Who Are We Really?
Do you ever think you’re being so brave and then you hear about one of those survivors of a serial killer attack and then you realize wow, that spreadsheet really had me going but I guess if they can take down a man with a knife and a will to murder, I can fill out these boxes appropriately.
That’s how I felt this week. All the things I worry about and stress over and all the ways my brain tries to trick me into staying out of arenas I’d like to be in came crashing down as I watched Season 2 Act I of the TV show Arcane. Stick with me. This connects.
Nothing is so powerful as a story.
Nothing is so powerful as thinking you can’t do something and then hearing about someone who did. Or sitting with loneliness until it becomes part of your DNA only discover you’re not the only one who feels that way. Not all stories are worthy ones and not all of them can happen to you, but the whole reason for stories, in my humble opinion, is to let us know we’re not alone.
Often this has a nostalgic twist. A nestling in the gut and a starry-eyed “yeah” as you curl into yourself by a fire and feel the weight of a thousand “love yous” from your friends and adoring fans but what if, what IF that also encompassed another side of things?
What if “we are not alone” was not just a call to feel the community of others but a wake up call instead? Ever found yourself on the wrong side of the internet? You’re seeing things that you don’t want to see and then you realize, somehow, some way you must have asked for this. (These algorithms are sneaky.)Don’t worry about sounding professional. Sound like you. There are over 1.5 billion websites out there, but your story is what’s going to separate this one from the rest. If you read the words back and don’t hear your own voice in your head, that’s a good sign you still have more work to do.
Be clear, be confident and don’t overthink it. The beauty of your story is that it’s going to continue to evolve and your site can evolve with it. Your goal should be to make it feel right for right now. Later will take care of itself. It always does.
Somehow some way you realize you are not, in fact, alone in the world in the things you’ve done and the things you’ve said and you might come to realize you’re not surrounded by especially good company. I’ve found myself there a time or two, realizing I started to fit into tropes and character arcs I never wanted for myself.
Except I did. Except I thought they were cool and I thought I was cool and I wanted so desperately to be accepted and loved and cool that I did those things only to find myself on the wrong side of it all. It’s amazing how powerful stories can be. They lure us into mindsets, into dogmas, into whole ways of living before we realize our entire lives were built on a story.
I was watching this show in which the fate of the world keeps dropping into the hands of different people, broken people, traumatized people, and I began to wonder if the stories we tell are for our benefit only. Are we telling ourselves these stories because they are true or we want them to be true? Are we kidding ourselves or is this the work to actual change?
You have to train yourself to recognize truth in a story. You have to wire your brain over and over again until it remembers its feet on the ground before it goes jumping off into clouds.
We use stories for a variety of things, to alleviate guilt, to justify our actions, to say everything is going to be alright just wait and see. We are so inundated with stories that I wonder if we don’t sometimes forget how interwoven they become into our beings. Holding onto a narrative, some call it, repeating these narratives to yourself over and over.
“I’m a good person.”
“I suck at this.”
“I’m the only one who knows what I’m doing.”
“Nobody will ever love me.”
We wind the truth of it way back down because the truth is an elusive thing. The truth likes to shape shift and the reality is it’s all far more complicated than we acknowledge on a day to day basis. Everyone is obsessed with the hero arc because they fancy themselves the main character but every single other character in that story is the hero of their own tale and we can’t all be right.
In the show the characters go through unspeakable things. I’m sitting here watching how they handle their world on the brink of war and how the characters settle into themselves and who they become and it makes me wonder who I am becoming. On the precipice of what could be great turmoil ahead am I going to be the person who complains it isn’t fair? Or am I going to buckle down and actually get work done? And in the wake of the self-care movement when we can not only acknowledge trauma exists but that it’s detrimental to our health, what does being a good person even look like in the wake of war? In the wake of economic failure? In the wake of oppressive regimes?
Are we allowed to be “good characters” going forward? Or are we going to have to be complex characters making choices to the best of our ability until we are put in better circumstances?
All this I ask myself as I weep over a Canva edit or deteriorate over someone’s constructive criticism. Somehow that seems more upsetting than fighting for a sense of justice because I’m desperate for meaning and there is no meaning to preference where graphic design is concerned. Maybe, just maybe, there is meaning in fighting for your neighbor’s right to live a peaceful life. Maybe there’s meaning in remaining aware, remaining open to changing your mind.
And if you find yourself identifying with a character whose questionable morals ring familiar in your bones, consider that it’s not too late to become who you want to be. Consider that stories are not just there to make us feel better but to illuminate a pathway to change.
Also, go watch that show. Nothing has been this good in a really long time and I think good stories ought to be told and told and told.
Thank you for being here and I hope you know, wherever you are, you are not alone. (Whether that comforts you are not.)
The author of this piece would like to share some of the ways that life has communicated that things will be okay. Results are below.
The Roundup of Little Magic Things That Make Me Feel Sane:
As I was reading in a graveyard a woman brought her grandchildren to their family plot to tell them stories about people they never knew.
There’s a “shop dog in training” at the bookstore and he’s doing a very good job.
Overheard at a coffee shop: People sang “Happy Birthday” to their beloved and very embarrassed coworker.
After the election I had several friends reach out to ask if I was okay. I wasn’t and neither are they but there is power in community and somehow, I have ended up with friends who remember me from thousands of miles away and I am humbled to be loved like that.
The sweaters are emerging. They’re coming to coffee shops, to libraries, restaurants, and corporate work halls. They are maroon, and green, and cream, and I love each and every one of their blessed little stitches.
