffee and quiche date, we were talking about an upcoming conversation with someone who may choose to journey alongside her. The question arose: Am I the right person? Or even more transparently, what if I am not the right person?

I recognized that question immediately. Not just as something I had asked at the beginning of my own practice, but as something I had been asking for most of my life.

This questioning didn’t begin three years ago.

As the son of a father who was regularly emotionally unavailable outside of his rage, the question was already forming. Am I good enough to make him happy? As the son of a mother who was regularly in danger, it continued. Am I capable of keeping her safe? Am I capable of bringing her joy?

Am I. Am I.

So much of my existence was shaped by how I could be in service to the world around me without witnessing the vastness of what was true within me. My attention was directed outward, toward the people I loved, toward the gaze of those who could offer me approval, toward whatever direction could affirm that I was enough.

Those questions followed me throughout life. Through school, where I never really fit in. Am I cool enough? Am I smart enough? They followed me into early relationships, where the desire to be chosen held another opportunity to wonder about my worth. And they lived within my faith practice. Am I good enough to be saved? Am I Christian enough to make it to heaven? Am I faithful enough to be held true?

So much longing. So much wondering. So much of my attention held outside of me, waiting for an answer that I was certain lived somewhere out there.

The questions continued into my professional life, even as evidence began to accumulate that I was capable, that I belonged, that what I was building mattered.

Even at the height of what felt like success, stewarding a nonprofit that was growing, that was being recognized, I was still asking. Am I able to sustain this? Am I doing this for real? Am I capable? Is it because of this? Is it because of that? There was always another explanation to examine. Beneath every question about what was happening was the familiar wondering about my enoughness.

And then came my brief time as chief officer in philanthropy, where those questions reached their loudest. Am I good enough for this role? Am I qualified enough for this work? Am I doing this the right way? Am I getting it right?

So much prove-it energy. So much of myself directed toward winning an affirmative gaze, from my CEO, from community, from philanthropists, from anyone who might look at me and say yes.

Yes, you are enough. Yes, you belong. Yes, I validate your being.

The question had followed me from childhood into rooms where I held responsibility, where I had experience, where there was evidence of what I could do. And still, I was asking those rooms to tell me who I was.

Two words. Am I.

So much can live between them.

We begin to build an evidentiary practice around our existence. What happened becomes evidence of who we are. What didn’t happen becomes evidence of what we lack. I didn’t pass the test. Am I smart enough? I didn’t get the job. Am I qualified? The relationship didn’t become what I hoped. Am I desirable?

And the things that go well can become part of that same practice. The invitation arrives. The person chooses us. The work receives recognition. For a moment, the answer is yes. Until another room. Another relationship. Another opportunity to wonder.

Through the questions people ask, the tests we take, the social environments we enter, and the unspoken agreements within our families, we learn to examine ourselves through the responses of the world around us.

But there is another place from which to begin.

I often return to the acorn. A very small seed. Once buried in the earth, it begins to take root, but it doesn’t question its identity. Am I acorn enough to become an oak? Am I open enough to take root as I break through the ground? Is my trunk strong enough to hold the weight of these branches? Will these branches sustain the weight of acorns as they begin to cultivate again?

It simply does what it does because it is what it is. Its becoming begins with what it already is.

It is, therefore it does.

There is something in that image I want to carry into my own life. What feels seemingly unique to the human experience is this invitation to ask Am I? as if there isn’t already a deep knowing. Because when you know a thing, you don’t ask if it is indeed a thing. Am I supposes that the answer isn’t already present. It externalizes the search. It looks for confirmation from something outside of ourselves to determine what is true.

The answer was never out there.

The same two words. In a different order.

I am.

Am I enough? Yes. I am enough. Am I complete? Yes. I am complete. Am I held? Yes. I am held.

There is room within that acknowledgment to ask whether I have the experience a particular task requires, or whether I am the right fit to walk alongside someone in this season. Those questions can guide how I prepare, what I offer, when I step aside. They do not have to decide whether I am worthy of being here.

I am allows curiosity to pave the way where critique closes the door. Where the critique of am I shuts the door before I am able to step into the threshold of possibility.

When I begin with I am, the world around me is still there. There are still relationships to tend, responsibilities to hold, things to learn. I can enter those experiences with something already known within me.

My being does not have to wait for an affirmative gaze.

Even as I write this, I can hear the familiar challenge. Who are you to believe that about yourself? Who are you to stand ten toes on what you declare yourself to be?

I am is the answer to that.

I’m not sure where these words might find you, or what question you have been carrying. Perhaps today you can pause with it long enough to hear what you are asking. Is there something you need to learn? Something you need to discern? Or are you waiting for the world to grant you permission to be enough?

When that familiar question returns, there is an invitation to return with it. To witness the universe within you. To let your next step begin from what is already here.

Am I enough?

Yes.

I am.