Afraid to be born in an adult world. [advice I wrote to a friend] 8-26-2003

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Afraid to be born in an adult world. [advice I wrote to a friend] 8-26-2003 Date: 8/26/2003, 12:56 PM Well, you -are- more of who you are NOW than you were then. Simply living and experiencing takes care of that. The trouble is (and it's the same sort of trouble I've been working on too), your internal mental IMAGE of yourself constantly compares the "NOW" you against the "THEN" you. You are old compared to who you were at 19. You feel like an aging teenager. But you are a youngster compared to who you will be a fourty. That's kinda the age I look at too for myself, wondering if that's when I'll "find myself". The great part about people like you and me, is that we will not suffer a mid-life crisis. I truly believe that. I think we're suffering our mid-life crisis' NOW, as an extension of the WHO AM I question that we started asking when we were, like 12 yrs old or 15 yrs old or 19 yrs old. So, instead of asking "Who am I?" young, then getting caught up in things, forgetting all of the important questions of life until we're middle aged and having a crisis, we NEVER FORGOT to keep asking those same important questions. The same "Who am I?" "Will I find peace?" "Will I find my people?" "Where is my purpose in life?" "What gifts do I have to give to the world?" "Will I ever come out of my cocoon and turn into a butterfly?" We never stopped asking. We've never forgotten. But, at the same time, we're also afraid to be born. We're afraid to be born into the adult world, to leave the womb of a fantasized childhood that never really existed in the way we envision it to have been, or should have been. We're afraid to step out into the unknown, without a security blanket, without someone guiding us. We expect failure and are afraid of success, because if we succeed, then what? But I think that's the beauty of life. We don't have to step out alone. I think that's a big old myth that plagues people like us. There's the American ideal of the John Wayne's. The strong. The independent. "I don't need nobody, no-how. I am an island who stands alone." But who really stands alone? Ecept in movies, of course. At the same time, we ARE all alone. We are born alone out of the womb. We are placed in the coffin, alone. Nobody ever knows the real me. Nobody ever knows the real you. We are afraid to reveal too much, lest we get ridiculed or blamed or shunned from family or community. So, in a sense, you are a part of the problem. I am a part of the problem. Perhaps the veneer we show to others isn't complete enough to encourage others to reveal themselves, which would then make us more comfortable and allow us to reveal more of ourselves, which would allow them to reveal more of themselves, and deeper and deeper it goes until we find out our hopes and dreams and fears are not quite so dissimilar. ---- [...personal advice specific to the friend's situation...] ---- "Sit back, shut up and deal" is okay when you've come to acceptance to the "way-things-are", but not if you're fighting it inside of yourself. Acceptance to the reality of a situation doesn't equal AGREEMENT to it, just accepting whatever is, for whatever is. One exercise that can help is sitting down quietly, and making a list of WHO YOU ARE, today. It doesn't have to be a long list. Start out with your age, gender, looks. Continue the list with what you do on a regular basis. Nothing about interests or needs or anything like that. "Just the facts, ma'am". But... I warn you - this list will probably be much shorter than you'd like it to be (especially the list of what you typically "do"). And it will also be sobering. Very sobering. Perhaps even somewhat saddening / melancholy. But if gives you a ground floor to work off of. It gives you an, "This is who I am. This is what I do" today, which allows you to start working on a direction for the future. -Ken ADDED: JUNE 22, 2016: Prediction accuracy: 100%. 31 when I wrote it. 44 now. Did I have a mid-life crisis at 40? 41? 42? 43? 44? Nope. Me then = Me now = me before the then too.