This Is My World

I sit here in this cafe typing when I look up and see something hanging from the wall. A cardboard frog is attached to a cardboard crest which announces "This Is My World." And as I sit here with my fingers hitting the keys, I realize this is a perfect way to start. 

From our earliest years we are raised in a kaleidoscope of structures; the family structure, the religious, the school, the government, and perhaps most permeating--the gender and culture roles that surround us. 

The hardest thing, or at least the hardest thing for me, is to find where I fit in these varying worlds while constantly constructing a personal truth of my own. I'm not knocking these structures. They serve as vital roles and make things interesting as we now have a world that is filled with different schools, religions, governments, cultures, etc. 

But when does the one leave off and the next begin? It comes as some surprise to me that I am a people pleaser of sorts. I don't like getting pushed around and if something really offends me I don't back down or bend to others' whims. But amidst all of the variations I put out there with the silently asked question of "is this okay? Have I scared you off? Do you approve of me?" I try to feel my way to a more original and truthful version of myself. 

In the end, it is I, and no one else who is living this life, and therefore I owe it to myself to be the most, well, of me. I believe Sartre called this "being authentic," and as one who has strived to do just that over the last few years I can say that it hurts like hell and is a road full of pain, but it's also kind of cool. 

Some people, as I was reminded on Monday night are wired for particular things; I am wired for monogamy. I am wired for emotion, for hope and optimism, for anxiety and nervousness, for personal cynicism, dreaminess and romanticism. All of these combine to be uniquely me and I have recently tried to refrain from asking others for their opinion about pieces of my world. Because, after all, this is my world.