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Who am I?
Who are you?
Perhaps you've never thought to ask this question to yourself. You might already think that you know and understand exactly who you are.
If you do, congratulations. You have achieved a pure state of self-actualization that very few that have ever lived on this planet has accomplished.
However, through my own journey through soul searching, I have come to my very own understanding of life. And I believe that the previously stated self-actualization is indeed: impossible.
Yes, that's right. Your psychology textbook is lying.
I don't believe that you can ever really know who you are, because you are always changing. You are always thinking, always growing, and always learning. Your priorities change, your goals are fulfilled or set aside for later discovery, you obtain new ideas, and preconceived notions and opinions can be re-written or simply misunderstood.
People are complex beings.
The best things in life are always the nearest: Breath in your lungs, light in your eyes, ground beneath your feet, potential at your hands, a God above your head, and the path of right just before you. Every day you may make progress down this path. Every single step and solitary movement may (or may not) prove to be fruitful. Yet there will stretch out before you an ever-lengthening, ever-ascending, ever-improving path. You know that you will never get to the end of the journey; not really. But that this, the twists and turns, rocks and mountains – that have been so ultimately discouraging – only adds to the joy and glory of the climb. It is not always the fight to touch the stars, but to do life's plain, common work as it comes. For more often than not, the struggle to accomplish the daily duties and earn your daily bread, result in the sweetest things in life.
I was talking with a friend who was engaged in the daily battle of survival, and we had an interesting discussion while sitting on a blanket of grass under the night sky. He said that he wished that he could always know when and what trial that the Lord was going to send his way, as well as the outcome; that he might be prepared for it. I thought about it, and realized that life, for me, would no longer have any sense of meaning at all. If I always knew who was going to win at a board game, what would be the purpose in playing it? If I knew the whole story of an unopened book, why read it? If I knew that I would have an experience that would result in a broken heart, why pursue it?
It is seeking out the unknown that keeps us feeling alive. It keeps us in this constant and continual state of movement. Had I known where I would be now, and all of the pain life has put me through since moving down here, away from my dearest friends, I might not have even considered the notion at the time. But now, as I look across the lake at where I stood, I can see that although I still struggle (as I am now), I can see just how beautiful and lovely learning really is.
The Lord is good to me.
~C
