How Much of This is Mine?
Thoughts on the Rollercoaster of Identity
Have you ever spent so much time with somebody that you adopted their words? Their little go-to phrases? The way their voice lilts on certain sounds and their tongue curls around others?
What about their mannerisms? The hand gestures, the facial expressions, the half-smile or the sultry gaze or the eye roll?
It’s so innocent and starts so small.
Your friend says “one hundred percent” and then you’re rolling with it every day after that. Your teammate has a little smirk that you accidentally perfected, her mirror image.
But what about when it isn’t small? Isn’t innocent?
Or, should I say, what about when it isn’t you, adopting their quirks?
What about when it's somebody else, or heck, a group of people, who kind of, impose upon you, these ‘quirks’ — phrases, mannerisms, ideas, ways — without you even realising?
I’m thinking a lot about healing, lately, and I find myself drawn to writing about healing. I especially have found space in journaling through my own journey of healing. I went to write recently about what life looks like, now — the ways I have met myself, learned to love myself, and learned to process in new ways. And I innocently started to describe this complex, beautiful, wonderful process in my mind, and on my pages, like a rollercoaster — you know, the cliche way of describing life with all those ups and downs?
I guess I’ve only just realised how often I ascribe this language to my life.
There’s nothing wrong with using that language… But something about the word on my page, well, it stopped me in my sentence.
It struck me, when I wrote it, what a peculiar description it was.
I’ve always experienced the vastness of what it means to be human — joy, delight, pain, sadness, anger, play — I felt it all and I felt it deeply, when it was mine, or when it was someone else’s (empaths, are you with me?).
Yet, somewhere, I dehumanised my experience, chose to call myself a rollercoaster, instead of human? I used this different imagery to separate myself from the emotions, from the reality of my human experience.
I stared at that freaking word on the page. The word that didn’t fit and never, truly, had. I let it wash over me until I realised what the problem was, until my eyes opened to why it had caused me to pause and stumble so quickly.
I guess I’ve only just realised I didn’t choose that description for myself.
I didn’t choose it.
It wasn’t mine.
It was adopted, taken deeply to heart.
And I know when.
I was sixteen, in a catch-up with a pastor. In the peak of my identity-formation, the high-point of discovery. Yet, the deep need for approval was ever looming. My god, I wanted them to like me. I wanted them to see me. I wanted to belong.
I wish I knew the context, but it was drilled into me that my personality was like a rollercoaster. I was either high or low, and I had no in-between. They told me I was unbalanced, like this rollercoaster, and that I’d have to spend my life learning balance. I’d have to intentionally step away from the “highs and lows” and choose to not engage them.
Sorry, but can we just re-emphasizez, this was said to a girl? Not an adult. Sixteen. Of course I was a combination of highs and lows, I was only just learning who I was. I was only just learning what it meant to grow up. Nothing about that time in my life was going to be balanced, even if it is completely human to feel the fullness of emotion, anyway.
They framed this normally delightful adventure ride, as a negative, sinful idea. I guess I adopted it ever since.
I guess ever since it was framed so negatively, I framed that part of me, negatively, too.
And by “that part”, I mean the part of me that felt. The part of me that experienced that full, humanness so damn deeply. The part of me that let myself be free with delight, with joy, with wonder, and let myself sit deeply with the emotions of sadness, anger. I cut that shit off, those negative, “rollercoaster” emotions.
Sweet young teenage me heard those words, and god did she take them on.
Have you ever had something similar happen to you?
Have you ever been told who you are, by someone else? Or who you should be?
It could be something small, a comment thrown your way about how you’re “not good enough to do that”, or a knife framed in joking humour. It could be more blunt, a “you must do this” or a “you must move here” or a “you must not move away” or a “quit your job because you are THIS and not this”. It could be someone implying that a certain music style is bad, that some people are not good, that certain ways of being are lesser. It could be worse, they could use god to prove their point, saying that “god said you shouldn’t go” or “you’re not following gods plan if you work there”… I could go on for hours.
The culture I was a part of from my early teens to mid-twenties was an expert in doing this, in controlling us by using their words to name us.
They did it explicitly. They did it implicitly. They used god. They used themselves.
I was given so many identities that were not of my choosing, yet I took them on board, always, seeking to be the “best version of me”, to live my “best life”. Which was, of course, their version of me, their version of my life, based on their interpretation of their texts.
Not my version of me.
I never got the chance to discover her, fully, then.
I caught glimpses though.
And when I saw her, my god, I felt the Divine wonder that is seeing your Self.
I have had to unravel so much, as I ask, always — how much have I chosen? How much of this is mine? How much of this is yours?
The worst part about this one, is I don’t have an answer, a quick fix.
I’ve sifted through so many pieces, found so many rocks that don’t belong, and thrown them out. I’m still finding them, though. I’m still finding the things that have found their way in, unbidden.
What I do have, though, better than any answer, is hope.
Hope for me, as I keep unraveling.
And, of course, hope for you.
That you, too, would see. That you would choose to see, choose to uncover, choose to unravel. Make space for the wonder that is you, let yourself be uncovered from the words and phrases and actions you never chose, maybe never wanted at all.
