I don’t feel as though I’m making progress anymore, and I don’t mean that I feel stagnant. It’s more that I feel trapped. Like, I’m waiting to be released from something and I’m not quite sure what it is, but I’m waiting patiently for it to let me go. I think somewhere along the way I stopped choosing myself. Like, I stopped choosing to be me—the real me.
What’s the point of life if we can’t be ourselves?
What’s the point of being alive if no one else is there to witness us as our truest self? Why does it feel as though life is this ridiculous battle to belong somewhere, and even after we finally do we’re still never fully accepted for who we actually are?
Instead, we’re shunned and outcasted for being too vulnerable. For being vulnerable at all. For showing weakness. For being anything less than light and bright—for showing any trace of that shadowy darkness that we all have to carry.
What’s the point of living if all we’re really able to do is show off all our different masks to people?
The masks we create for work, the mask for our aquaintances, different masks for our closest friends. We have masks for the strangers we meet and the people we love—including that person looking back at us in the mirror, (and whether they’re a stranger or someone you love is a topic for another day).
I don’t like masks, and the idea of playing pretend as an adult is ridiculous. Yet, here I am… choosing to be someone I’m not because the rejection I feel whenever I don’t is so much worse. So, what do I do? Pretend until I die? Fake it ’til I make it? Am I supposed to wait patiently until the mask solidifys into a new personality?
If we’re not allowed to be ourselves where we are, then where do we go to belong? Where do I find people on my wavelength? Is it obvious and I’m just oblivious? I don’t think it’s just me… from where I’m standing, it really does seem like we’re all attempting to portray the idea of having our shit together when in reality like we’re doing a lot better than we actually are.
Is it easier to live when we don’t know we can choose to be who we are?
Why do we work so hard to receive love from others while we neglect to give any of that love to ourselves, and why is it treated like it’s an achievement when we do? Why do we strive to be adored and cherished via social acceptance and external validation when the only person who actually matters the most is right here patiently waiting for our love?
And why do we run away from vulnerability? Why do we run away from the faults in our humanness—the embarrassments , honesty, and lessons—that lead to growth, but come from mistakes? Why are we so afraid to connect, to be real, to say how we actually feel? And why do we encourage everyone who is trying to heal to ‘disappear’, and then suddenly pop back up as if that old version of them never even existed?
There’s something really disconcerting about the whole ‘winter arc, disappear and come back healed, don’t let them see your weakness’ thing. It’s almost as though society is saying ‘yes, healing is good but it’s shameful, so be quiet and don’t talk about it’. Is this perception I have true? Or is it just bullshit people sell us so they don’t have to experience the awkward misery that comes with learning to take responsibility for your life.
Why does it feel like choosing to be human is shameful?
Sometimes I feel as though I’ll never catch up. I’m never going to be healed enough or good enough. I’m never going to meet society’s standards, and I’m always going to stand out as different because of my life experiences—given to me without my consent, and here to stay for the foreseeable remainder of my entire life.
Maybe I’ll never know enough to get it all just right. Instead, I might just continue to embarrass myself while I try to figure it out. Who am I supposed to be? What am I supposed to do in this life? Because I know I’m not only here to mess everything up over and over again. There has to be more to progress than repeatedly failing and hoping for things to get just a tiny bit better with each try.
But isn’t that what we’re supposed to call growth?
Actual growth, not the self-help, toxic positivity growth, where we pretend as though everything is great now that we’re on the other side of whatever shadowy healing it was that we’ve recently just accomplished… pretending like the next tunnel isn’t just right up the road waiting for us to drive back into the darkness; never knowing when or if we’ll make it back out to the light on the other side.
Sometimes, I think we forget that everyone has a different number of tunnels to go through, and that all of these tunnels have a variety of lengths. Which doesn’t exactly help in the grand scheme of this whole self-help culture. It’s like we’re all so desperate for someone to give us the answers, but the reality is that the only person who’s capable of actually driving through that next tunnel and out the other side…. is you.
No one else can drive your ‘life car’ through the dark tunnel of healing
Instead, you have to be brave enough to go in there alone, or face the consequences of being left out from reaching whatever’s on the other side. See, I understand that. It makes sense that we have to do the heavy lifting alone. But who said we can’t phone a friend or two? Who said we can’t talk about our experiences—both while we’re currently experiencing them, and once it’s all said and done?
Why is it more acceptable for us to pretend as though the tunnel never existed after we’re on the other side? Is it really so bad to be human, and to share our human experiences? I just don’t understand what’s so disgusting about vulnerability. Maybe we’d all be a lot closer if we shared more of ourselves with the world—not just the few small parts of us that we’ve been led to believe people only want to see.
I think there needs to be a new word for authenticity
Because whatever we’re currently doing, isn’t it. Especially not on social media. And I’m just as guilty of it. I know that. It’s distressing for me to think about all the things I could’ve said and the things I would’ve done if I’d actually been more authentic… not just with others, but also with myself.
I don’t know if it would’ve physically changed anything, but I do know that I’d probably feel a lot less guilt and anger towards myself. I probably wouldn’t torment myself or have so many regrets if I was brave enough to be human. But I also wouldn’t be writing this reflection if I were, so I suppose there’s a reason for everything in the end. Either way, if I were to be authentic—more ‘real’, if you will—then I would have to admit that I have absolutely no idea what I’m supposed to be doing; in this life, with myself, currently at this moment etc.
I’m genuinely clueless.
I don’t know what I’m doing and I feel like that meme where the dog is just sipping his coffee as the house burns down around him. Only it really does have to be fine. At least while I attempt to figure all of this ‘life’ shit out. Where/when/how/why did everything become so damn complicated?
All I can reall do is continue to try new things until hopefully I get something right. Because I have to get something (home, career, love, health) right eventually… right? Statistically speaking, as long as keep trying then at some point I’ll eventually have it all figured out. At least I hope so.
There must be something I’m good at
Somewhere I fit in, people who see value in my humanness and appreciate me as I am. Statistics never lie, so even if the odds are 1/8,000,000,000 it still has to exist. Who knows, maybe I have to accidentally stumble into it. Perhaps whatever is mean for me isn’t ‘traditional’—maybe it’s a weird niche.
After all, most of my best experiences do tend to come whenever I have zero expectations. So maybe I’m an outlier for a reason. Maybe I’m meant to be a stranger. A wanderer. Someone who stands out from the crowd, (even if it’s a small crowd).
Perhaps I’m supposed to be a ghost; disappearing from people’s lives and then suddenly reemerging as though I never left. Or perhaps I’m just not supposed to have roots like everyone else. Maybe there isn’t one single physical place I belong. Instead, maybe there’s several.
Maybe there’s still a metaphorical tunnel or two I need to drive through
And everything I’m looking for is simply waiting for me on the other side. Or, it could be that I need to take a literal wrong turn and end up somewhere I don’t belong—a right place, right time situation I accidentally stumble into. Maybe I’ll end up exactly where I was always meant to be. Like, divine timing or something. Whatever it is that I’m meant to do or be, I won’t know until I know, so I’ll continue searching for home until then, (a physical home—I already have the figurative one).
Besides, if this is the only life I get then obviously I’m going to choose to be me—all of me. Yes, even the me that is silly and unrealistic, controversial, irresponsible, socially inept—like ‘totally unaware of how my actions impact others’ inept—and of course, selfish and judgmental.
Because not everything in life is about choosing sunshine and rainbows
Those healing tunnels? Total opposite. Dark af. Like driving without headlights. But, all things are a spectrum and we all have the ability to choose how we perceive everything in life. Choosing to see the best in whatever shitty situation you happened to fall into? That’s called free will.
No, like, literally. That’s all free will actually is: a human’s ability to choose and apply meaning to the external world. All those things, people, and experiences we interact with in life? Literally meaningless until we decide what it means to us. How we choose to perceive experiences = life. That’s it. That’s the grand mystery.
The meaning of life is all about choosing what life means for you
…a little anticlimactic, right?
Well for me, I’m choosing to dream and wish for something better. I’m choosing to believe that there really is something right for me—a right job, home, person, etc.—something I will enjoy and cherish enough to feel a sense of purpose. And what I’m no longer choosing is to live a life that makes me miserable. I went through that ‘masochist healing tunnel’, and I’m pretty sure I made it out the other side.
Oh, I’m also choosing to be human, and I’m choosing to actually own it. Because that’s what’s authentic for me. So, no more solo tunnel drives. From here on out, I’m taking the world with me.
It’s your turn now: Who are you choosing to be today?
What will you choose to do? Where will you choose to go? How will you choose to live?
P.S. Beginning with this post, I’m choosing to share the song that inspired me to write. For those who are curious: I write randomly and edit as I go. Some posts are created specifically for mainstream appeal, others (like this one) are created just for me. I’m figuring it out as I go.
And as always, feel free to share your revelations with me in the comments—if you so choose ♡
Until next time,
Audrey
“I’ve still got your demons
And they’re not gonna be leaving any time, any time soon”A Portrait Of by Sorority Noise (from the album You’re Not as _ as You Think)
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