Do you remember yourself?

Do you ever feel lost - about yourself? That feeling of not even recognizing who you are?

36 years of various hairstyles, changing wardrobe themes, navigating through different careers academically and professionally, playing different social roles - only to realize I have no conception of who I am.

Ever since I remember, I have struggled so hard to become who I wanted to be personally, socially and professionally and then suddenly after 35 years I couldn't remember who I used to be and wanted badly to get back to who I used to be, undoing everything I have done, and all these without pausing for a second to recognize who I was becoming, deep down underneath the want-to-be images and underneath the used-to-be images of my own self.

That is when it struck me, that I am either always in the future or in the past, either living up to others' expectations of me or even my own expectations of who I should be and now I have no idea of who I am or have been all this while. It hit so hard that I started looking within myself and soon after I started having terrible dreams, mostly violent. But one dream that really shook me up was this:  I have this big chalkboard on my wall and in my dream, I saw it was a mirror. When I looked at myself in it, it stared back at me with that unnervingly deep see-through-your-soul kinda look that spooked me. As I tried to move sideways to avoid that stare, that image froze in its place and another image moved with me, and again stared like that and it kept happening. I got so freaked out, that I ducked down below the mirror trying to escape from the room, that's when I woke up sweating from fear.

When I spoke about it with my therapist, she said, you are making huge progress. It is a beautiful imagery that your subconscious is showing you exactly what it is going through. To say the least, BEAUTIFUL is the last thing I felt about it. Anyway, she explained that "you are taking that long hard look at yourself, within yourself, that is what you saw in the mirror. It is scary and you are still doing it, so bravo." I asked, what's with the images freezing like some horror movie? She said, "that's because right now you are in a phase where whatever you are observing in yourself at the moment, you are fixating on it as a permanent characteristic of yours and judging yourself, and losing sight of the reality. And quite obviously, if you keep judging yourself like that, it will be terrifying and in the end, you will want to avoid and escape the mirror. So stop judging. Just observe the layers of your personality as they unfold."

And thus started my journey of unraveling. Among many other things, one thing I struggled with was my gender identity. I was brought up as a son with pros and cons to it. I idolized my dad, I followed the dressing style of Male actors rather than female actors and yet, I was always a woman at heart, I wanted the attention of boys. Quite obviously, never got that coz I was too macho and my friends, both girls, and boys, looked up to me as a Bro! 

So despite being very clear about my sexual preference, I wasn't sure about my own gender alignment. I was the protector of my girlies and I have been called a lesbian, and in those days, it was worse than most abuses. I didn't know how to behave. So I swayed from being all rockstar bro-ish in school to extremely docile feminine in college and after....from being a girl who loved Tae-kwon-do and mountaineering to becoming a girl who only wanted to please her husband with cooking and dressing, of course setting myself up to fail, because that's not who I was. 

Now I am not saying I was bad at cooking, I am quite decent, coz it's a basic survival skill we were taught very early in life. But when you are doing only that, that too to please someone, cooking, and cleaning and getting groceries as a drudgery while the real you inside is struggling to fly like a free bird, go on a trek, learn flying, or whatever random adventure captured the fantasies, you are bound to screw up. You are frustrated, you do a less than decent job for which, of course, you are not appreciated, and that frustrates you even more. See the cycle there?

From following Bollywood men's fashion to suddenly turning towards women's fashion, I made a clown of myself. I dressed up well sometimes, but again, it didn't reflect who I was and I felt miserable. And not just that, I was also clouded by the societal stereotypes of the genders and roles. For example, being opinionated amounted to being masculine, so I dimmed it down. And this went on in every aspect of my life.

Slowly, I lost all sense of self and self-esteem. My daughter came into my life as an angel and one thing I knew for sure was I DO NOT want to become a mother with no sense of self and self-esteem. That's when I sought help and started therapy again. The first time I had started, I ended it abruptly coz I was too messed up in my head to look within. This time, as a mother, I knew I would do anything to get it right. 

Finally, when I had to describe myself, this is who I found. A princess, not a calm and composed one, a bratty naughty warrior princess, dreaming in a long flowy gown and running around in sneakers with a machine gun blazing yet relaxed on her shoulders - a perfect coexistence of feminity and machoism, Power and Gentleness. 

Pic: My own painting

Now I look at myself as a whole. I cook out of love, I travel out of love, I write, I paint, I seethe at hypocrisy and react, and then I respond out of love. Let's take a cliched example. When we see the beauty of the moon, we do not fixate on the blemishes. Those imperfections are what make it complete and natural and beautiful. We see the soft dreamy glow and marvel at it. My imperfections, emotional scars, and reactions only make me human, a complete human, and my retrospections and constant self-evolution make me a rather good one at that. 

If I had to do it all over, make different choices, survive different outcomes, I would give up that chance.....because anything different would not make me the same person I am today, and the more I explore and remember this person, the more I love her.

How about you, do you remember who you are? Do you remember the little child who still loves Tom and Jerry, or splashing in a muddy puddle, or building blocks? Do you remember the teen in you? Do you remember your dreams as a college freshman? Would love to hear from you in comments.