“Who are you?  And what are you doing here?”

According to a story I recently heard, these were the questions a Roman soldier barked at the famous teacher Rabbi Akiva in the first century.

Lost in thought on his walk home, the rabbi missed his turn and, instead of ending up at his house (I picture him as a bungalow with a lot of books kind of guy), found himself standing outside a heavily guarded Roman military post.

Startled, the rabbi then asked the soldier: 

“How much do they pay you to stand up there?”

“Two drachmas a week,” the soldier replied.

“I’ll pay you double that if you stand outside my house every morning and ask me those exact same two questions.”

My first thought here was “How much is this rabbi making that he can afford his own Roman soldier?”

But then the realization hit me that that these are questions we should be asking ourselves more often.

Who am I?  And what am I really doing here?

When I’m living my life on autopilot, I’m much more likely to be pondering deep questions like “How many meetings do I have today,” or “Do I have spinach in my teeth?”

Maybe we could all benefit from pausing for a bit & ask ourselves better questions.

Life feels endless when we’re panting on the treadmill & sitting through mandatory training sessions.

But it is finite.

So is it really worth spending such a large percentage of it in a lukewarm situation, just trying to make it to the weekend?

If the answers to those questions leave you feeling disconnected, unmotivated or like you’re living someone else’s version of your life, maybe it’s time for a reset.

Ladies, let’s figure it out together.  Send me an email at [email protected] or schedule a free consultation.

P.S.  I like to imagine the soldier took the rabbi up on his offer, realized he was onto something, recruited a few of his fellow soldiers, and accidentally became the founder of Rome's first self-awareness franchise.