WattMag: Spooky November Issue

Turning Point: Discovering Your True Self

Title: Turning Point:  Discovering Your True Self

Topic: What does “be yourself” mean?

Written by: WckdWzrd

To be yourself, you should do whatever you—

Whoa, hold it. We’re not going down that road. The whole internet is already filled with sappy quotes and how-to’s about you ‘being the true you’. You can search for those back-scratching articles yourself. I won’t go into that direction, though. So I say this with utmost candor: This will not be one of those. We want to start a turning point here, a starting line on a mental journey in achieving transcendence. Or maybe I’m only blabbering about random stuff, and I just sound like I actually know what I’m doing. Either way, this whole thing gives a little light to a simple question with a not-so-simple answer: What does it mean to be you?

Discovering yourself is hard enough; being yourself is social, emotional, and psychological torture. There will always be a hidden self behind every cheerleader, jock, nerd, pop star, or even an astronaut. Even Mulan has this issue. And you will always be amazed (and most probably disgusted) by how jeje you were two or three years ago, give or take. You hate that kid and want to bury him six feet below ground, but you can never deny the fact that that jeje kid was you. So how can you say that you really are being yourself? Who actually knows who himself is?

We all grew up in different places, with different customs, different choices and morals and situations, that it really is hard to keep track of each person’s personality to actually create a standard that can help us test ourselves if we really are being who we are.

But “No death, no doom, no anguish can arouse the surpassing despair which flows from a loss of identity,” written one of my favorite authors, H.P. Lovecraft, in his short story, Through the Gates of the Silver Key. And truly, identity crisis is one of the hardest problems to solve in this generation, especially by teenagers.

Who would you be like?  What should you be like? When and why should you be like this? We’re just so self-absorbed that we always struggle to stand out or be unique (trust me; those two are not the same), and get out of our shells to the point where we view rebellion as independence. But the thing is: you don’t have to force yourself to be someone you’re not or struggle for “freedom”. If you’re doing it the right way, discovering yourself is easier than pie.

Now, I’m not telling you to YOLO out and kill yourself in the process of self-discovery. I’m saying that in order to have an idea of who you are, you should examine yourself first in a smaller scale and know the factors on how to be yourself.

Before anything else, I just want to let you know that this is not based from scientific studies, but just from a wicked person’s analysis on stuff, and of course, some research. And in my analysis on the matter at hand, I observed that there are three parts in one’s identity:

a) The inevitable parts – the things that can’t be changed in one’s life, ever. Like your parentage or your birthday or your eye color. Whatever you do, these stuffs will still be a part of you until the day you die, and you can’t do anything about it.

b) The changeable parts– the things that don’t stay the same. It’s pretty self-explanatory. And I further classify these parts into two factors:

1)      Growth/development ­­– physical, emotional, mental, and spiritual growth. This change happens as we acquire knowledge, talents, and experience whenever new doors open for us.

2)      Decisions – the choices we make that often change the way we view the world. These are the paths we take when met with crossroads, which would then lead us to new, unexplored territory.

c) Your moral compass ­– your sense of right and wrong. Wherever you might get this – life lessons, rules, belief, analysis of the world, etc. – it will definitely serve as a guide as to how you might use the inevitable and changeable parts in discovering your true self.

These things only show us that you are not just a free spirit trying to get out of your cage. We all feel caged at some point in our lives, and it’s normal. But, like what Ecclesiastes 3:1 says, “There is a time for everything…” You don’t have to struggle free of that cage. Eventually, you’ll grow too big for it and they’ll have to let you free. And by the time, you’ll already know what you’re going to be.

So, when you’re asked again the question – What does it mean to be you? – consider these factors and not only your emotions. It might not be a very accurate standard, but it can help focus your thoughts into choosing what you want and need to be. You can follow some of it and leave the rest or you can not follow it at all, it’s still your choice.

All of us, at one point, were asked, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” But, I think, what we want to be is just a role we should play in becoming who we want to be – which is a very big decision to make. Just like how we treat each cell without a care and we view the universe as scary, there will be things that will be too small for us to concern ourselves about or too big for us to handle. In the end, there will always be things that can both change and enhance who we are; they could make us or break us, and we may have all or no control over them, but that’s what makes us ‘us’ – the inevitable and the changeable. And as long as we have a compass that would lead us to the right path, finding one’s self wouldn’t be such a torture.

So no, I’m not going to tell you to do whatever you want. That’s ridiculous. Instead, surprise yourself. Be unpredictable. Anyway, no one entirely knows who one’s self is until the end of his days.

And then go back and try to answer the big question again: What does it mean to be you?