Know(ing) Yourself

“Today you are you, that is truer than true. There is no one alive who is youer than you.”

–  Dr Seuss

I’ve never been good at defining myself, that’s one task I’ve been struggling with all my life. Hell, I’m even always eager to ask fortune-teller to tell me more about myself. That’s how bad/curious I am about myself. Simply said, I may be facing what people say “Identity Crisis”.

Aristotle once said, “Knowing yourself is the beginning of knowledge”, but I only know a glimpse of myself. I do know that I procrastinate a lot, I have ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder if you’re wondering what it stands for), and my curiosity is higher than most people, but I definitely can’t write any of these on my resume. I even made a tattoo “Gnothi Seauton”, which means know thyself, as a self-reminder, but ink is just an ink.

They say that when you have a problem, try breaking it down, so I’ll give it try. I can pretty much say that I’m not a party goer although partying isn’t one thing that I hate, not even a social butterfly because being around people eventually drain my energy. So I’m proclaiming myself as a nerd, someone who enjoy “learning” instead of socializing, but not really a bookworm because learning academic stuff definitely isn’t exactly my forte.

When people say that the genre of music you listen defines your personality, that’d confuse the hell out of me because I listen to any kind of genre. I also read any kind of things that I deem interesting, because who knows if it’ll widen my knowledge.

On the positive side, this trait makes me know much about the world, from when-the-fuck-will-this-knowledge-come-to-use to important things. I know quite much about sport, underwater creature, from Greek to Nordic to legend, art, and other stuff, without knowing which thing really matters to me. Hence, the knowledge I know won’t be much use except for the sake of curiosity.

On the negative side, I don’t know what is it I’m really interested at, thus I can’t focus on one thing. I might be interested about coffee for a while, then shortly afterward I’ll be interested in mythical creatures. I’m not sure if it’s one of the perk of being super curious while having ADHD.

I don’t know if it’s just me, but people tend to decorate their room. Girls will probably decorate their room in a fancier manner, while boys would probably do so in a simpler way. In the room I grew up in, aside of a Barcelona FC poster my dad gave to me when I was on elementary school, my room was plain af. At that time, I thought it was normal.

After I graduated from high school, I got a room for my own near  campus. Only then I realized that aside of the usual things that are found in a room, the other things are either left-off from something me and my friends did there, like a vodka bottle, a gift from my ex(es), or an item my friend brought there. I don’t have any item that I specially brought for the sake of decorating my room. It was bland, and so am I.

Eventually, it hit me. I took graphic communication (DKV) as my major, but then I changed major after my 3rd year simply because I don’t think it’s my calling. Before you assume things, I did plan to change major after a year in graphic communication, but things didn’t go out as planned and so I have to stay for another 2 years.

Franky speaking, I gave up too easily because I’m pretty sure I could finish my first major (although with difficulty) but no, I chose not to . And so Mass Communication was my major of choice because it’s way more general, and it teaches how to be confident in front of other people, a skill I definitely need. It’s not that I really like communication (I’m an ambivert, but leaning more to introvert), but I think that the things that are taught here is more applicable for me.

Things didn’t stop there. At this point, I moved to a new building and my room stayed the same. It took me almost 2 years, and a relationship, to figure out my problem. Long story short, the failure of my relationship made me think about all off the stuff I’ve done up until now, and that is nothing. I move in the same pace as time, monotone, only following where the time goes. Wisdom doesn’t come with age, the only change is the place where I stand, when in truth I havent even moved an inch. I put my life in the hands of time, where the time goes I’ll follow, when in truth it’s my own life that I’m leading.

I guess I’m just scared of stepping out of my comfort zone. Scared of failing before even trying. Well, you won’t fail if you don’t try, but you won’t succeed either. You just stay in place. And with the world constantly changing, staying the same is the worst thing to do. Why? Because you won’t learn anything, and learning is a part of living. Your whole life you’ll always learn something new. And by not learning, you, or at least me, won’t know who I am. Being stuck sucks.

And so, I decided to change.

Change was never easy, and the first thing I did was to make peace with my past and accepting reality, because as stated by 7 Cardinal Rules of Life  (LMAO, not even sure who made this), “Make peace with your past so it doesn’t screw the present”. I have a personal/family issue that has been going on since God knows when, and I decided to face it instead of not giving it a care. Denying your past means denying reality. By denying it, you’re denying a part of yourself, because past is one of the reason why you are the person you are now. It didn’t solve the problem, but it did help.

And then I started decorating my room. I bought my first poster to fill my once empty wall with my childhood cartoon “Beavis and Butthead”. I also found the encyclopedia “The Wildlife of Indonesia” at home, to which I cut the photos that mesmerize me and put it on my wall, complete with a Starbucks logo above it, simply because I love Starbucks. Wasn’t much but it’s still an effort.

The next thing to do was to pursue my interest, and this writing is a form of it. I’ve always liked reading, and by reading, you’ll eventually learn how to write. So I thought, why not write down the things I thought into a writing? People can’t read thoughts, but they can read it in the form of writing. Besides, I’ve never been good at expressing myself, so writing might actually help me express.

At this point, I’m not sure where and what will the universe bring me to, but I’m sure the amount of regret I’ll give is none, at least I tried. And hey, I don’t know where my life is heading, but I’m gonna find out rather than just sitting around. Miracle doesn’t happen miraculously, bro. I won’t be heading anywhere if all I do is sitting around and wait until something happens.

So yeah, I’m not gonna put up any expectation since Shakespeare said “Expectation is the root of all heartache”, but at least lets hope for a more interesting life ahead.

Bon Voyage, me!