Remember who you are
Featured art: unknown
I may not be religious, but I do consider myself a spiritual person. For a couple weeks now, I’ve been seeing signs to remember who I am. It started with the youtube videos I watch from guides, then it started popping up as inspirational videos on reels and tiktok, and even in the movies I’ve rewatched recently: Alice In Wonderland, Harry Potter and The Lion King.
I, of course, took this as a sign from God, the universe, creation, whatever you want to call it, for me to remember who I am. But I didn’t actually know what that meant. Who am I? And why must I remember?
If I have to remember something, the implication is that I have forgotten that thing. That thought was finally when I started to get somewhere. I started thinking about what I possibly could have forgotten about myself.
During this time, I found myself thinking about my childhood a lot. I was looking at old pictures of when I was little and I started feeling very emotional. I was thinking about the hardships I had to endure at such a young age, hardships that I never should have been through, and I was wondering if I actually was happy in those pictures.
I know I did have a lot of happy moments in my childhood, along with very hard ones, but I started thinking that I shouldn’t have been happy back then, knowing what I know now. I started thinking that I was too naive, I was too kind, too loving, I gave people too many chances, I forgave too many times and that got me hurt. I noticed that my sadness, questioning if I was happy, started transforming into anger. I started thinking that I shouldn’t have even been happy then because I deserved better; that I should’ve been angry instead.
But I was just a child. A brilliant, beautiful child with a pure heart.
Finally, after all this time, I have remembered who I am.
No one is born into this world bad. Bad people are not born, they are made. We are all made and shaped by life. Bad things will inevitably happen to all of us, the difference is that good people swallow poison and don’t make others taste it. Those people in my life, God knows they swallowed poison and as sure as hell made me taste it. But I am not like them.
I realized that I let their poison change me. It made me untrusting, it made me cynical, it made me doubt kindness, it made me feel like a burden; it somehow made me feel too little and too much all at once. It made me be a little more like them and I hate them for it. I am nothing like them.
These past two years I’ve been coming back to myself. I’ve been undoing all the disease from my body and my soul, and I am so thankful for it. I am living my dream. Two years ago I dreamed that I would be who I am now, I dreamed of feeling peace within me and now I do. I would’ve never thought it’d come true, but it did, and I will forever be so grateful that I get to live my dream. I fought like hell for this, for me, and I will fight to keep this.
Everything I’ve learned up until now, from books, and songs, and poerty, and life, has been me preparing for this moment, for me to remember who I am. Who I truly am before life and poison touched me.
Being trusting is not a weakness, it is a bravery. As Kelsier from Mistborn would say: “Better to trust and be betrayed. Better to love and be hurt.” Fear does not control me anymore. I will not live in fear of getting hurt, I refuse. I will trust and I will love, and if I get hurt I will feel it through and out. Trust is not something that is meant to be earned, not truly. I will trust people until they give me a reason not to. Until then, I will not drive myself insane with possibilities and “what–ifs” that are not rooted in reality.
I will believe that people are inherently good, unless they show me otherwise.
I will see the world the way I first did as a child. I will give my kindness, I will give my love and my trust, and perhaps one day I’ll even learn how to forgive wholly and truly like I once did. I will give, and if it is not received, I will continue to hold myself in high honor, because there are others out there who are deserving and wanting of what I have to give.
I don’t think I was naive as a child anymore, not at all. I was the bravest, fiercest little girl I knew, who wore her heart on her sleeve. That is who I truly am.
I still have anger within me, but I don’t want it to rule me, I choose to be ruled by love, or as Darrow O’Lykos from Red Rising would say: “sharpened by hate, strengthened by love.”
I will not let others make me lost again, for now I know the way back to myself.
Thank you so much for reading my blog!
Every time I write an entry, it’s always my hope that someone reading this is able to see a piece of themself in my writing, and that maybe somehow it can help or at least offer a new way of seeing things.
I have so much love for myself now, but I never used to feel this way about me. I used to have really low self esteem, I think in some ways I’m still growing out of it. I used to romanticise my sadness a lot, but now that I’m on the other side I can see that, that was not normal. The more I learned about myself, the more I understood about me and faced and forgave about me, the more I started to like me.
If you are reading this, and if you believe that you are unlovable or unlikeable (even by yourself), I want you to know that it’s not true. If you believe you cannot trust, if you believe the kindness and affection you receive isn’t real, let this be your sign for you to remember who you are, before life happened to you.
I read your post and it felt like a reflection to me.
Once upon a time, a little girl like you were once.
A reflection.
Remember who you are means so much more to me as well.
Now, 41, I spent most of my life searching for “her”, the girl I once was, when I was untouched by the past.
The girl with hopes and dreams (big ones).
Back then I sang a lot and my dreams of being on stage started to take place.
I wish I could tell that little girl back then – how amazing my future would be. That I would meet a man I would sing with, someone who is an artist just like me…
My life is beautiful now as I am helping others remember who they are through my blog, our music, words and quotes – and it is amazing to read posts like these as well.
Sending you all my love, dear sister-in-heart.
Lots of love.
And remember, you are beautiful!
My life has been a long series of wounding and healing. Healing is also becoming and for me, the process of retrieving and embracing the real me has lasted my entire life. The older I get the fewer labels I attach to I am…I just am and there is a lot of peace in that. Nothing to prove to anyone especially not me, just being and loving and getting ready for what comes next.
Thank you for this timely reminder. My courage and love is experiencing a slight dip at the moment and so it’s good to read your words. They have buoyed me. I have a curiosity and a desire to learn more about one aspect: when you said ‘I loved, and I loved freely. And I will still love, but now I will love wisely’, how do you prevent ‘wisely’ from becoming ‘conditionally’?
Kindness – Robert.
Thank you, Robert. I’m sorry your courage is dipping at the moment. I hope it returns soon. And what a wonderful question! I really enjoyed thinking about how to answer this.
I would always want to love someone purely, because I don’t think real, true love can be conditional. If you love someone because of what they do for you and not who they are, I don’t think that is real love. Real love isn’t really something you hand out or withhold in the first place. I think when you know someone deeply enough, to the point of loving them, it becomes almost involuntary, so in that sense, it can’t really be conditional.
So, for me, I wouldn’t be saying, “I will love you as long as you treat me well.” I think love can exist independently of what someone gives you. I have loved people who hurt me, and I think a part of me will always have love for them, but from a distance now.
When I say that I will love wisely, I don’t mean that I will withhold myself or make sure someone is holding up a certain ideal I have. My core thought is that the love itself stays the same, and wisdom only decides the distance. I think someone’s behaviour may change how close you allow them to be, but that doesn’t necessarily mean your love was conditional on their behaviour. You can love someone for who they are while still having the wisdom to revoke their access to you when that relationship harms you.
Distance when someone mistreats you is protecting yourself, not punishing them. And loving someone shouldn’t require you to continually abandon yourself. I think loving wisely also means keeping your self-love.
So I think that is how I would prevent “wisely” from becoming conditional: stay loving them. Love them for who they are and not for what they do for you, but have the wisdom to know that if the person you love isn’t treating you right, it is okay to put distance between you and take away their access to you. Start off with trust, and then adjust with evidence.
Of course, I suppose it depends on the person and what they have done. I don’t know if love always remains unchanged when someone repeatedly harms you, or whether there are some things that can eventually change it. If love can transform over time and someone can grow out of loving, then perhaps that is the point where wisdom could transform into conditionality. I think that is a more complicated question, and perhaps one I don’t fully have the answer to yet.
But for me, I think the intention is not to let being hurt make me less loving. I can still love someone and recognise that they can no longer have access to me.
Thank you so much for asking me this question. I really had fun thinking about how to answer it! I could probably ramble on and on about this!
The part about your sadness turning into anger at your younger self — that turning is the part most people never say out loud. You did it in one sentence.