Why I am starting this blog?
Well, I’ve always considered writing to be one of my strong suits, until I recently got a B- on a 10 page research paper. Starting from high school and later on in college, I’ve tried loosening the hold academic validation has on me; yet sometimes I think of academia as a world that will never leave me. That it will always be something larger than me, something out of my control and hard to please. And I have a theory about this, that I’ve been living my whole life up to this point, trying to excel, only to have been building this perfect, undefeatable enemy who knows me better than I do. The theory is that I think everyone has one, their own monster, I mean.
I have a habit of becoming the things I see in my life — whether it’s adopting my friend’s way of speaking, emulating the behavior of others in my environment, or taking a situation and being completely consumed by it, or even just being influenced by books or TV shows — I have watched myself slide in and out of different bodies over the years, struggling to find an exact definition, to find where I stood among all my good and bad moments. This is the way my younger self understood survival. If I saw a problem happen in my life, I would conjure up more copies of it so that I had to confront it again and again, so that I always knew who I was, even if I didn’t like that person, even if that meant I would always be stuck in the same place.
So when I got a B- on my final research paper, though I hated that letter, though I hated the mediocrity of it I attached myself to it, I became the B-. I played the thought over and over in my mind, incapable of resonating with my past successes; the fact got stuck in my head, and I felt less confident about my writing. I wondered why I even had this habit of latching on to the bad things. If I looked at the bigger picture of what I was, then, I was more a combination of my faults than I was a human being. But really I was just a person incapable of seeing, really seeing myself, denying myself ugly moments, restricting myself from making a fool of myself, restricting myself from failure. Truly, trying to avoid failing is exhausting.
Recently, I have tried to be more — to uncover what I really am, what I like to eat, where I like to study, what feels good, what kind of people inspire me, what kind of people disgust me, and so on. For instance, I have been experimenting with being less judgmental (sounds crazy, I know). When I judge others for how they dress and excuse it for my being conservative, I have learned it is in fact because I have always admired self-expression through dress code, and I was envious knowing I could never have the same audacity to step outside with people staring at me. In some ways I am brave; in other ways I will never be. I know this.
And so I suppose that means I am starting this blog in order to uncover more lies about myself, since I have been looking at things the wrong way for a long time.
Maybe we are never seeing ourselves correctly, or at all, but I hope that through the pursuit of myself, others may recognize themselves and might be nudged in the direction of self-awareness, and more love and consideration towards others. And though writing is a selfish endeavor, it has the power, as Neil Gaiman said, to relate to many people no matter how specific it becomes. This is my goal: to be as selfish as possible while still hoping to reach someone, to make their eyes light up in recognition.
So I challenge myself this year, starting January 2024, to really write, to write consistently, and to write honestly. I look forward to embarking on this journey with you. Or, with me. Both.