The Magic of Knowing Thyself

The art of knowing myself is something I can predict. The art of understanding myself will forever elude me.

It's fairly easy to get to know who we are on an internal level. What we like. What we don't. What we want. Yet the aspect of truly knowing myself becomes convoluted when I stop asking what?, and replace it with why?. Why do I want the things I want? Why do I continue to convince myself I am not skilled enough to accomplish those things? Why do I stop myself from trying new things? No matter how many years I've spent in therapy and alone with my thoughts, I'm still not used to pausing to ask my own reasoning. And for that very reason, I know that whenever I have an idea for something new I want to do, I will do everything in my power to convince myself I don't actually want to do it. That it will be too hard. That I already have enough on my plate so I shouldn't bother. Which used to limit me in my younger years, but now allows me time to pause and think.

I've accepted that I'm a slow goer. It will take me a while to start new activities, especially things my mind registers as risky. From the first time I considered it, it took me about two years to commit to self-publishing my first book. I didn't take my painting seriously for more than that, telling myself I didn't really want to be a professional artist because my art would never sell. This part of me--this constant doubt--frustrated me. It made me feel like like an imposter in the fields I was passionate about, which ruined my motivation even further. But then it occurred to me: if I stopped coming up with excuses and asked myself why I wanted to try these new things, my perspective would change. Why did it take me years to finally self-publish and sell my art? Fear of failure. When I realized how silly that was, I worked through it.

Once I stopped seeing my hesitations as a shortcoming, it allowed me to use the time to understand myself better. Something that made me feel so terrible about myself as an artist became a tool for introspection and growth. And since people are ever changing, and I am in fact a people, I'm always understanding new parts about myself. So in the end, I know myself very well. Well enough to expect anxiety from any new experience. It's when I take the time to understand the why that I learn even more about me as a writer, an artist, and a human being.