Being the best "you"

Have you ever sat and thought about when you became self-aware?  It's obviously not something we're born with, otherwise kids wouldn't be so cruelly honest.  And really, it's probably more of a gradual transition as we see traits in others that we don't like and start comparing them to ourselves.  But sometimes you have an epiphany moment; at least, I did.

In 7th grade (around age 12) there was a boy in my class who was a complete know-it-all.  He was new and essentially thought he was smarter than everyone which really annoyed me and a lot of the other kids in my class.  As the year went on he quit trying so hard to impress everyone and we became friends.  At some point during that year he asked me, "Would you be your friend?"  Meaning, if there was an identical copy of you, same personality, habits, manners and everything, would you be their friend.  I, of course, immediately snapped "Yes" but then I started to wonder.

Would I really be my friend?  And I started to take stock of who I was.  Looking at yourself objectively can be incredibly difficult, especially when you're a kid but I did my best.  What I came up with was I was bossy, imperious, had a horrible temper that would go off at the tiniest thing, and was really kind of a bitch.  I realized my answer was "no."  And that realization changed me.  I had never thought about "who I was" before, but I knew I didn't like the person I was being.  So I decided to change.

As it turns out, it is HARD to change behavior patterns that have become ingrained.  Every year I would pick the aspect of my personality or behavior that was the most egregious and I would consciously work on changing or stopping whatever it was until I didn't have to think about it anymore.  Some things took longer than others.  It took three years to get my temper under control and another two to quit cussing.  Some traits seemed to fade away while I was working on a different one.  Which makes sense, I suppose, since I was changing an entire personality and it was all connected.

Eventually, I was satisfied that I was a good person who I would indeed be friends with.  But I'd learned something valuable.  I decided who I am and who I will be.  So I kept looking at myself as I am and how I would like to be.

Throughout high school and into college I was cripplingly shy.  So one year I resolved to say "hi" and smile at every person I walked past that made eye-contact with me.  It sounds like such a little thing, but to me it was daunting and I'd be lying if I said I never cheated and looked at the sidewalk when I saw someone coming.  But I kept at it until it became my default.  I still do it today and it's kind of remarkable how happy some people are just to be seen and recognized as a fellow person.

I feel safe saying that I've conquered my shyness.  I am, at this point, very happy with the person that I've become.  Of course I have flaws, but they're flaws that I can live with.  I hold myself to MY standards for me. I don't expect me to be perfect or to be completely zen when I've had a horrible day.  And I recognize my flaws.  I know when I'm being irrationally angry about something, and often that's enough for me to stop.  Other times I indulge the anger because I think it's good to let emotions out.

One thing that I've decided throughout this journey of becoming the best "me" is that people have different visions of who the perfect "you" is.  And it's wonderful that they want you to fulfill your full potential, but what they are doing is holding you to THEIR standards of what a successful person is.  And that isn't really fair.  People have different opinions about practically everything and if you live to someone else's standards, are you really being the true you?  I truly believe that you can't change other people.  But, sometimes, you can make them want to change themselves.

I'm so grateful to that 12-year-old for not just brushing off some impertinent question from the annoying boy she didn't really like.  But I'm even more grateful to him for asking the question in the first place.  I mostly lost touch with him when we went to college, apart from a brief email exchange a couple of years ago.  He doesn't have any idea he had such a huge impact on my life, but I shudder to think what I would have been like if we had never had that conversation.  Hopefully, I would have figured it out on my own but you never know.  I should really thank him; he's the reason I'm the person who I am today.