Common Ground.

Thanks loonatic!

During my life I tried to define who I was in order to stand out from everyone else. I felt it was the most important and necessary thing a person could do, more so than having a successful career, or a stable relationship, or lots of friends; knowing who I was, specifically what set me apart from others was my Holy Grail. I thought that if I could achieve that, I could die happy.

I think if I knew that at 28 my life would be over, I would have done things differently, which isn't to say that I regret how I spent my final years, or any time of my life for that matter. But if I knew I was going to die, I would have wrapped things up, drawn some conclusions, and reflected on the progress I made towards finding myself.

But it's the nature of life not to know when the end is approaching, or near, or coming, only when it happens and then it's over just like that, in a split second, in the blink of an eye, except that eye never opens again, not even to say goodbye. Just one more peak, would have been nice, damn, it happened so fast. So, anyways, I can't say if I died happy, or died knowing I lived a full life, because what measures a life? How many years do you have to live for your life to be full? Was 28 years enough? I say no. Til the day I died, everyday was a constant struggle, with the choices I made, the place where I was. I was no more sure of myself then I was at 18, which isn't to say that I hadn't learned anything in 10 years because I did, I learned a whole hell of a lot, but learning quantity just makes it harder to find the things that really matter. I thought for sure I would have at least another 30 years to shift through all the stuff and make some sense of it.

Now I'll never know, but I do know this, I spent my entire lifetime searching myself for those idiosyncrasies that separated me from everyone else, that identified me, and as time went on, I felt like I was slowly creating my individuality. I had my own thoughts and opinions and feelings all of which were unique because I used my own reasoning and insight and reflections to come to my conclusions. I armed myself with these positions as I went out into the world and what do you know? I found others who thought like me and dressed like me. I felt, for the first time, that I was a part of something bigger and I felt safe. I blended in with a larger group and I felt more confident in speaking my mind, but what I was really doing was further dividing who I was from who I was not, creating a bigger gap between us and them,;and them over there, oh and them too, yup and them, and them, and them, until before I knew it my "large group" was a select few and everyone else was, well everyone else.

What happened was my individuality became a collective conscious, one in which I embraced while forgetting who I was and blindly running with the pack because I had made a connection with other people who were as individual as I was,. Yet somewhere along the way I forget who I was, and I lost that part of myself that defined me, that made me stand out from the crowd, because all of a sudden the crowd was just like me. The crowd was thinking my thought and having my opinions and telling me how I feel and my reasoning and values got skewed and I didn't even know it. And before I was able to find out what mattered, nothing mattered anymore.