I once sat atop Table Mountain in South Africa. I felt so small, but comfortable in awe of a most spectacular view, in awe of the friends who sat with me, in awe of my achievement. I slowly realized the frailty of my existence as I looked at the city, the harbor, the wonder down below. I became aware of how few precious moments I was granted to walk this earth. I felt a sense of urgency.
The experience motivated me to begin a task which I had only dabbled in prior. Though it was a task I knew for so long I needed, wanted to do. I needed to figure out who I was.
Such an endeavor is one that never ends and must be constantly pursued.
Some might call it a search for happiness. Though often the wrong avenues are sought: money, fame, instant gratification ... etc.
I have interacted with people who will never know money, fame or luxury. They lived in nothing more than a one-room home with a straw roof, dirt floor and no running water. Some of these individuals were more content, happier than most people I see around me everyday.
It is not your world that defines you; it is what you make of it, what you learn from it, what you become because of it. Individuals must be challenged to define who they are.
People are not being taught how to think freely, how to view all sides and formulate an opinion. This reality is very unfortunate.
The detriment of modern society is it has become entirely too external. Money is the ultimate definition for most everything.
Information overwhelmingly flows to all.
The fact is that many people are strongly defined by things that speak not of themselves. Individuals shy from taking the opportunity to understand and treasure the one person they should the most, themselves. They have distanced from the personal with a world of lights, empty promises, mindless activities, assumptions, fake pride and corruption at the highest levels.
I am by no means promoting isolation or a loss of faith in the world. However, self-awareness, self-discovery, personal accountability, self-reliance -- these are necessities -- not endearing qualities.
Try new things. You will never know if you are good or bad at something unless you try.
Be willing to develop an understanding of the person you must contend with everyday of your life.
Realize first what you are not. You are not your possessions or the money you make. You are not your job. You are not the people you know or the places you go.
You are not the clothes you wear or the body we behold. You are not someone else or a group. You are not what society thinks you are or what others say. Then realize what you are. You are what you do or do not. You are what you say, you write, you think.
You are what you feel. You are what you love, what you hate.
You are what you perceive yourself as and what you believe in.
And so I leave you with a poem I wrote, attempting to describe the wish I have for all of us: to figure out who we are as individuals.
We are the privileged; we are the free
Individual definition
A proposition not enough harkened
And we fall a little further
The mud of mediocre
The pit of popular
We are all a million shades of human
Do we know ourselves, the beauty,
The world, the true, the real, the frailty
Of all we grip so tightly
Release with faith
No one will catch you
But yourself
"To thine own self be true"
Define you
Try new, try old, meet new, meet old
Meet all with cautious anticipation
The gratification will be unyielding
Relentless in the pursuit
Of my talents, of my character,
Of my self, of my world
I will catch you on the flip side.
