“Who the heck do I think I am, anyway?” I backed into this fundamental question as a result of my obsession with finding my life’s purpose. For years I focused on what I did, or what I thought I was supposed to do.

I knew I had a higher purpose, and believed it was in the form the work took. At one point, I left a high-paying position in a corporate setting to work at a nonprofit. My rationale? Working at a nonprofit was clearly more spiritual than working at a profit-oriented corporation. Helping others certainly ranked higher than making money. And, truth be told, I was feeling guilty that I was making quite a bit of it.

Four years later I rejoined the corporate rat race, taking seriously an exchange with Ken Wapnick, renowned teacher of A Course in Miracles, at a weekend workshop I attended. I cannot recall the specifics, only that I had been telling him about my disappointment in learning that nonprofit entities had the same characteristics I disliked in the world of business and looked to avoid: politics, competition, and divisiveness. I sought his guidance on how to handle these elements. His gentle–yet pointed–comments taught me that it wasn’t where I worked that mattered but what I brought to the table.

Now a new question emerged. “How do I want to be?” Ah, now I was onto something! No longer focusing on external form, I worked to identify the characteristics I longed to possess, or, if I had them, to exhibit more often and consistently. Kindness, compassion, understanding, and love topped the list. I deliberately returned to a difficult environment to strengthen my resolve and capacity to be a better person. I was certain I could be kind, compassionate, understanding, and loving. I simply needed to focus being more so.

Before too long, given mediocre results at best, and with the feeling I was swimming upstream, it dawned on me that I still wasn’t getting to the heart of the issue. Another, more fundamental question needed asking. “Who am I?”

Initially, I answered the question based on my relationships: daughter, wife, mother, sister. My job: accountant, IBM employee, executive. My health and physical status: active, medically well, physically fit, financially secure. Through personal growth workshops and study, I could take it to another level. I found myself answering, “I am kind, I am loving, I am funny, I am intelligent.” Better, but still feeling as if I wasn’t answering the big kahuna question.

“WHAT AM I?” I finally admitted I was still basically clueless. I asked my heart—not my head—to get to the bottom of things. I had been terrified to ask, afraid of the answer. Some of the terror resulted from beliefs instilled by my Catholic upbringing. I needed to clear my head of every concept I felt safe with and held dear, which meant questioning premises I took for granted, and upon which every previous answer was based.

Inherent in all my responses was the firmly held, unquestioned belief, “I am a body.” Is this true? My willingness to sincerely consider the question increased, as did my receptiveness to key statements from A Course in Miracles teachings. A Course in Miracles states, “The body is a fence the Son of God imagines he has built, to separate parts of his Self from other parts. It is within this fence he thinks he lives, to die as it decays and crumbles. For within this fence he thinks that he is safe from love. Identifying with his safety, he regards himself as what his safety is.”

When I experience fear, guilt, and suffering, I’ve chosen to identify with the body. My problems come down to one: a case of mistaken identity. I’m not what I think I am. Oh, thank God! If I’m not a body, with what do I identify? From A Course in Miracles: “Love is your safety. Fear does not exist. Identify with love and you are safe. Identify with love, and you are home. Identify with love and find your Self.” Now we’re talking!

I recently reread the Bhagavad Gita (The Song of God) as translated by Swami Prabhavananda and Christopher Isherwood. The introduction to the book by Aldous Huxley notes that a fundamental doctrine, upon which every major religion is in agreement, is that “man’s life on earth has only one end and purpose: to identify himself with his eternal Self and thereby come into knowledge of God.”

Jesus, whose birth is celebrated as Christmas around the world, is a perfect role model for anyone seeking to know God and learn the truth of his identity. He was not afraid to claim his Divine Identity and his relationship with God, whom he called Father. He taught only love because he recognized that as a Son of God, that was what he was. He encouraged us to do the same; he assured us we had this same relationship to God.

Last year, I wrote, “For me, the birth and life of Jesus is meant to inspire, encourage, and teach how to find, honor, and make visible the Christ within us. Christ means God, or love, manifested through the individual.”

I am no longer haunted by the questions, “What should I do? How should I be? Who am I?” Thankfully I’ve found my answer to these questions and the yearning that identified them, along with an Inner Guide to help me choose wisely. In the words of the Beatles, “…all you need is love, love is all you need.”

May you awaken to the truth of your identity this holiday season, and experience the glad tidings of hope, joy, and peace that the birth and life of Jesus is meant to teach.