Nobody knows you better than yourself. And no, these are not just words used when guilting people into confessing to things. When something is on your mind, you're the only person who could fix it. Listening to what people have to say doesn't fix anything, it's your changed perspective on things that does. It is what you learn from them that helps you find out about things. Maybe it's about someone else, maybe it's about something mundane, or maybe, like me, it's about yourself.
Believe me when I say that it can only be you who could truly understand yourself.
From what I can remember, when I was in Form 3, I was a whole lot different. I had myself figured out. I knew exactly who I was. Self-righteousness was all that mattered, and not even in a self-centred manner, I wasn't actually enough of a ruckus to cause much harm. Maybe I was a little passive aggressive but I don't think I've ever acted on what I say I'd do to someone who would hurt me. I actually thought what I had to offer meant something to others. I thought having something to always say made me smart. Negative views of me were irrelevant. Everything wouldn't touch me unless I let it. That was how it was.
And from what I can remember, I have always surrounded myself around friends since young. I wasn't once quiet. Or maybe it was more accurate to say that my friends were always around me. Every year during Open Day the form teachers have the same old - she's too chatty. Which is a really curious thing, because you'd think such traits would last through childhood. Well no, it didn't.
A lot of all that stayed until today, but I'm just not so sure about who I was any more, after I've changed over the course of Form 4 and now.
I honestly don't know what changed me so much, but it did and I let it. I never knew it was coming. Nor did I see it coming. Things have definitely happened between the "normal" pre-Form 3 me and the "now" me. Nothing huge, but it doesn't add up to me why it led to what it had become. Between the time, I've had and lost 3 best friends because they either walked away like they didn't know me at all or I've pushed them away because I didn't have the pride to bow my head. I also got robbed of the very one choice I wanted to make for myself. I felt alone because I wouldn't fit in with my new classmates and I had no one I could really talk to. It was my first time without friends and family.
It was my first time without a close friend sitting next to me in class. Maybe it was my friend who walked out of my life that made me change. Maybe she was the last shred of my personality from childhood I couldn't live without.
So I had, for some reason, caved. Caved not to the circumstances, but to the dumb thought that I couldn't do anything alone. I felt like I needed someone there with me when I was catching up on homework and poured my grief on. But nobody was there. Maybe now. But at the time when it mattered the most? I was completely alone. But to be fair, it's not like I was threatening others to talk to me or I'll lock myself up to cry. Because that was what I did, just minus the threatening part. I didn't talk and I cried myself to sleep instead.
I'll say it, I was sick with depression. I cried over nothing, lost over 5 kgs in a month, hated everything I did, had thoughts about death. I can't spell it any clearer to myself.
I still wrote, but in hindsight, I didn't write what I needed to write the most. I wrote what I wanted to read, as I usually do. How could such a habit kill me? I write, and I'm my own reader. I'm the only reader I need; the only critic; the only pair of eyes. And I suppose subconsciously I didn't want to remember how much I really hurt. Not wanting to read it, I didn't write it either. But even if I did write what I needed to write, such a mediocre effort would not have made much of a difference.
No, I didn't just cave. I tore myself to bits. Whatever little fear, anger, despair I could have felt, however tiny, I made it feel a lot worse and I would cry over it. At first I just let myself cry over nothing. Then I just couldn't help it. Eventually, after what was it, a month of looking at myself in the mirror after crying everyday, I couldn't help but actually be ashamed and disgusted of looking at what I looked like in the reflection; how pathetic. Maybe I could have been thinking, this is really not me.
The entire time, I had thought of so many million things. I just felt so much, most of it out of nothing and all at once. When I realised how terrible my thoughts were, I realised I had to snap out of it. And I did, quickly.
Miraculously, I walked out of an illness that claims thousands of lives a year. I didn't even know what I was really feeling at the time, but I'm surprised the "me" I have been looking for was what ultimately saved my sanity, and maybe even my life.
Unfortunately, I didn't become happy the next day. For an even longer time, I just felt a whole lot of nothing. I felt indifferent to every damn thing. I could read a report of thousands of deaths in the papers and not feel anything. I thought this was worse than depression because I'd laugh but it wouldn't mean anything. I'd be doing work and it doesn't make sense. I'd be writing and I wouldn't know what I wrote. It was terrible. I passed time watching something I enjoy, rewatch it, and when it gets boring, I switch to something else. It was terrible, I was actually grinding all the things I enjoyed until I hated all of it. It was terrible because I hate everything I used to love now. I have not played the piano or a guitar in over a year. I don't remember how much I used to love playing now.
And what did people think? When I was still "normal", I was outspoken, daring, strong-willed, outspoken, I was heading in the right direction. That was how I ended up on the Debate team to begin with. But now what? After all I went through, I don't even know who the hell I was any more. I am now the reserved one who doesn't speak, don't have friends, don't know what the hell she wants, odd with crazy emotions, without aim. That's not all strictly true, but being my own worst enemy, it seems true enough to me.
There was no real "me". I didn't know what to think now, but I do know the person I used to be - overpoweringly pungent but strong, and the new me I became - really quiet but you know it's there. I had to figure out who the hell I was and is and most importantly, what exactly I wanted to be. Actually, I'm not sure if I am even allowed to pick between versions of myself. I didn't know what I was supposed to do or what I should be feeling about things. I didn't know if I should try and become the person I used to be or if I shouldn't. Nothing made sense.
I got really desperate, I prayed for help. And I know some people prayed for me too, at this point. They of course, didn't know what I was going through. But they could see I was somewhat troubled. I did sort of burst into tears in church. I'm just glad I did that in front of people I trusted.
It's dumb because the answer was handed to me twice but I missed it the first time. I actually missed a smoke signal tossed at my head from Heaven. It was so big, wide and obvious, the hints. I'm not even sure if God could be this obvious.
He didn't talk to me in my sleep or anything crazy. He spoke to me in compliments from others.
A teacher of mine has taught me for many, many years. She knows me well. Well enough. But she wasn't teaching me when I was troubled. She had no idea what was going on. And all she did was ask me where I was headed to after school. I told her my plans, and she actually had faith in me that I was smart enough for a scholarship. Nothing much to think about, really. She's just a really nice teacher with a really kind heart. She said something nice, I overlooked it.
Except she told me the answer - Who I am isn't how I examine myself. It's how others see me.
Then shortly after, another teacher, but this time a school teacher, had said a bunch of really nice and encouraging words to me. This teacher though doesn't know me that well, and she said something I wasn't quite so sure on. But she was insistent she was right. I thought of what she said to me for a little while simply because I slightly disagreed with it. That evolved into me thinking of how wrong she was, how differently people perceive I must be, based on what they see.
Finally I found the answer - people think what I must be based on the way I act, based on what they see. But I think I am what I am based on how I thought. Obviously, there's a lot more that goes through your mind than what actually translates into actions. Actions are thoughts manifested physically. People see of me what I can't see of myself.
So I finally found it - me, my answers, what I should be. My answer was how it doesn't matter what I think I am - whether that be reserved, outspoken or self-righteous and everything else. Ironically, it matters what others perceive of me. People who believe in me, they know who I am or who I would be.
Maybe "me" is not in my thoughts, but the "me" was in the character others saw. It is not a character by definition, being smart enough for a scholarship or being a reserved person. "Me" doesn't answer my questions and tells me much of what I should be, or am. But it tells me everything that I show others subconsciously.
How bloody ironic is that? That I've always not cared for other people's expectations and thoughts of me but now it is the only thing that makes sense to me.
There's still a long way for me --the actual, real me-- to go, but at least I feel a lot more certain of my footing on this foothill now. It hurts me less now to think about this and maybe I won't bawl on the floor the next time I talk to people about it. Maybe I won't feel a pang of doubt the next time I smile. Maybe I could speak on stage one day without thinking I'm terrible. Maybe I could play music again.
Maybe.
- Fire ninja out.
Original post date: 2nd August
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