Something I wrote about "true selves" that I have to share somewhere

I really long to be somewhere new—that is, I wish I’d moved somewhere far away just before high school started. I long to be peculiar or, more accurately, unique, and I could at least be unique in the respect that I’m from somewhere else, I have an accent, etc. Maybe then I’d be different, because as it is, in my pursuit of uniqueness, I’ve become loud and stupid when that’s not who I want to be and, moreover, not who I see myself as. When it comes down to it, I always relate more to characters in anime and such who are quiet, reserved—those who know when to speak and when to hold their tongue. I want to be the person who doesn’t speak often but, when I do, always says the right thing. I want to take in more than I put out—is that impossible now? I don’t know if it is. How am I to make friends if I’m silent all the time, because the truth is that people don’t notice you when you’re quiet, like in anime or movies, but when you’re loud and  rambunctious—two things I certainly wasn’t when I was young, and where did that get me? It got me bullied and picked on. I guess that’s why I changed how I am in the first place. 

Perhaps silence is too… not “emotional”… personal for me? In silence, it can be said that one shows their true self—who can I show that true self to? Almost nobody. Silence is vulnerable. The funny thing is, I’m vulnerable even when I’m loud—it must be obvious, everyone must see it. 

The truth is, I’m not happy I won’t see anyone here again because of any of their faults, no matter the magnitude—the truth is that my memory will die with my absence, thereby killing whoever I have been. This person I’ve been certainly isn’t my true self—or, it doesn’t feel like my true self. That raises the question, then, as to whether I should even uncloak to reveal my true self to any passerby who appears to be a friend, or should I keep this false self on, or weave a new façade? I don’t believe I’ll be able to figure that out now—will I ever? I guess it’s something that must be done sooner or later, and I guess later is the only option now.

I want to be silent with someone. To just sit with someone I trust would be a dream—whether we’re both reading, on our phones, watching a movie, or just thinking, there’s a bond that’s formed, in my mind. It seems like this is absent from some other people—that, or almost nobody has trusted me enough to do such a thing.

Does everyone have a façade they put up? Are other loud people the quietest? Are the dumbest the smartest? Are the people who don’t want anything to do with anyone actually the most friendly? It’s said in movies and tv shows that the most popular are the loneliest, but is this really the case, or is it just a few people’s experiences? There’s no way of knowing, and therefore there’s no way of putting the quietest, the loudest, the smartest, the dumbest, the most popular, the least popular, into boxes—they all have to be dealt with individually, which is frankly scary. No method by keeping to one may navigate human interaction? No pattern whatsoever?

What does this mean for me? I feel like that question is just a roundabout way of asking the same question from before: should I wear the mask? There’s more to be said of it, I’m sure, but I can’t seem to find words to articulate what I feel about this—at least, not in an elegant way. So, to put it bluntly, I feel a sharp pain and sorrow about my past actions. Call it regret that I didn’t look into myself more and see why I acted loudly and foolishly when there was no need. What did it give me in the end? People I dislike and the exact friend group I would’ve ended up with anyway. Not to say that I dislike my friends—I love them! It’s just that I would’ve ended up in the same place had I not put on an act for people who will forget about me in a year or so.

The truth is that I know I’m unique and that God knows I’m unique, and I know that those are the only two things that really matter, but man is the approval of others addicting. That sounds incredibly trite, and it also sounds like an excuse to stop delving into my deepest recesses, an excuse to stop trying to arrive at an answer. But no answer is to be had now, I don’t think. But on the other hand, what use will waiting do? I don’t think there’s anything in my future that will uncover some deep part of me that has thus far remained covered. My only solution for now is that I’ll weigh each option, see if being whatever my true self is is better than being my false self.

Speaking of these true and false selves, despite what I believe to be my true self—the one who wants to keep quiet and observe more than I output—being that true self, I also know for certain that embracing that part of myself would only serve to make me depressed. I can only come to the conclusion that what I’ve been calling my “true self” isn’t all of the equation, because as much as my desire to be quiet is truly a part of me, so is the desire to be loud, which is why I embraced that part of myself in the first place. Therefore, committing wholly to either of these aspects of myself would be giving into the false self and therefore putting on the mask once again, but embracing both of these feelings when they’re applicable is the truest self I can create. 

But there’s the difficulty yet again—how can one ever know exactly when to “use,” for lack of a better term, either of these aspects without slipping into one wholeheartedly out of laziness or carelessness? Again, I don’t think there’s any kind of method to this, and that’s scary—I don’t want to have to be conscious of myself constantly, I want this to come naturally. But, that might just be the consequence of not learning how to balance them earlier. 

There’s no way to end this in a grandiose way, and I feel like that would cheapen what I’ve said anyway, so I’m just gonna leave it at that for now.