Oh hello Bethany!

Newsflash: Sometimes I am caught off guard. I know, I know. This is hard to believe. Ms. To-Do List and day planner is usually prepared for anything. But alas, there are moments when I am unprepared…surprised even.

One of those moments came the other day in an otherwise ordinary moment. I was reading twitter and some generic handle tweeted the question, "Do you really know yourself???" The three question marks were obviously to instill a sense of urgency and maybe panic in readers who would otherwise skim right over the tweet. And it worked. When there are three question marks or explanation marks or even capital letters one pays attention. It's the Achilles heel of those who are well-educated.

And so there I was, caught off-guard by a moment of internal struggle. DID I really know myself? I tried to brush the uneasy feeling inside away and go about my day but I kept returning to that ominous tweet with it's trickster question marks and would feel unsettled. Feeling unsettled isn't an usual feeling for me but usually I'm not left reeling by a casual twitter feed look-see.

So I started thinking. All my life I have allowed myself to be defined by other things. What social group I belonged to, what sport I played, where I lived, etc. Somehow, along the way I had started confusing my identity with those things.

As I mentioned in previous posts, I had come to a juncture in my life where I had started not to "fit in" in the places I had normally found comfortable. It wasn't any one's fault, it just happened. I have been forced, over these past couple years, to redefine myself and latch onto things I had previously considered "secondary." By secondary I mean those things about yourself or your life that you take for granted or think, "yeah but that's just how it's always been." You don't really consider those traits or circumstances to be the things that make you, you. You don't think of those things when you fill out silly questionnaires about yourself or make a "short bio."

My short bios always consisted of those things that externally defined me. "Hi I'm Bethany and I play lacrosse and love my friends and family…" and then reel off my various accomplishments or hobbies. But as that tweet forced me to question, did that really describe ME? Do I truly KNOW myself?

A more true bio would be one where you bare your soul and reveal the things that drive you, hinder you and allow you to dust yourself off when you've fallen. But how do you put those abstract things into words? How can one describe oneself with integrity when those traits are intangible? What if you have instead become defined by the moments and events in your life that have forced you to look inward and reevaluate?

"Hi I'm Bethany and I thought I had it figured out but turns out I don't…and that's okay. Because now I know how strong I am. I smile at the inane, appreciate those who can be vulnerable and I like to connect to the different parts of myself to get me through the unpredictable."

Let's be honest if you read the above on a profile about me you'd peg me as "one of those weirdos," right? But isn't the above truly more descriptive of who we are than the traditional listing of one's hobbies and accomplishments? Yes, you may be an executive at a large firm but who the hell ARE you?

Needless to say when I am confronted with the question, with multiple question marks trailing behind it, asking me if I know who I am, the unsettling feeling comes from the fact that I am torn- do I continue to describe and define myself by the tangible or the truly influential and defining intangible parts about myself that have started to become primary and no longer secondary in my life?

And does it even matter? It seems to me that digging deeper was what I was meant to do all along. So, the answer to that jarring tweet is yes, I know myself. I just can't DESCRIBE myself.

And there is a joy in realizing that you do, indeed, know yourself and that you like what you find. For the first time I am able to celebrate the "me" that doesn't look good on paper and cherish the parts of myself that can't be easily described in social media or a work seminar designed to "get to know one another."

For the first time I am able to say hello to myself genuinely. Say hello to ME and not my bio on paper. And that's something to celebrate.

Now for that twitter handle whose name I have now forgotten, I'd like to offer a "thank you." Thank you for asking the question that made me realize that I am not what I can put on paper (or the web). Mysterious-twitter-handle-I-have-now-forgotten, you must be some kind of philosophical genius. Keep the tweets coming! ;)