They tell us that we need to try harder, but that I don’t believe it, no, because I try and I try and it makes me sadder, makes it harder, tougher, cooler and darker.
They tell us to try and do more, work harder, longer. To smile and laugh, to be nice and be pleasing, be amicable, be polite, be good, be an example. Be this and be that, but when do they ever tell us to be ourselves?
I haven’t be raised to think like this. I have never been told to be myself. I have been told that me being myself was an issue for others and that it caused me to be bullied, so maybe I should change to avoid this kind of moquerie. I have been told and taught that being myself would be a problem and would cause me to get hurt. I have been told and taught to change to please, to smile, to be polite, to tell them what they wanted to hear and be who they wanted me to be.
It helped, somehow, it helped to grow up, to get better jobs and earn more money, but in the midst of all this pleasing I lost me. This me who was telling the world to piss-off because I was who I was, full fracking stop. I could swear and would not apologise for anything I was. I lost me and my confidence with it.
Why don’t they tell us that who we are is THE thing we need to never let go. Compromises are possible, but letting go should be a no-no.
They never told me that it was ok to be me and that it was not ok to feel the hatred others were throwing at me, and from being victim I went to be the one responsible for my misery. They never told me that this, this sense of self I had and was doing my very best to hold on to would be my most valuable possession in the future, as an adult.
Because if you tell a teenager that they shouldn’t be just this, knowing yourself that everything is a phase that will lead to the adult they are meant to be, then you are setting this teenager for failure. The failure to hold on to certitudes, to beliefs that are proper to this very own and unique personality.
I am an adult who doesn’t know who I am.
I am an adult who has no idea where to go and even who I love.
I don’t know if I love my partner for who she is or who she once was.
I am an adult who knows nothing other than that I know nothing.
They took my right to be myself away, one day, mocking me the way they all did because I chose to be different and because I decided that I needed help from adults to fend off these attacks, ending up being told by these same adults that they kind of saw why I was being mocked and that I should change if I wanted it to stop.
Adulthood is a fucker we all dream about when we are kids, teenagers, because we know we won’t have anyone on our backs, ever, to tell us what to do and not to do, and here I am, 35 and wishing that someone would tell me what to do.
Here I am, 35 and wishing that someone would show up and boss me around and tell me who I should marry, love, where I should live and what job I should have.
Here I am, 35 and wishing that someone would strip me of my very basic right to chose what I want to do with my life.
How sad is that?
How sad is it to think that there is someone out there who think that not having to make their own decisions would relieve them from a lot of pain and suffering?
What if the truth could only be revealed if I let go?
Let go of the chains that keep me so grounded that I feel stuck in dried out concrete?
Let go of this idea that life is about money and savings, house and dogs and cats and normality.
What is normality?
What is normal?
Who said this was normal?
Why is this supposed to be normal?
It doesn’t feel like the freedom I was dreaming about when I was a kid.
When I was dreaming about being an adult, I was dreaming about going to bed as late as I wanted and do whatever I wanted whenever I wanted.
When I was dreaming about being an adult, I was driven by this sense of self that was still mine, that they hadn’t stolen from me yet. There was no girlfriend, no owning a house, no having a great job and earning a big load of money from a job I hated.
When I was dreaming about being an adult, I was dreaming about the freedom to be me, to do me and to not care. Not be disrespectful, but make their voices go quiet, go distant and disapear, not have their expectations drown me, like the sound of the alarm in the morning, causing an immediate headache and heartache. Eyes barely open, head dry and throat tight, there was none of this.
I dreamed about endless nights writing about my pain and the pain the world felt.
I dreamed about being free to write all night and go far, far away where the words had the meaning I would give them.
Never did I dream to binge watch a TV show all night, never did I dream to spend my nights watching Netflix. Never. This was never a dream because it was not a reality at the time.
Is it ok to stick to the realty from back then?
Would it be more realistic to accept the polution we are subjected to and live with it?
I don’t accept choosing to watch a shitty tv show rather than work on a Novel I have been writing for more than 6 years now.
I don’t accept giving in to this urge to chose the simpler version of life. Giving up is easier.
It’s easier to chose a takeaway over making your own diner, easier to stay on the couch rather than go for a run. It’s easier to watch TV rather than work on my lifetime dream, because these things, they are pure and simple instant gratification.
It takes work. It takes work, time and effort to do those things, and we don’t, because we want the results now, the satisfaction now, like an addiction.
We don’t want to work out our relationships, we don’t want to give each other a second chance because there has to be someone out there with whom it is just easier, right?
I never dreamed of giving up. Who ever did?
I never dreamed of being a slob or being a coward who just takes what life gives.
I never dreamed of suffering when life was not a routine.
I never dreamed of being so lost.
That little girl wanted to write. That’s all she wanted, all she liked, all she enjoyed.
That little girl wanted to be creative, wanted to create, to share these feeling that were taking over her when life was tough in her house.
That little girl, she was a warrior. She got me through the toughest moments and I owe her a big thank you. I owe her to fight the way she fought the tears and the hatred.
That little girl, she’s a fracking hero for doing what she did.
She never dreamed of being a sad adult with a relationship she couldn’t get a grasp on, and a life that didn’t mean much.
She never wanted to be a corporate number, of course not, because she didn’t know what it was, but still, she didn’t want to be one of those adults.
She never wanted to be a hairdresser, policewoman, a nurse. She wanted to write songs. She wanted to be better than the adults around her.
What could I tell her?
What would I tell her
Would I tell her that life got in the way, and people too, tell her how some of them took a little bit of my soul away?
Should I tell her that? Really?
Because from what I can see she is the one who had to go through the toughest times, the abuse, insult and more. She is the one who had to be tough. She never let any of them take anything from her, regardless of how horrible they were to her.
Should I tell her that I got weak and tired to fight them, that I just thought it was easier to go their way, the main way, the highway, the way they all went?
Should I tell her I am a coward? Tell her that it was just easier like that and at the time the price to pay was all worth it?
Should I tell her the amount of excuses I make up everyday for not writing?
I would be ashamed.
If I had to face her, I would be ashamed. She would make me feel even worse than that, and rightly so.