How many times in my life have I allowed myself to be true to who I am? Without the relentless self-criticism and constant search for mistakes, just to be the first to notice my own flaws? Without treating my interests as secondary, less significant than everyday survival and existence.
You can catch a glimpse of this at the corner of your eye, only to later grab your head in disbelief at how ruthlessly you treat yourself. To your body. To your very identity. You deny it, don’t allow yourself to fully be, and seek norms to fit into.
This subconscious strategy has guided me since birth—self-avoidance, self-evasion, tuning myself like an antenna to others’ interests. All to fill the inner void, that gaping abyss of guilt and prickly errors. To fill it with self-affirmation, which often crumbles and sinks with me to the depths of the “I am nothing” mine.
Any attempts to “find my place” led me nowhere because one cannot find oneself without truly seeing, without complete self-awareness. When you’re ready to gnaw at yourself over the tiniest mistake.
And now, unexpectedly, the self-hatred machine has shut down. Inside me, it’s quiet yet resonant. A ringing silence that occasionally erupts in self-criticism, but quickly subsides—I’ve played that game enough."
Photo by Juan Davila on Unsplash
