Know Thy Self

I believe, at forty-seven, I have finally arrived at a place where I am comfortable to be Me.

I know that this is a bold statement, but I have always suffered, like most people I believe, from a certain amount of anxiety around how I was presenting myself and was being perceived.  I've always worried and thus spent a lot of energy pulling my punches around others.  I no longer feel the need to do this anymore.  It's incredibly freeing; a whole new perspective on my life.

I know that many people in the world come, through various circumstances, to have this same sense of self very early on comparatively.  I have come to this place of comfort now.

Gnôthi seauton -- The Greek maxim often meditated on my poets and philosophers, puts it very succinctly -- Know Thyself!  I don't claim to have reached this point and I hope I am never arrogant enough to claim this.  No, this feeling --  sense of comfort -- I feel is different: It is a form of feeling grounded, a sense of living in the present fully, with no thought of worrying.

Except in the many instances when I am careful about treading lightly in order to avoid hurting peoples feelings or for the sake of simple human politics to achieve a greater goal; only then, do I now feel the urge to hold back my opinion or choose to simply say nothing.

Derek Walcott's poem, "Love After Love," which I placed in my wedding program thirteen years ago and have hung on the wall of my bedroom since, speaks about ones love for self:

The time will come when, with elation
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror
and each will smile at the other's welcome,
and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you
all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookshelf,
the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.

It is by no means complete: this process.  But it feels like I have reached a plateau.  I have arrived.  I have finally found a comfortable seat and am ready to feast.

Alanis Morissette's song, " " comes to mind.  Here are the last three stanzas from that song:

the moment I let go of it was the moment
I got more than I could handle
the moment I jumped off of it
was the moment I touched down

how bout no longer being masochistic
how bout remembering your divinity
how bout unabashedly bawling your eyes out
how bout not equating death with stopping

thank you india
thank you providence
thank you disillusionment
thank you nothingness
thank you clarity
thank you thank you silence