The Lost Art of Being Yourself

"Be yourself" as a standalone phrase sounds so simple; a tried-and-true testament of who we are at our core and who we want to become. It's shaped by lived experiences where we learned what we enjoy, what doesn't work for us, and how we choose to handle the randomness that life throws our way. To truly be happy within yourself you need to: do the things that you genuinely enjoy, be surrounded by people that provide positive value to your life, continue to grow as a person. Sounds simple right? Then why does the question, "how are things going?" always elicit responses like "oh, it's going", "can't complain", or the ole reliable and always monotonous "living the dream!"? Because being yourself is simple when the only variable in the experiment you're concerned about is yourself, but life is full of everchanging outside variables that make impressions on us and muddy the waters of what it means to be yourself.

I was stuck in rush hour traffic after work today thinking about where I am in my life now compared to where I was headed a few years ago. The world of professionalism was something I scorned for years due to feelings of inadequacy in comparison to my peers and a crippling fear of failure that consistently bred a failure to attempt anything outside my comfort zone which pointed me straight towards my biggest fear, being content failing in all aspects of life. Now I'm working towards something that I love to do, with an emphasis on helping people as my driving force and I'm doing so without any of those less-than feelings or debilitating fears I once had. This led me into taking a personal inventory as to what change I could've possibly made along my sobriety journey to cause such a dramatic shift in drive, personability, and overall outlook on life. That's when the idea for this blog hit me like a Jimmy Neutron brain blast. I've been living life as an open book, honest about my struggles and comfortable admitting fault to the laundry list of abhorrent behaviors that negatively impacted people around me. With everything on the table there was nothing I had to hide internally out of embarrassment or fear of the response from others. I made the decision along the way that I wasn't going to let my past mistakes be used as fodder to govern my happiness in the future and in doing so I guess I stumbled into comfortably being myself. The shift from glum and rudderless to jovial and confident wasn't the result of a change in the fabric of me as a human, it was the willingness to shed the proverbial skin harboring my embarrassment, pain, and regret that let me be me unapologetically.

I really hope this section doesn't read like one of those fruitless hit piece articles about how social media is destroying self-worth, but I feel like this had to be included in a writing about being yourself. Here's my big Shyamalan-esc twist: social media in a black and white context isn't what hurts self-image, it's how we choose to perceive what we see on our feed. Groundbreaking I know, but please hold the applause until I finish this poignant explanation that's bound to get me the Nobel Prize for Literature. You know how I mentioned that seemingly everyone you ask about how they're doing has pretty much the same unexciting answer? Yeah? Well why do we choose to feel worse about our own lives when we see those same people post about something exciting in their lives? I've never understood that. It's not a social media issue, when I see people in my life post cool stuff they're doing I'm happy for them, not jealous of them which is generally its intent. It's undoubtedly a self-image issue that leads people to compare where they are in life to where others are even though we've established that the grass is rarely greener during the day to day. When you are secure in yourself and building towards who you want to be personally/professionally you're able to see social media through rose colored lenses and choose to share in the celebrations and successes of others instead of wishing you had what they have or were able to go where they went when it's almost certainly not what you would buy or where you'd choose to go. To conclude: social media is awesome when you open it to go "hell yeah, that's cool. Good for them." instead of "why/how the hell are they doing that?" so do cool shit, post cool shit, and be happy for other people doing cool shit.

The "do cool shit" theme ties perfectly into the do things that you genuinely enjoy aspect of being yourself and it's been an important one for me. It doesn't take a physicist to figure out that abrasion from continuous friction makes things weaker. The same analogy can be used in regard to us as humans; going against the grain of what makes us as individuals happy will have adverse effects over time. This is how people end up bitter in an "old man yells at cloud" type of way where even the most miniscule qualities of life are somehow a burden. I understand that not everybody has their dream job, that's not what I'm getting at specifically even though doing what you love for a living is what everybody should strive for. It's the outside of work time that makes a world of difference, or it does for me at least, when I'm off the clock I'm always doing something I love to do. I don't like to be defined by work and I'm sure a lot of people do and that's totally fine, I get my energy for work by doing things I genuinely enjoy outside of work to unwind and stay off the work focused hamster wheel. I know what I need to do to maintain the work-life balance with very little abrasion and that's by making time for the things that revitalize me instead of the things that suck the life out of me.

Surrounding yourself with likeminded and supportive people that will push you towards the vision you have for yourself is a necessity. This doesn't mean that you have to limit your friend group to only people that fit this mold but having an inner circle that pushes you to better yourself and voluntarily rides with you through the rough patches is the biggest asset you can have in life. This is something I got incredibly lucky on; I always say the only good thing I ever did as a drunk was surround myself with a core of people that are supremely motivated and truly wanted to see me hit my potential and I'm unbelievably grateful for it. Latch on to people heading in the direction you want to go yourself and before you know it you'll be doing things you never imagined for yourself. These are the people that love you for you and encourage you to be yourself at all times, a rising tide lifts all boats if you will.

Continuous personal growth isn't always fun or easy but the amount you learn about yourself in the process is what makes it worth it. I'm far from perfect and will never be close to it. I still mess things up quite often it's just that my messes are a lot more manageable now than they were a couple years ago and seeing that growth periodically has built my confidence up from 0 to the highest it's ever been currently. Doing hard things just to prove to yourself that you can is what raises your self-esteem floor, a fall from grace doesn't hurt nearly as bad when you have a pile of overcame adversities to land on.

"You gotta fucking embrace your inner fucking strange, man."

This quote is from the Richard Linklater film "Everybody Wants Some!!" and it has sat in my head since I watched it, I absolutely love it. Every one of us has some inner strange, man, and so many people are afraid to let the world see that side of them. A side that they love to let loose when nobody is watching but won't dare to express in a public setting to avoid being tagged as weird. This is where I shine, I'm strange and I gladly embrace my inner strange. It doesn't matter who I'm around or what the setting is I'm going to be true to myself and, like everyone else, I enjoy some weird or out of the ordinary stuff. Like, sure a decent chunk of people enjoy watching NASCAR but how many people:

1. Had a NASCAR themed room growing up complete with a duct tape track on my floor to conduct races with my collection of mini diecasts (I had every driver's car)

2. Collected every monthly release of the magazine NASCAR Illustrated from 2005 until it was tragically discontinued in 2016 (I ran out of places to store them towards the end, every drawer and usable closet space was full of magazines)

3. Genuinely wanted a legit textbook sized book titled "The Complete History of NASCAR" more than a Nintendo DS (I still have the book, but I need a new version)

4. Are able to explain detailed stories of its history from its inception in 1949 to current day off the top of their head (The inaugural Daytona 500 in 1959 took 3 days to declare a winner because the finish was too close to call with a naked eye, they had to collect pictures and newsreel footage ultimately declaring Lee Petty the winner)

5. Can recount certain finishes, crashes, championship moments, and career statistics in vivid detail like it was yesterday (In 2007 Clint Bowyer led 222 of 300 laps at New Hampshire scoring his first of 10 career wins)

I went off the rails with that but as you can see it's like a moth to a flame. I know NASCAR isn't cool to the vast majority of people, but I don't care, I love it and have always loved it, so I'll talk about it freely if an opportunity presents itself. I cut up whole lemons into slices and eat them as one of my favorite snacks. I've worn Merrill loafers, the shoes universally loved by all grandpas since I was 20 and will never stop. I'm completely willing to be open and vulnerable about any aspect of life at the drop of a hat which tends to catch people off guard. These are just a few of the ways that I embrace my strange, I know they're not normal characteristics but that's exactly why they're some of my favorites.

I'm totally comfortable being myself, I love who I am and who I continue to grow into quirks and all. Society as a collective seems to me like it tries to stuff everybody into a box of normal for some reason. Meeting a new group of people? Completely avoid talking about anything that makes you unique so you don't get weird stamped. The discussion rubric explicitly says we may only discuss the weather, the game last night, or what we do for work on the most basic level of understanding possible. I hate nothing more than pretending like we're all the round version SpongeBob trying to be as nice and inconsequential as humanly possible. More people need to embrace their fucking strange; tell me you collect stamps, tell me you're into competitive equestrian, tell me your favorite car is a 2004 Geo Tracker, just tell me about what makes you strange. This quote from American Beauty sums it up perfectly, "I don't think that there's anything worse than being ordinary."